Irish cheap flight airline Ryanair has announced that from 5th May, the costs of checking in baggage will increase, and also the cost of checking-in at the airport will increase too.

The cost of checking-in hold luggage will increase to £8 and airport check-in will increase to £4 per person.

Running check-in desks or allowing passengers to take luggage in the hold of the plane increases the overall cost of each flight - especially when the profit margins of passengers are very small.

Ryanair's price increases are in part to encourage passengers to check-in online via the internet before getting to the airport and to just travel with land-luggage. The relatively generous 10kg hand luggage allowance is meant to allow passengers to carry more than the bare essentials.

A Ryanair spokesman said "Forty per cent of Ryanair passengers currently avoid queues at both check-in and boarding by availing of our free web check-in service, and this increase in baggage fees will result in fewer checked in bags and more passengers changing to online check-in. "

"Online check-in is faster, more efficient and costs Ryanair less....” “There is no doubt that it is the future for air travel. ".

The spokesman continued to say that the costs of check-in at the airport and checking-in luggage will continue to increase until the airline has over 50% of people using the online check-in facility.

Airline Booking and Information