Thanks for ruining another holiday Ryanair!

No frills, no thrills, just tills should be Ryanair’s motto if their customer service is anything to go by – or lack of it from what I can tell.

The front page of its website extols the virtues of visiting Catalonia and I did just that recently, flying with family from Bristol to Girona airport. It didn’t get off to the most auspicious start with a confusing mix up at Bristol over extra charges for a pushchair, ending with one customer service rep declaring that Ryanair are always trying to get more money out of people.

Not exactly the best advert for a company. But that was nothing compared to the trip home.

Leaving ourselves a good couple of hours to check in at Girona airport, there was another mix up over the boarding cards at the online check-in that was set to cost us an extra £160. We weren’t the only ones experiencing problems but, unfortunately, we were first in the firing line at the customer service desk, set upon by one of the rudest customer service reps I’ve ever encountered.

Unhappy, unhelpful and unsympathetic within 10 seconds of contact, she blatantly ignored any attempts by us to explain the problem, simply barking “you have to print the boarding cards – 40 euros” like a demented robot. When even that became too trying, she just turned her back and shouted for the next customer to come forward.

Begrudgingly forking out the extra £160 for the luxury of getting the passes printed out on paper resembling old fashioned Izal, we joined the queue for what we thought was another of the paid for privileges, the priority boarding queue, to get the bags checked in. Five minutes later, the person manning the desk disappeared, leaving everyone in the queue a bit baffled. When he eventually returned, we enquired as to whether we were indeed in the right queue. “It’s closed,” came the curt response – did he go to the same customer service training class as the previous woman I wonder?

“There is no priority boarding,” he then clipped when questioned as to why the sign in front of us clearly said ‘priority boarding’, next proving that sarcasm has travelled abroad unscathed, offering: “Well you can queue there if you like but I doubt you will get much joy.”

He was right – there was no chance of getting any joy out of this experience.

The problem was which queue to join next – there was certainly nothing on the screens above the check-in desks to indicate where to go. Despite having different flight and destinations times, passengers where indiscriminately banded together, the atmosphere rapidly turning into one akin to the approach of an F5 tornado as more tales of bad customer service rippled down the queues.

It was such a relief to finally clear check-in and get nearer to the plane home that no one could be bothered to complain about then being unceremoniously herded up some concrete steps to pass through security and wait behind some more tape with only minutes to spare before the gate opened.

Not much chance of squeezing in some quick duty free shopping then. Still, you have to count your blessings - one unlucky couple didn’t make it onto the plane at all, as the pilot finally announced over the tannoy after we waited on the tarmac for an age so their bags could be taken off the flight.

Do I expect any come back from Ryanair? I won’t be holding my breath. The New York Times recently interviewed Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary and catalogued more instances of its appalling customer service but the basic message is if you don’t like it, tough. Why care when you get a low fare (maybe an alternative motto for the airline)?

In contrast, rival easyJet - which has also had its fair share of customer complaints - has launched a new online community that gives customers the opportunity to put their complaints to employees – you can read more from head of customer experience Paul Hopkins here. Whether it will really improve customer satisfaction remains to be seen but at least it seems as if they care.