Aussie influencer's 'entitled' airport act sparks fierce debate: 'Selfish'

Aussie influencer Ruby Tuesday Matthews has divided fans after complaining about an airline’s strict rules. The Byron Bay-based model was unable to board her flight to Sydney on Friday morning after missing the bag drop cut-off by just two minutes.

The family were already checked in for the flight and just needed to drop their bags off. In a series of Instagram stories, the mother-of-three complained about the airline not being able to bend the rules for her, since she was travelling alone with her two young children.

“Okay, two minutes late for bag drop and they would not let us drop our bags. So literally, our flight hasn’t even boarded or left, but we are not getting on it even though we are checked in,” she told her followers.

“Like surely, you would just let someone with two children travelling by themselves check in three minutes late, but whatever. Especially when the airport is the size of an airport for ants.”

She added that the bags weren’t on the plane yet, and then filmed herself listening to an airport worker calling her name over the loudspeaker and asking her to come to the gate.

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However, Ruby’s story had a happy ending, as the airline managed to move her onto the next flight completely free of charge.

“The air hostess was really understanding and lovely, and now we’re definitely not gonna miss this because we’re sitting here, waiting,” she said in another video. “I feel like an idiot, but I really wasn’t late, it was [my son] Rocket that made me late, I swear to God.”

After her airport debacle was shared on Influencer Updates AU’s Instagram account, the public figure was slammed for her “selfish” behaviour.

“Travelling alone with kids does not entitle you to extra time to check-in. Flights have a schedule for a reason, and there is a bag cut-off time for a reason too,” one person commented.

“As someone who has worked as both airline ground crew and cabin crew…this infuriates me. Even if you boarded the aircraft, your bags would not make it. Then we’d have another story complaining that your bags didn’t arrive and how crap the airline apparently is…it’s on you to get there on time — kids or not,” another wrote passionately.

“No. You can’t hold flights. Fuel is expensive, crew run out of hours which means replacement (that can cause bigger delays), the arriving airport charges for bays and if they’re late can chase other flights/airlines to be late,” a third chimed in.

“Not hard to get there on time. It’s your own fault. Everyone knows with kids things take extra time so she should’ve been more prepared. Seems like a her problem tbh,” another remarked.

On the other hand, the influencer also gained sympathy from some understanding fans.

“Wow, what a sad world we live in. No one has any remorse. It was two to three minutes. It’s happened to me plenty of times just like I have been on time plenty of times. How many times have airlines made us late for stupid reasons? Reality is kids can make you late even if you have allowed extra time…just because people choose to have kids, it doesn’t mean that they don’t deserve any compassion ever,” one person hit back.

“I think this is the first time I’ve seen people rally around an airline. You all obviously just hate influencers,” another said.

“It should be up to their discretion, if it was me I’d say yes and let them through because kids can get difficult and hold things up,” a third chimed in.

“I [have] arrived one minute late to bag drop and they pushed it through. My flight ended up leaving 45 minutes late,” another remarked.

Ruby’s oyster dinner holds up Jetstar flight

This isn’t the first time Ruby has had a controversial airport mishap. In 2020, the model held up a flight from Ballina airport to Sydney after her original flight was delayed. The airline asked passengers to stay at the airport while waiting on the engineer, but she left the airport to have an oyster dinner with a friend.

Because the 29-year-old wasn’t in the terminal, she didn’t realise the plane was ready to take off ahead of the expected delay and held the plane up for an additional 30 minutes.

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Multiple people used her latest airport debacle to take another jab at Ruby’s airport history.

“Is she sure she wasn’t just held up indulging in some oysters?!” a follower quipped.

“Wasn’t she the one who held up an entire flight because she wanted to finish her oysters? Seems to thrive on privilege,” another added.

“She probably has some extra time now to go get some oysters!!! Also, if the airport is the size of one for ants, I’m guessing traffic to the airport isn’t that hectic too. Just arrive organised and early. It’s not that hard,” a third pointed out.

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