Will profits fall devastatingly if customers are treated like customers and not as cash cows or if staff are treated valuable members of a team who take pride in their work and do the best for the company and not as cost centres?
Not devastatingly, I'd imagine, but yes probably. MOL's whole philosophy is to cut, cut, cut costs and to keep them down. Every little bit of money spent on a "frill" is another bit eaten away from their profit - and that includes such things as salaries, comforts, nice customer service etc. His attitude is that if Ryanair adds one "frill", then why not add another and so on so forth - which all adds up in the end.
Well, Southwest Airlines, being it a REAL Low Cost "majestic" Airline, unfortunately has to deal with pilot's union called SWAPA (
www.swapa.org), and Southwest is still doing extremely good business anyways, "despite" the SWAPA... so explain to me, now, how REPA could ever damage RYANAIR then?
A whole different kettle of fish, really. Different continents, different approaches, different people, different regulation and most importantly now - a different history. It's like comparing an orange and a grapefruit and saying that they are the same because they are both citrus fruit. Ryanair and Southwest's business models share some similarities in that they are both "low-cost" carriers, but from there they've diverged greatly.