Irish budget airline Ryanair is considering increasing a bonus it pays staff for identifying passengers with oversized bags. According to the airline boss, Michael O’Leary, the larger bonus hopes to deter those who break the rules and cause delays.
Staff currently receive €1.50 (£1.30) if they thwart customers who try to bring bags that are too large on a Ryanair plane. “We are determined to eliminate the scourge of oversized bags which delay boarding and are clearly unfair on the over 99% of our passengers who comply with our baggage rules,” Ryanair said in a statement. Meanwhile, Mr O’Leary told RTE’s Morning Ireland: “We’re thinking of increasing it [the bonus],” to stop people from bringing oversized bags”.
The budget airline added that oversized baggage fees are only paid by a small minority of passengers.
“Our message to those 0.1% of passengers is simple; please comply with our generous bag rules or you will be charged at check-in or at the gate,” the airline said.
Mr O’Leary said his airline was already struggling with the amount of baggage taken on planes: “That’s one of the reasons we are so aggressive about eliminating the scourge of passengers with excess baggage,” he added.
The CEO said over 99.9% of passengers follow the baggage rules correctly and referred to “sizers” found within the airport that allow bags to be measured.
“We are happy to incentivise our (staff) with a share of those excess baggage fees, which we think will decline over the coming year or two,” he said.
Ryanair currently allows a small carry-on bag – a maximum of 40cm x 20cm x 25cm and a weight of 20 litres – with every ticket. However, passengers risk being charged up to £75 for bringing a bag larger than the size they paid for when booking their flight. The fee depends on the route and travel date. Customers can also pay to take extra luggage on the plane and agree to specific size terms and conditions when they book.
However, these bag sizes are set to increase as a result of minimum standards being introduced by the EU. At the end of October 2025, the start of the winter aviation season, the new dimensions of the baggage will be 40 x 30 x 15cm, allowing a volume of only 18 litres. This comes in response to an attempt by the European Commission to persuade airlines across Europe to standardise.
Yet, Ryanair told The Express: “Ryanair’s current free ‘personal bag’ size is 40x25x20cm. Following the new EU minimum bag size of 40x30x15cm, Ryanair will increase its max ‘personal bag’ dimensions to 40x30x20cm, so that Ryanair’s ‘personal bag’ allowance is bigger than the EU standard. This change will be implemented over the coming weeks, as our airport bag sizers are adjusted.”