{"id":83895,"date":"2025-09-25T01:46:22","date_gmt":"2025-09-25T01:46:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/83895\/"},"modified":"2025-09-25T01:46:22","modified_gmt":"2025-09-25T01:46:22","slug":"ryanair-wont-give-woman-her-money-back-after-sudden-death-in-family","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/83895\/","title":{"rendered":"Ryanair won’t give woman her money back after sudden death in family"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mary has been battling for a refund for nine months as her family comes to terms with their grief<\/p>\n

Neil Shaw<\/strong> Assistant Editor (Money and Lifestyle)<\/p>\n

08:12, 24 Sep 2025Updated 08:40, 24 Sep 2025<\/p>\n

\"MaryMary and her husband Colin (Jam Press)<\/p>\n

A Ryanair passenger says she has been waiting nine months for a refund after she missed her flight due to family bereavement. Mary McHale was due to fly from Dublin to Brussels for a girls weekend away in December last year.<\/p>\n

Sadly, one day before she was due to fly, her brother-in-law Alan McHale, died suddenly, aged 61. The 54-year-old claims she reached out to Ryanair immediately to request a cancellation. She says she was told via online chat that she needed to provide a death certificate before the flight took off.<\/p>\n

Mary claims she couldn\u2019t get her hands on a death certificate that soon and was also busy supporting her husband, Colin, 55, in his grief. She claims Ryanair have refused her \u20ac435 refund. \u201cI\u2019m absolutely fuming,\u201d said Mary, from Dublin. \u201cThere\u2019s no empathy. It didn\u2019t matter how sad my case was, they weren\u2019t interested.<\/p>\n

\"MaryMary and her husband Colin (Jam Press)<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ll never fly with Ryanair again. Alan passed away suddenly three days before I was due to fly. The funeral service would be on the morning of the holiday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was no way I was leaving my husband. A death certificate is a very official document and we couldn\u2019t get it in time. Even if we could, there was no way I was going to ask the family for it while they were grieving so I could get a refund.<\/p>\n

\u201cI tried to appeal to Ryanair and said it wasn\u2019t physically possible to get the certificate. We didn\u2019t get it until January.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mary says battling Ryanair while grieving only added to her heartbreak and made an already difficult time even more stressful. She said: \u201cAlan had Motor Neurone Disease and ended up getting an infection and pneumonia so it was quite sudden in the end.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were trying to organise the service. I couldn\u2019t ask my sister-in-law for it while she was grieving her husband. I was grieving too. This was the last thing we needed.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was so stressful and I\u2019m so frustrated by it. I didn\u2019t even mention it to the family because I didn\u2019t want to make them feel any worse. I kept chasing Ryanair up but they stopped talking to me and closed the case. There needs to be a management review. There need to be some discretion.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"ColinColin and his brother Alan (Jam Press)<\/p>\n

In a online chat message, a Ryanair worker told her: \u201cI wish to inform you that Ryanair tickets are non- refundable. This is clearly stated in our Terms and Conditions, agreed to at the time of purchase. Changes to flight dates, routes, times and customer names can be made online or by contacting our Customer Services Department prior to the initial date of travel.<\/p>\n

\u201cChange fees and possible fare difference will apply. I sympathise with your circumstances but I am not in a position to process your refund request and recommend that you contact your travel insurer with regard to this matter.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a follow-up message she was told: \u201cWhilst I have noted your continued dissatisfaction, I regret that the position remains unaltered.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs per our previous correspondence, as the Terms and Conditions state clearly. You must make your claim before the date of the flight and provide a copy of the death certificate”, therefore I cannot accede to your refund request.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ryanair has been approached for comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mary has been battling for a refund for nine months as her family comes to terms with their…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":83896,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[79,18,19,17,623],"class_list":{"0":"post-83895","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-eire","10":"tag-ie","11":"tag-ireland","12":"tag-ryanair"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83895","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=83895"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83895\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/83896"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83895"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83895"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83895"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}