{"id":395786,"date":"2026-04-13T06:04:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-13T06:04:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/395786\/"},"modified":"2026-04-13T06:04:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T06:04:08","slug":"ryanair-and-rathwood-are-the-most-complained-about-companies-in-ireland-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/395786\/","title":{"rendered":"Ryanair and Rathwood are the most complained about companies in Ireland \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ryanair<\/a> was the most complained about company in Ireland last year and Rathwood<\/a>, the home and garden retailer, attracted almost as many contacts to Ireland\u2019s consumer watchdog, a report said on Monday.<\/p>\n

Currys<\/a>, Sky<\/a> and Eir<\/a> made up the rest of the top five most complained about companies to the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission\u2019s<\/a> (CCPC) helpline.<\/p>\n

Faulty goods and services topped the list of concerns for consumers for the fifth consecutive year, though there was a significant jump in complaints connected to online ordering.<\/p>\n

Having finished in third place last year \u2013 behind Ticketmaster and Eir \u2013 and in second place in 2024, Ryanair was the number one company that prompted consumers to contact the CCPC in 2025.<\/p>\n

A total of 593 people got in touch with the watchdog to highlight their concerns about the airline. This was an increase of 39 when compared with the previous year, although the number does represent a fraction of the consumers who would have used Ryanair\u2019s services in and out of Ireland.<\/p>\n

Rathwood by contrast is a much smaller operator. It has been in business from premises on the Wicklow-Carlow border for just over 30 years and attracted 565 complaints, up from just 14 in 2024.<\/p>\n

Last year it emerged that customers who bought products, including garden furniture and firewood, through Rathwood\u2019s website were left waiting months for orders to be delivered, with many rescheduled on multiple occasions.<\/p>\n

It blamed delivery issues on the closure of a key supplier and said it was restructuring its supply chain. However, the problems continued throughout last winter with many affected customers contacting the CCPC to highlight delays and difficulties in making contact with the company.<\/p>\n

Last week the CCPC said Rathwood had signed legally binding commitments<\/a> and agreed to issue refunds to consumers who bought products on its website before cancelling the orders over delivery delays.<\/p>\n

The CCPC\u2019s annual helpline report said Currys attracted 445 complaints while Sky was the subject of 431, just one ahead of Eir. Harvey Norman, Aer Lingus, Lidl, Virgin Media and Vodafone were the other companies that featured in the top 10.<\/p>\n

Just under 43,000 consumers contacted the CCPC helplines last year, having spent an average of \u20ac6,292 on products or services they subsequently had issues with.<\/p>\n

The biggest call driver was from motorists, with 5,827 contacts connected to cars. Just under 3,000 consumers were concerned about home building or improvements, with an average spend of \u20ac14,597 recorded in that space. <\/p>\n

\u201cHome improvements can be costly for consumers, especially if things go wrong,\u201d CCPC director of communications Gr\u00e1inne Griffin said. \u201cEvery year, issues with home building and improvements are one of the biggest call drivers to our helpline.\u201d <\/p>\n

Griffin said that in situations where traders were not following the law \u201cthe CCPC can take enforcement action\u201d.<\/p>\n

The report highlighted a significant increase in the number of consumers contacting the CCPC about online purchases, up by 14 per cent since 2024 with total of 10,297 consumers referred to the Small Claims Court for redress.<\/p>\n

Griffin noted that about a fifth of all contacts related to faulty goods and services. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s important that consumers know their rights if they buy something that turns out to be faulty. Regardless of whether you had a warranty or a guarantee, it\u2019s up to the seller to resolve your issue, you shouldn\u2019t have to go back to the manufacturer,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ryanair was the most complained about company in Ireland last year and Rathwood, the home and garden retailer,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":395787,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[11756,98349,602,61,60,43,173552,1899,15640],"class_list":{"0":"post-395786","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ireland","8":"tag-competition-and-consumer-protection-commission-ccpc","9":"tag-currys","10":"tag-eir","11":"tag-ie","12":"tag-ireland","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-rathwood-home-and-garden-world","15":"tag-ryanair","16":"tag-sky"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395786","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=395786"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395786\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/395787"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=395786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=395786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=395786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}