Ryanair has apologised to customers for seeking their feedback on flights they had not taken.
The airline sent emails from late Thursday asking people to review their trips for research purposes.
“Thank you for flying Ryanair and we hope you had a nice trip,” it said, promising that the feedback would be “totally anonymous” and would “take no more than two minutes of your time”.
The only problem was that many recipients of the email survey, intended to help Ryanair “improve the experience for our customers”, had not recently flown with the airline.
“Ryanair just sent me an email asking for feedback on a flight I took three years ago,” was typical of the confused responses on social media.
“It is profoundly worrying when Ryanair sends a post-trip feedback survey the week before one travels,” one Twitter user wrote, while another said his last Ryanair flight, five years ago, “was hardly memorable even then”.
Others suspected the email, which came from the addresses marketing@ryanairemail.ie and marketing@ryanairemail.co.uk, might be fraudulent.
However, the airline has confirmed that it was responsible for sending the emails.
“This was a post flight survey email we did send. It went in error to some customers who flew previously and we apologise for any inconvenience caused,” it said. A spokesman was unable to say how many people on its email database were contacted by mistake.
“Sorry - we sent you the wrong email,” the airline wrote in a follow-up message.
“Although we really want to get your feedback, we understand we got our timing wrong! The email we sent asking for feedback was intended for Ryanair customers who recently took a trip. We’re sorry if we bothered you.”
It finished by telling former customers that it hoped to see them on board soon.
