Birmingham Travel Forum

Hi!

I am wondering whether it is feasible to transfer between a Ryanair flight and a FlyBe flight at Birmingham international with two hours between landing and departure of the next flight. Bear in mind I will have to collect my luggage from the Ryanair flight, and I am a non-EU passport holder, so that will also take longer. Check-in at FLybe will also take time, given that I have to have my visa checked and passport details entered. Should I just be on the safe side and book the next flight, which is 6 hours later? I have never flown through Birmingham before.

Thanks!

i would book on the later flight - you never know what might happen other than the transit thingy -

flybe did give us the option of booking onto a later flight as long as we did it about 45mins prior to the take off time of the earlier flight (i think free of charge- or 3ogbp max) but as a "no-show" we would have had to pay full price for the later flight as we missed the earlier one ( just something to think about)

I agree that booking the next flight is sensible. BHX is not a large airport but you never know with flight delays, waiting for luggage and then having to check in again for the new flight etc. Easier to give yourself a bit of time.
Bring a good book to read - there is not much to do at Birmingham except a limited number of shops, a pub and a couple of places to eat.

thanks to you both for your advice! i was also going to hedge my bets and book the later flight. it just makes more sense than stressing and thinking that something will go wrong.

I think a lot depends on which airport you are flying from. You might not have a problem at Birmingham, but so many flights are late leaving and then you would get stuck.

Birmingham is not a large airport and the check-in desks for Ryanair and Flybe are within a few minutes walk of each other, however I would say that two hours for what is not a guaranteed connection is pushing it. Usually I can collect my luggage and be out of the airport within half an hour. For check in I would allow a minimum of an hour and a half, so yes it is possible but two hours doesn't allow yourself any slack if your first flight is only slightly late.

The notices at BHX say that they aim to turn the baggage claims around in 30 mins. Last time I was there (Aug 08) the bags took 1 hour to be delivered to the carousels.