Is Ryanair doing anything illegal by purposely allocating separate seats?
<p>Recently I was checking in with Ryanair, and shockingly encountered the following situation:</p>

<ul>
<li>Each row contains seats ABC JKL</li>
<li>My wife was allocated 3C and I was allocated 30K. </li>
<li>After closer inspection it turned out that 3A, 3B, 30J and 30L were completely free (and for a fee I would be allowed to book them)</li>
<li>Even after takeoff we both had an empty seat next to us</li>
<li>Both of us ended up sitting next to someone who encountered the same, and thus did not get to sit with their travel companion. (our neighbors were not companions of each other)</li>
</ul>

<p>There is no doubt in my mind that this practice is wrong (and others <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/ryanair-flights-seat-allocation-reserve-twitter-attack-social-media-kenny-jacobs-a7809286.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">seem to agree</a>), but I wonder if it is anyhow illegal/against guidelines or whether they can receive penalties for this.</p>

<p>There may be many grounds for this, but the first one that came to mind for me is that they seem to create inconvenience, with (<em>in at least some instances</em>) the main purpose of letting people pay for removal of the inconvenience (rather than creating value for others, or optimizing their operation in any other way).</p>

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<p>I booked this flight from The Netherlands to Morocco, but would also be interested if this practice is illegal elsewhere, or if there has been precedent for punishment in similar situations.</p>

<p>I can't see any law that would make this illegal.  If you don't like it, you can either pay the upgrade, or not fly Ryanair.</p>

consumer-protection