Aer Lingus shifting to become a UK airline?

[Podolski]

I was booking a flight online for a neighbour yesterday and went to www.aerlingus.com but was surprised to see that the website had a default setting for users in the UK using Sterling.

Even if you put in aerlingus.ie you get redirected to the .com site. If you are an Irish customer you have to use the drop-down menus to change the settings from United Kingdom to Ireland.

With the dropping of the Shanon-Heathrow slots and other changes following the privatisation of Aer Lingus, it seems to me that the airline is following Ryanair in becoming a British based carrier sporting a shamrock logo just as Ryanair has its harp but is UK based and all onboard purchases are in sterling. What next, Aer Lingus moving its headquarters to London?

[locke]

The price will be quoted in the currency in the airport where the journey commences. It's a bit of a pain if you're booking an expensable flight that starts in the UK. Some other airlines allow you to select your currency.

As for the default country...

If I use Firefox at work I get the UK. If I use IE at work I get Germany (I do in fairness work for a company where this could make sense). If I use Firefox at home (Eircom.net) I get the USA. If I use IE at home I get Ireland.

Make of that what you will.

[Sligoboy]

I was booking a flight online for a neighbour yesterday and went to www.aerlingus.com but was surprised to see that the website had a default setting for users in the UK using Sterling.

Even if you put in aerlingus.ie you get redirected to the .com site. If you are an Irish customer you have to use the drop-down menus to change the settings from United Kingdom to Ireland.

With the dropping of the Shanon-Heathrow slots and other changes following the privatisation of Aer Lingus, it seems to me that the airline is following Ryanair in becoming a British based carrier sporting a shamrock logo just as Ryanair has its harp but is UK based and all onboard purchases are in sterling. What next, Aer Lingus moving its headquarters to London?

It’s cheaper for Large(ish) outfits like Aer Lingus to operate from the UK. Dublin will become a transport hub with most flights originating from London. Also I wouldn’t be surprised if UK citizens made up the largest percentage of Aer Lingus's customer base.

Its also convenient in that it takes pressure of a beleaguered Dublin Airport as this move would probably reduce slot numbers and there fore passenger numbers. Now who what that benefit politically

[farnaby]

I was booking a flight online for a neighbour yesterday and went to www.aerlingus.com but was surprised to see that the website had a default setting for users in the UK using Sterling.

Even if you put in aerlingus.ie you get redirected to the .com site. If you are an Irish customer you have to use the drop-down menus to change the settings from United Kingdom to Ireland.

With the dropping of the Shanon-Heathrow slots and other changes following the privatisation of Aer Lingus, it seems to me that the airline is following Ryanair in becoming a British based carrier sporting a shamrock logo just as Ryanair has its harp but is UK based and all onboard purchases are in sterling. What next, Aer Lingus moving its headquarters to London?

There's too many leaps of logic here for me.

If the flight originates in the UK, sterling is the currency selected, same as for Ryanair. It's Euro if it originates here in Ireland, US$ if USA. That's just catering to the customer, not an indication of where its loyalties lie.

Secondly what makes anyone think Aer Lingus would save on cost or gain in revenue by moving a hub and HQ to a massively congested Heathrow in a city with higher property, rent and salary costs than Dublin? And if it's not Heathrow, would it be worth it?

[MookieBaylock]

i have the same thing where it looks me on to the UK site - noticed that before..

[qtman]

I was booking a flight online for a neighbour yesterday and went to www.aerlingus.com but was surprised to see that the website had a default setting for users in the UK using Sterling.

Even if you put in aerlingus.ie you get redirected to the .com site. If you are an Irish customer you have to use the drop-down menus to change the settings from United Kingdom to Ireland.

With the dropping of the Shanon-Heathrow slots and other changes following the privatisation of Aer Lingus, it seems to me that the airline is following Ryanair in becoming a British based carrier sporting a shamrock logo just as Ryanair has its harp but is UK based and all onboard purchases are in sterling. What next, Aer Lingus moving its headquarters to London?

I get US settings.

Its hardly some sort of conspiracy. They're justing detecting your ip address and trying to predict where you're from. Lots of foreigners use Aer Lingus, particularly Yanks, so why should the site default to Irish settings?

This is common on airline websites. Try KLM, NWA, BA etc

[seabhcan]

I think its just a dodgy website. Everytime I log on, it assumes I'm in the states. very annoying.

[The Trinity Politick]

I just tried it. US settings. How silly

[Aindriu]

I just tried it. US settings. How silly

Could it be that most of their customers are septics?

[drbob1972]

I think its just a dodgy website. Everytime I log on, it assumes I'm in the states. very annoying.

i have a suspicion that they are trying to use CIDR (classless internet domain routing) blocks of IP addresses to establish where your connecting from and thus set the country and currency. I've tested this and can confirm same works when i use a US based IP address and a UK based IP address i get USD and UKP as currency

the problem for people in Ireland using it is that they are often using IP address ranges that are not associated with Irish ISP's (they just think they are) and thus end up with this oddity - of course this is based on the assumption that they are using CIDR blocks as a identification method