Why Ryanair ditched paper for digital boarding passes

The airline says it will lead to lower ticket prices, but not all travellers are comfortable using apps

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“We’re not so good on smartphones,” said Beryl. I met the lady from East Anglia and her husband, Mick, yesterday morning at Stansted airport. I was assessing the effects of Ryanair’s latest cunning plan: scrapping paper boarding passes. It is fair to say that Beryl and Mick were not the youngest passengers I talked to, but they were certainly the most interesting.

After 16 years of dutifully checking in online and printing out boarding passes so Ryanair didn't have to, things have changed. As from dawn on 12 November, print-at-home boarding passes are no longer acceptable.

There are now two ways of getting on board a flight belonging to Europe's biggest budget airline: show a digital boarding pass on the Ryanair app, or ask the carrier's customer services team at the airport to print one out for you. As long as you have checked in online, the latter option is free - and it works. I asked for one for my flight from Stansted to Baden-Baden in Germany, and it was printed out without fuss.