Ryanair has to pay out a customer £123 for charging extra for hand luggage on five flights between 2019 and 2024. A Spanish court ruled that the low-cost airline could not charge customers additional fees for hand luggage, as carrying a bag onto a flight was considered essential to air travel.

It is the latest legal dispute between cheap carriers and Spanish consumer rights group Facua. The group has battled other low-cost airlines over the imposition of charges on what Facua considers to be essential elements of air travel. The judge, Raquel Martínez Marco, based her decision on a EU Court of Justice ruling from 2014.

The ruling stated that “[hand luggage] must, in principle, be considered an indispensable element of passenger transport and that its carriage cannot, therefore, be subject to a price supplement.”

Facua has brought similar cases against Ryanair before, as well as rival cheap airline Vueling.

Earlier this year, the group ran a campaign warning customers that Ryanair may owe them compensation. Facua’s leader was pictured next to an image of Michael O’Learly, the man behind Ryanair, under the caption “this billionaire owes you money”.

In May 2023, Ryanair, along with easyJet, Vueling, and Volotea were hit with a £126m fine imposed by Spain’s Secretary General for Consumer Affairs.

As well as charging extra for hand luggage, the fines were also for the reservation of an adjacent seat for accompanying minors or dependants and vagueness in the pre-contractual information on the price of the airlines’ services.

On top of that, the airlines were fined for their refusal to take payment in cash for these extra charges and the £17 fee charged for printing boarding cards at check-in.