Student changes name by deed poll to avoid £220 Ryanair admin fee

A student has changed his name by deed poll because it was cheaper than paying a “ridiculous” Ryanair charge for a booking error.

Adam Armstrong, 19, was presented with a £220 administration fee after his girlfriend’s stepfather mistakenly reserved a seat to Ibiza for him with the budget airline under the surname of West.

Armstrong, who is studying for a foundation degree in digital marketing at Leeds City College, changed his name to West for free and drove to Liverpool to rush through a new passport for £103.

Several airlines charge more than £100 to make minor changes to bookings as highlighted by the Guardian in the past.

Armstrong said: “Her stepdad got my name from Facebook but I had put it as Adam West as a joke, because he was the actor who played Batman on TV.

“Ryanair were not helpful at all. We showed them we were not trying to change the person, just the name, but they wouldn’t back down.

“Ryanair pride themselves on being a customer-centric business, it just seems like a joke when they wouldn’t change the name. I just thought it was completely ridiculous. All they needed to do was hit the backspace key on a keyboard and they want to charge me £220?”

Armstrong, from Manchester, and his girlfriend, India Lomas, 17, are flying to Ibiza on 11 June with friends and family for a week-long stay. The administration fee was £110 for each leg of the journey.

Ryanair is known for tempting customers with cheap fares but demanding fees for anything from printing boarding passes at the airport to checking in additional bags. The airline’s boss, Michael O’Leary, once mooted charging passengers to use the toilet mid-flight but the plans never came to fruition.

Armstrong urged other travellers faced with a similar dilemma to “think outside the box” and “find a way around the system”.

Most airlines impose a charge if a passenger name needs to be changed.

According to Bob Atkinson at Travelsupermarket.com, the typical fee is £25-£40.

Norwegian Air and Thomson Airways charge £25 plus the difference in the original fare and its current price. Monarch charges £100 for a name change, or £120 if this is done at the airport. Ryanair charges the most at £110, or £160 at the airport.

“If you are booking for anyone who’s not your immediate family then before you make the booking, ask for their name as it appears in the passport,” Atkinson said.

“Most airlines will make a name change free of charge if you do this on the day of purchase, as mistakes happen, but not if you leave it two or three days.”

If your plans change, the cost of changing a flight or flight date can vary from £15 per person, per flight with Thomson, up to £60 for a longer flight with Ryanair in high season.

If you need to cancel your flight and want a refund, the charge for this varies from £15-£40.

“However, if the fare is non-refundable, the only refund you can get back is the airline passenger duty,” Atkinson said.

A statement from Ryanair said: “Customers are asked to ensure that the details they enter at the time of booking are correct before completing their booking and we offer a 24-hour grace period to correct minor booking errors.

“A name change fee is charged in order to discourage and prevent unauthorised online travel agents from ‘screenscraping’ Ryanair’s cheapest fares and reselling them on to unwitting consumers at hugely inflated costs.”