Is Wizz Air’s ‘all you can fly’ subscription too good to be true?

The deal has excited some and angered others

“All you can fly” – unlimited flights for an annual subscription fee. What’s not to like? A fair amount, for some passengers, it turns out.

Wizz Air’s new scheme under that title has divided opinion. Some have praised the €499 (£426) scheme’s “insanely great” value on trips as far as the Maldives, and the budget airline says it has been “overwhelmed” by the positive response.

But others hit out at the airline’s service and recalled their own experience of delays, while questioning the scheme’s terms and conditions.

Wizz says its new membership, effective from September, will allow frequent flyers to “save money, visit friends and family more regularly and spontaneously visit off-the-beaten-track destinations”.

It says it sold out in most markets within 24 hours, but some customers have been pointing out what they describe as a “catch”. Those who sign up can only book flights up to three days before departure and must pay a fee of about €10 per flight.

Flights do not include “trolley bags” to stow in overhead compartments or checked baggage. And crucially, the scheme is limited to just 10,000 people. It’s also dependent on whether there are any seats left.

Wizz, which flies to 53 countries, carried 62 million passengers in the year to the end of March.
Its scheme is similar to those being offered by Frontier Airlines in the US and Malaysia-based AirAsia.

Is it a good deal?

Rory Boland, editor of Which? Travel, advises passengers to look behind the enticing headline price to work out if this really is a good deal for them.

Once booking fees, seat selection and luggage costs are added on, travellers will see costs climb, he says – particularly as multiple short-notice journeys will be required to break even on the original cost of the subscription.

“It is also ironic to see an airline which claims to be Europe’s ‘greenest’ encouraging consumers to take unlimited flights,” he adds.

The Hungarian airline has faced a number of hurdles in the last year, which it might be hoping to overcome with the new scheme.

In June, the airline was named the worst for UK flight delays for the third year in a row, based on analysis of official data by the PA news agency.

And in January, it had to pay an extra £1.2m to customers in compensation, after the industry regulator intervened over the way it had handled flight disruption.

Wizz Air points out that it has been working on improvements, such as investing an extra £90m in its operations and customer service last year. And it says 1.8% of its UK flights were delayed for more than three hours in the first half of this year – a 50% reduction on last year.