22 ms·

But many, if not most, of those things are things I would prefer to not pay for, and I would prefer that my seat on a given flight not subsidize the overpacking

But many, if not most, of those things are things I would prefer to not pay for, and I would prefer that my seat on a given flight not subsidize the overpacking drunken Luddite who hits all those items in one swoop. The cost for an airline to serve me vs serving that high needs customer is very different, why should I pay for the extra service without seeing the benefit?

bbcbasic 10y ago
Once they have sold you the ticket though they are free to extort you e.g. on meals. Sure you could BYO for the 14 hr flight but ... yuk!
- mikeash 10y ago
  I've not seen such a long flight where meals are paid. Once you reach that timescale, food becomes non-optional. I have had 14 hour flights where the food was so bad that it wasn't even worth getting it for free, so it can still go wrong that way.
  - ohwello 10y ago
    Norwegian Air does not serve free food on transcontinental flights. Fine by me, I'm comfortable surviving 12 hours without eating hot food, in fact I do it almost every day.
    - jacobush 10y ago
      I guess you are Norwegian. Smörgåslunch?
    - wott 10y ago
      Not getting Norwegian food is a service.
  - arghimonmobile 10y ago
    Melbourne to Singapore recently was 7+h with no included food, only dubious snacks Easyjet-style. And in contradiction to another comment here, the email confirming my booking explicitly stated that no outside food and drink was allowed on-board. It's anyone's guess how,well that's enforced, but on first evaluation, if that's not extortion, I don't know what is.
    - mikeash 10y ago
      Seven hours with no included food would be OK in my view. I'd start to draw the line around 10 hours. Really, as long as they're up-front about it (both the fact that there's no free food, and what they sell and the prices), I'd be OK regardless. However, banning outside food and drink is ridiculous. I'd get right on ignoring that, and if they were somehow able to enforce it, I'd stop traveling with them.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - monksy 10y ago
    The 5 hour flight of Charlotte to Aurba (US Airways) was a pay for lunch deal. Shame for an international flight.
    - jeffwilcox 10y ago
      Many airlines do not consider Central America or Caribbean to be actual international flights from North America. You can usually tell in whether they offer a true business class cabin or just a first class cabin like other domestic flights. :/
- eh78ssxv2f 10y ago
  I do not understand this. Do other means of transport provide free food? I have traveled cross-country in Greyhound. Never got free food. What is that about airline travel that people want cheap, and still want luxury?
  - diogenescynic 10y ago
    Greyhounds usually at least stop for food. Airplanes cannot.
    - hyperbovine 10y ago
      Greyhound takes 8 hours to go from LA to San Francisco. What choice do they have?
      - maneesh 10y ago
        I've been on 13-hour transatlantic flights. They've never once stopped so I could get lunch.
  - SixSigma 10y ago
    The irony is airlines included free food to get people on board.
  - vertex-four 10y ago
    Weirdly, the low-cost long-distance bus service in the UK has an option for food, drink, more reliably available wifi and better seating at not much more in cost if you're clever about it, in the form of Megabus/Citylink Gold. Its higher-cost competitor, National Express, stops at service stations on certain routes and provides vouchers for the cafes/restaurants there. (They also often make stops at large bus stations for upwards of quarter of an hour, allowing people to get food from surrounding shops.) And at times, you can get first class on the trains at less additional cost than the wifi would cost - with comfier seating, free wifi, multiple meals, and free alcohol. I have a suspicion the issue isn't really the lack of service, it's that either you get nickle and dimed or the next step up is an order of magnitude higher in price.
- snrplfth 10y ago
  So instead of bundling into your ticket price the cost of food you may not want or like, they allow people who bring their own to save money, and only charge those who consume that particular good. Apparently this is "extortion", somehow? Nonsense.
  - saiya-jin 10y ago
    liquids are, since you cannot bring anything through security checkin. and if you don't drink a single drop on that 14h flight, well you are an exception
    - snrplfth 10y ago
      Then buy a drink and pack your own food. In any case, it's hardly the airlines' fault that liquids can't come through security. I just do not see what is so bad about unbundling food from ticket price.
      - fornever 10y ago
        If everyone would start bringing their own food that would lead to a huge mess of transporting, storing, unpacking, preparing and disposing of food in all sorts of random ways at various times throughout the flight by the hundreds of hungry sleep deprived passengers. Airports would be even less efficient going through security, vendors trying to sell food to go and people congregating to buy things. There's really enough general unbundling of comfort and efficiency at airports already. I would definitely pay more if even more things was standardized and included for everyone on the flight (like luggage, security, airport seating).
        JoeAltmaier 10y ago
        Or, people could suck it up and not eat for an hour or two. Sure on longer flights a meal is welcome, but even missing a meal should not be a terrible burden.
        10y ago
obstinate 10y ago
Part of me agrees. And I also think flying is really cheap, not expensive like people are saying here. On the other hand, I do want to point out a couple of things. It's crazy to charge for printing a boarding pass. That does not cost money (to a first approximation). Also, substantially all the airlines that charge to check bags will gate check for free. It's just more hassle. So what's really happening is that your seat IS being subsidized -- by the people who check bags at at checkin rather than at the gate.
- peteretep 10y ago
  This is all classic price discrimination
  - snrplfth 10y ago
    Yes, but hardly anybody understands price discrimination. Generally, people think that by requiring services and their prices to be bundled, their overall price will be lower. Which is not true of course.
    - lmm 10y ago
      I think mostly people are offended by the waste of having a very complex sales contract - understanding and negotiating terms is a lot of effort for all parties, and may well add up to a higher cost than what's saved through pricing efficiency.
      - snrplfth 10y ago
        Yes, it might do so. Depends on how expensive the services are and how easy the process is. But what annoys me is the attitude of "I prefer that Service X and Service Y be bundled together, therefore it should be mandatory that they are." Sure, there are arguments for bundling, and for unbundling. I don't see that just because some people prefer one or the other that it should be required.
        10y ago
earcaraxe 10y ago
Sure, but they were giving those to you for free and now they'll be taking them away without decreasing the price. So you're still paying the same for the base fare, it's just nobody gets the "luxuries" anymore.
- WorldMaker 10y ago
  It's also funny how some of those "luxuries" were originally part of the base service to make everyone's experience better and by removing them, now everyone's experience is worse and costs more. Primarily: checked baggage exists as a system to get baggage out of the cramped main cabin and into simpler, dedicated storage with marginal and reasonably efficient load/unload times. By charging fees for any checked baggage (as opposed to excessive checked baggage as used to be the regime), the airlines incentivize a lot more people to try to cram every thing they can carry on into the main cabin. This results in slower loading/unloading times of people because all the carry ons fill the bins quite inefficiently; many peoples bags wind up in bins that aren't easy for them to access for them to unload; some peoples bags won't fit at all because there has never been enough room in the main cabin. The airlines now have to compensate for this by asking for volunteers to gate check bags for every flight, which is a waste of everyone's time involved, and still not as efficient for anyone involved as simply checking bags up front like airlines originally were planned to do and airports were planned to handle.
  - massysett 10y ago
    "Primarily: checked baggage exists as a system to get baggage out of the cramped main cabin and into simpler, dedicated storage with marginal and reasonably efficient load/unload times. By charging fees for any checked baggage (as opposed to excessive checked baggage as used to be the regime), the airlines incentivize a lot more people to try to cram every thing they can carry on into the main cabin." So Frontier, Spirit, and now the "Basic Economy" fares charge even more for cabin bags than for checked bags. Problem solved. One theory I heard about the checked bag fees (back when carry-on bags were no extra charge) was that the fee freed up cargo space so the airline could carry more paid air cargo, purposefully pushing baggage into the main cabin.

bbcbasic 10y ago

Once they have sold you the ticket though they are free to extort you e.g. on meals. Sure you could BYO for the 14 hr flight but ... yuk!

mikeash 10y ago
I've not seen such a long flight where meals are paid. Once you reach that timescale, food becomes non-optional. I have had 14 hour flights where the food was so bad that it wasn't even worth getting it for free, so it can still go wrong that way.
- ohwello 10y ago
  Norwegian Air does not serve free food on transcontinental flights. Fine by me, I'm comfortable surviving 12 hours without eating hot food, in fact I do it almost every day.
  - jacobush 10y ago
    I guess you are Norwegian. Smörgåslunch?
  - wott 10y ago
    Not getting Norwegian food is a service.
- arghimonmobile 10y ago
  Melbourne to Singapore recently was 7+h with no included food, only dubious snacks Easyjet-style. And in contradiction to another comment here, the email confirming my booking explicitly stated that no outside food and drink was allowed on-board. It's anyone's guess how,well that's enforced, but on first evaluation, if that's not extortion, I don't know what is.
  - mikeash 10y ago
    Seven hours with no included food would be OK in my view. I'd start to draw the line around 10 hours. Really, as long as they're up-front about it (both the fact that there's no free food, and what they sell and the prices), I'd be OK regardless. However, banning outside food and drink is ridiculous. I'd get right on ignoring that, and if they were somehow able to enforce it, I'd stop traveling with them.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- monksy 10y ago
  The 5 hour flight of Charlotte to Aurba (US Airways) was a pay for lunch deal. Shame for an international flight.
  - jeffwilcox 10y ago
    Many airlines do not consider Central America or Caribbean to be actual international flights from North America. You can usually tell in whether they offer a true business class cabin or just a first class cabin like other domestic flights. :/
eh78ssxv2f 10y ago
I do not understand this. Do other means of transport provide free food? I have traveled cross-country in Greyhound. Never got free food. What is that about airline travel that people want cheap, and still want luxury?
- diogenescynic 10y ago
  Greyhounds usually at least stop for food. Airplanes cannot.
  - hyperbovine 10y ago
    Greyhound takes 8 hours to go from LA to San Francisco. What choice do they have?
    - maneesh 10y ago
      I've been on 13-hour transatlantic flights. They've never once stopped so I could get lunch.
- SixSigma 10y ago
  The irony is airlines included free food to get people on board.
- vertex-four 10y ago
  Weirdly, the low-cost long-distance bus service in the UK has an option for food, drink, more reliably available wifi and better seating at not much more in cost if you're clever about it, in the form of Megabus/Citylink Gold. Its higher-cost competitor, National Express, stops at service stations on certain routes and provides vouchers for the cafes/restaurants there. (They also often make stops at large bus stations for upwards of quarter of an hour, allowing people to get food from surrounding shops.) And at times, you can get first class on the trains at less additional cost than the wifi would cost - with comfier seating, free wifi, multiple meals, and free alcohol. I have a suspicion the issue isn't really the lack of service, it's that either you get nickle and dimed or the next step up is an order of magnitude higher in price.
snrplfth 10y ago
So instead of bundling into your ticket price the cost of food you may not want or like, they allow people who bring their own to save money, and only charge those who consume that particular good. Apparently this is "extortion", somehow? Nonsense.
- saiya-jin 10y ago
  liquids are, since you cannot bring anything through security checkin. and if you don't drink a single drop on that 14h flight, well you are an exception
  - snrplfth 10y ago
    Then buy a drink and pack your own food. In any case, it's hardly the airlines' fault that liquids can't come through security. I just do not see what is so bad about unbundling food from ticket price.
    - fornever 10y ago
      If everyone would start bringing their own food that would lead to a huge mess of transporting, storing, unpacking, preparing and disposing of food in all sorts of random ways at various times throughout the flight by the hundreds of hungry sleep deprived passengers. Airports would be even less efficient going through security, vendors trying to sell food to go and people congregating to buy things. There's really enough general unbundling of comfort and efficiency at airports already. I would definitely pay more if even more things was standardized and included for everyone on the flight (like luggage, security, airport seating).
      - JoeAltmaier 10y ago
        Or, people could suck it up and not eat for an hour or two. Sure on longer flights a meal is welcome, but even missing a meal should not be a terrible burden.
        10y ago

obstinate 10y ago

Part of me agrees. And I also think flying is really cheap, not expensive like people are saying here. On the other hand, I do want to point out a couple of things. It's crazy to charge for printing a boarding pass. That does not cost money (to a first approximation). Also, substantially all the airlines that charge to check bags will gate check for free. It's just more hassle. So what's really happening is that your seat IS being subsidized -- by the people who check bags at at checkin rather than at the gate.

peteretep 10y ago
This is all classic price discrimination
- snrplfth 10y ago
  Yes, but hardly anybody understands price discrimination. Generally, people think that by requiring services and their prices to be bundled, their overall price will be lower. Which is not true of course.
  - lmm 10y ago
    I think mostly people are offended by the waste of having a very complex sales contract - understanding and negotiating terms is a lot of effort for all parties, and may well add up to a higher cost than what's saved through pricing efficiency.
    - snrplfth 10y ago
      Yes, it might do so. Depends on how expensive the services are and how easy the process is. But what annoys me is the attitude of "I prefer that Service X and Service Y be bundled together, therefore it should be mandatory that they are." Sure, there are arguments for bundling, and for unbundling. I don't see that just because some people prefer one or the other that it should be required.
      - 10y ago

earcaraxe 10y ago

Sure, but they were giving those to you for free and now they'll be taking them away without decreasing the price. So you're still paying the same for the base fare, it's just nobody gets the "luxuries" anymore.

WorldMaker 10y ago
It's also funny how some of those "luxuries" were originally part of the base service to make everyone's experience better and by removing them, now everyone's experience is worse and costs more. Primarily: checked baggage exists as a system to get baggage out of the cramped main cabin and into simpler, dedicated storage with marginal and reasonably efficient load/unload times. By charging fees for any checked baggage (as opposed to excessive checked baggage as used to be the regime), the airlines incentivize a lot more people to try to cram every thing they can carry on into the main cabin. This results in slower loading/unloading times of people because all the carry ons fill the bins quite inefficiently; many peoples bags wind up in bins that aren't easy for them to access for them to unload; some peoples bags won't fit at all because there has never been enough room in the main cabin. The airlines now have to compensate for this by asking for volunteers to gate check bags for every flight, which is a waste of everyone's time involved, and still not as efficient for anyone involved as simply checking bags up front like airlines originally were planned to do and airports were planned to handle.
- massysett 10y ago
  "Primarily: checked baggage exists as a system to get baggage out of the cramped main cabin and into simpler, dedicated storage with marginal and reasonably efficient load/unload times. By charging fees for any checked baggage (as opposed to excessive checked baggage as used to be the regime), the airlines incentivize a lot more people to try to cram every thing they can carry on into the main cabin." So Frontier, Spirit, and now the "Basic Economy" fares charge even more for cabin bags than for checked bags. Problem solved. One theory I heard about the checked bag fees (back when carry-on bags were no extra charge) was that the fee freed up cargo space so the airline could carry more paid air cargo, purposefully pushing baggage into the main cabin.