Discount airline CEO calls customer "stupid" for not printing ticket

Keeping in mind that Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary is known for making noise (including when he talked about including blowjobs on their planned long-haul flights) but he's also been on the leading edge with many airline trends such as add-on fees. When you fly Ryanair, if you fail to print out your ticket at home, they slap on extra charges which are not insignificant.
The day when the big airlines do the same may be coming, so the story is very relevant to those who travel a lot. I completely stopped printing my own tickets after it took me days to make a simple change. Because I had already printed my ticket at home (rather than via a kiosk at the airport) it was a long, painful process to make what should have been an easy change to my ticket. Once that ticket is printed at home, it presents problems for the airline (and security) since in theory, it should get you through the initial entry at the airport.

Most of the airline industry still hasn't figured out how to make money so the day of charging to print tickets at the airport may not be too far off. As long as the political class lets them get away with it, the industry will continue nickle-and-diming customers, because they can.

The Ryanair chief executive recently admonished passengers, who fail to print boarding passes before arriving at the airport.

The issue came to a head after a mother of two — Suzy McLeod — paid about $380 at the airport in August so her family could get the paperwork to fly home to Britain from Spain. Upset about the fee, she vented on Facebook and received hundreds of thousands of "likes," according to an NBCNEWS.com report.

O'Leary responded. "We think Mrs. McLeod should pay 60 euros for being so stupid," he told The Telegraph. (McLeod was charged 60 euros each for five boarding passes, or about 300 euros total.)