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Higher checked bag fees!

suzyed

By suzyed,
in Cruise Air

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sverigecruiser

sverigecruiser

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Of course! Why not!

 

For me vacation is never about paying as little as possible. It's always about getting the best vacation, for the money I want to pay.

 

If I only wanted the cheapest my vacation should be spent at home. (That is nice too but not always what I want!)

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FlyerTalker Excellent Advice! Rare

FlyerTalker

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If you demand the lowest level of fare, then expect the lowest level of service and included amenities and don't whine about it.

 

And another winner. The public wanted the lowest possible fare, and they are reaping the results of their wishes.

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Zach1213

Zach1213

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Of course! Why not!

I think everyone likes paying less. But you need to be aware that airlines are for-profit companies, and they need to make money. Operating an airlines is not cheap, and doing it in a safe manner (of which almost all airlines the world over do almost perfectly) is even more expensive. At the same time, customers are demanding the absolute lowest fare...time and time again, it has been proven that people will go out of their way to save $5 on a $400 ticket, so fare wise it's a race to the bottom, all while expenses go up for the airlines. This need to be made up in several ways, and here's how many airlines are doing it:

 

Extra fees, seemingly for everything. Pros and cons - one is that it's sometimes easy, if you don't look carefully, to miss some fees and suddenly the trip is more expensive than it may have been to pay a bit extra for the ticket to begin with.

 

 

Comfort, largely, is going down. Seat pitch and width have both been decreasing, because they need to put more people on the plane just to break even. So, the same customers who wanted to save the $5 are now (often) the same ones complaining about how comfort levels are going down. Two examples of this: 1) The increasing trend of putting one more seat across on many 777s...for example, airlines going from 3-3-3 in economy to 3-4-3, but of course the aircraft is the same width, and 2) American's "More Room Throughout Coach" program several years back that increased seat pitch (aka legroom) in economy across the board for a slight price increase. It was a disaster, because people weren't willing to pay the small increase in price for the increase in comfort.

 

 

So yes, of course, everyone wants to save money...but often, the same people who are the most "frugal" about air travel are also the loudest complainers about how the airline industry is changing.

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Globaliser

Globaliser

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So yes, of course, everyone wants to save money...but often, the same people who are the most "frugal" about air travel are also the loudest complainers about how the airline industry is changing.
I think that there is one other big factor at work in the complaining.

 

For many passengers, air travel is a rarity. I'm still startled to see occasional posts here from people who are plainly well into adulthood but who have never before flown in their entire lives, or who have only flown a handful of times, or for whom a forthcoming trip is their first air travel in 5 or 10 years. So for these people, their trip will be a very special occasion.

 

But that immediately sets up a real tension with the way that airlines will treat them, which is the complete opposite of special: the passenger who's paid three or four hundred dollars for their ticket is merely a low commercial value number to be processed along with several hundred thousand other passengers that day, usually in an almost completely de-individualised way.

 

And so whether it's about the booking process, the additional fees for what have become optional extras like checked bags, the boarding process, the paucity of on-board catering or whatever, these passengers have their special experience severely dented by the reality of being in many ways the air travel equivalent of the battery-farmed chicken. Hence the complaints.

 

For every airline, there are some passengers who will be treated as particularly high value cases and offered the best service that the airline can deliver. On BA, for example, there is a known category of passengers who are issued with cards that entitle them to this. The qualifying criteria are said to include having personal control over spending with BA in excess of £5 million per annum.

 

The rest of us just have to go along with the rubbish that air travel sometimes involves.

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iancal

iancal

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Why complain? You have no control over pricing other than the usual consumer choice as to voting with your feet and wallet.

 

Just make a decision and do it. Why whine and moan? Add up the total cost. Go or stay home. Why all the bleating in between?

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suzyed

suzyed

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Why complain? You have no control over pricing other than the usual consumer choice as to voting with your feet and wallet.

 

Just make a decision and do it. Why whine and moan? Add up the total cost. Go or stay home. Why all the bleating in between?

 

Rude much?

 

Wow! Just a discussion of fee and how some have changed after booking and trying to decide how much luggage to take vs. how much we want to pay.

 

If you aren't interested in the discussion just scroll on by and keep YOUR bleating to yourself.

:(

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suzyed

suzyed

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For me vacation is never about paying as little as possible. It's always about getting the best vacation, for the money I want to pay.

 

If I only wanted the cheapest my vacation should be spent at home. (That is nice too but not always what I want!)

Agree!

 

And when the fees sometimes change after booking, it will give one a reason to pause.

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richstowe Great Review Rare

richstowe

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I always travel with one bag or a carry-on because it's too much work to manage more .

If you demand the lowest level of fare, then expect the lowest level of service and included amenities and don't whine about it.
Absolutely true but the majority , and I'm in the majority, will still whine . ;)

 

Thought I'd include Warren Buffet's thoughts on the airline business

The worst sort of business is one that grows rapidly, requires significant capital to engender the growth, and then earns little or no money. Think airlines. Here a durable competitive advantage has proven elusive ever since the days of the Wright Brothers. Indeed, if a farsighted capitalist had been present at Kitty Hawk, he would have done his successors a huge favor by shooting Orville down.

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Globaliser

Globaliser

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Ah, yes, Warren Buffett. Remind me, what's his current stance on investing in airlines?

Hmm - Warren Buffet on the one hand and an anonymous poster on the other .

Whose opinion to respect ? :rolleyes:

Definitely Warren Buffett's.

 

Now remind me, what's his current stance on investing in airlines?

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fbgd

fbgd

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Posted

 

Didn't your investment advisor ever tell you that you only lose money if you sell it when it's down? Reporting a drop in value seems like an odd stance for a news report, especially an institutional investor such as BRK who have hundreds of billions parked all over the place. BRK didn't sell their stakes in the airline businesses.

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Bo1953

Bo1953

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For me vacation is never about paying as little as possible. It's always about getting the best vacation, for the money I want to pay.

 

If I only wanted the cheapest my vacation should be spent at home. (That is nice too but not always what I want!)

 

 

I agree with this... a reason we never complain about baggage fees?

 

 

We fly first class, while we can and never worry about weight and take two (2) bags each, plus a carry on, each.

 

We do not complain, neither does the airline or cruise line.

 

bon voyage

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Globaliser

Globaliser

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Didn't your investment advisor ever tell you that you only lose money if you sell it when it's down? Reporting a drop in value seems like an odd stance for a news report, especially an institutional investor such as BRK who have hundreds of billions parked all over the place. BRK didn't sell their stakes in the airline businesses.
And not only that, a single URL which is over six months old doesn't tell you very much about Buffett's current attitude. The original 2007 Buffett quote tells you nothing about it either.

 

For those who are interested in the current Buffett attitude to airlines, he has just (August 2018) added to his stakes in DL and WN. For that matter, there is renewed speculation about whether he might mount an outright takeover of WN.

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Shorex

Shorex

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Has anyone had experience with a luggage forwarding company? We are cruising Viking Ocean on a Mediterranean cruise. It would be lovely to not have to drag a 50 pound bag through airports and customs!

 

I know some Crystal cruisers have used such a service. There are several providers. The service is very convenient and definitely not inexpensive. You might ask on the Crystal board or do a search on the board for luggage free, luggage forward, etc.

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em-sk

em-sk

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Not if you are going from US/Canada to Europe. Delta is charging $60 for the first bag (unless you have the AmEx card) and $100 for the second bag. :(

 

That fee also only applies if you are flying "Basic Economy" their deepest discounted economy offering. If you are flying regular Economy, Economy Plus or a premium product then the first bag is free.

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richstowe Great Review Rare

richstowe

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That fee also only applies if you are flying "Basic Economy" their deepest discounted economy offering. If you are flying regular Economy, Economy Plus or a premium product then the first bag is free.
I wonder what % of the economy section is "Basic Economy" passengers . I'm thinking reasonably high .
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FlyerTalker Excellent Advice! Rare

FlyerTalker

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On the contrary, it is probably less than 15 percent. It is just another fare bucket, however it has many more restrictions.

 

And an airline has limited incentive to make many seats available at the "rock bottom" fare bucket. The whole basis of fare differentiation.

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