The boss of Ryanair was bombarded on Twitter today after agreeing to host a question-and-answer session from customers.
Michael O'Leary, who recently vowed to stop p***ing people off, posted a picture of himself on the social networking site dressed as a leprechaun before fielding tweets.
He was using the stunt as part of a drive to improve the public image of the airline, which was recently voted worst of 100 biggest brands by Which? readers.
Having fun: Ryanair boss Michael O'Leary poses in a leprechaun hat and beard as he fields questions on Twitter
Some of the questions fired at Mr O'Leary - one of which received a rather tongue-in-cheek response
Andy McGeady joked: 'How much will Michael charge per reply? And are you charging me to send this tweet?'
Erica Lennie asked him whether he would be changing the colour scheme on the website because 'it hurts my head'.
Mr O'Leary replied: 'Hurts mine too. Big redevel underway.'
Another called him as a 'plum' while asking whether he had 'just hired British Gas's former head of publicity'.
PR war: Mr O'Leary offered to field questions after vowing to stop p***ing customers off
Anger: Some Twitter users took the opportunity to vent their frustrations about the company
The comment was a reference to a question-and-answer session held by the energy firm last week when it faced a torrent of abuse three hours after it announced a 9.2 per cent price hike.
It was widely considered to be a public relations disaster.
Mr O'Leary replied: 'Hey, don't call me a plum. Pudding would be more accurate.'
The feed, which started at 4pm, used the hashtag #GrillMOL.
'Sensitive soul': Mr O'Leary says the worst aspect of his job is the criticism
However, users reported having difficulty finding Mr O'Leary's responses initially because he didn't appear to be using the correct hashtag.
Michael Kelly said: 'When do you start your classes in learning how to use Twitter?
The Ryanair boss joked back: 'Just making this up as I go along.'
Speaking about this Q&A session earlier this month, Mr O'Leary said: 'We want to keep improving our industry leading customer service and so I’m looking forward to our customers’ feedback.'
The Irishman told shareholders at Ryanair’s annual meeting last month that the firm should try to 'eliminate things that unnecessarily p*** people off'.
Ten days earlier, he had referred to a passenger who complained at being charged to print out a new boarding pass as ‘stupid’.
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