Stuff It Up Your Pitot Tube
I’ve known about this for a while and then read about it at Anne’s and still didn’t post about it, but it really is a ridiculous outrage on top of all the other indignities of airline travel: Only one checked bag per customer or you’ll pay for it, literally. The chart, from the Wall Street Journal, lists the one-bag-only offenders as United and U.S. Airways. Even worse but a little more understandable, a newer discount carrier, Skybus, offers no free baggage–but if that’s been their policy since the beginning and part of the reason why they can offer rock-bottom prices on their as-yet very few routes, that passes the laugh test. But when you’re two of the biggest carriers in the country and charging prices to match, changing the decades-old policy of allowing the baggage to come with the customer seems like economically shooting yourself in the foot. My son travels with a checked suitcase and a checked carseat, and I don’t see that changing any time soon, so United and U.S. Air, kindly shove your money-hoovering policy right up your pitot tube.
11 comments »
Copy link for RSS feed for comments on this post or for TrackBack URI
Leave a comment
Line and paragraph breaks automatic, e-mail address never displayed, HTML allowed: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <code> <em> <i> <strike> <strong>
Seeing as one of your son’s “suitcases” is a car seat, I’d check with the airline to see if that even counts toward the limit before doing anything rash. Also ask what the charge is. For Skybus, it’s $10/bag for the first two.
Comment by Xrlq — April 3, 2008 @ 10:15 am
Another good reason not to lump Skybus in with the other two. But at United it’s $25 for the second bag.
I don’t plan to do anything rash … just avoid United and USAir. :)
Comment by Anwyn — April 3, 2008 @ 11:59 am
Now just how did you know about the pitot tube? That’s exactly where they should stuff it.
Comment by Anne — April 3, 2008 @ 1:26 pm
Dad’s a pilot, and I’ve taken some lessons myself. In a little single-engine plane like the kind you learn in, you have to check the pitot tube as part of the preflight, to make sure it doesn’t have junk in it (dirt, birds’ nests … feathers …) that would prevent it from giving an accurate airspeed reading.
Comment by Anwyn — April 3, 2008 @ 1:50 pm
Not sure why $0 for the first bag and $25 for the second is all that much worse than $10 for each, but that’s neither here nor there. Wouldn’t the rational choice be to purchase the cheapest ticket you can get, from whoever issues it, unless the cheapest and the next-cheapest are within $25 of each other?
Comment by Xrlq — April 3, 2008 @ 7:41 pm
I misunderstood you. I thought you meant $10 for both of the first two bags, and I didn’t bother to go to Skybus to check it out. And yeah, of course that is the way it will adjust, checking the flights for price differences within the baggage fee.
Fortunately I’m not often faced with a situation where United is the best or cheapest choice.
Comment by Anwyn — April 4, 2008 @ 8:20 am
Didn’t Airbus just go under?
(Got here via Venomous Kate.)
Comment by Kat — April 5, 2008 @ 12:12 pm
Skybus did, apparently, today. I had no idea they were struggling, seeing that I only first heard of them about a week ago.
Comment by Anwyn — April 5, 2008 @ 1:59 pm
Oh, and Kat, I just looked at your blog–thanks for the tip about the gadget that preserves wine’s freshness. I’m not drinking wine outside my budget but it does get a little frustrating pouring 1/3 of a bottle of what was perfectly good cabernet the night before down the sink … commenting here instead of there because 1) it’s an older post and wasn’t sure you’d see it and 2) I have a Google account for blog commenting but because I was an idiot when I set it up it leaves my name as “Anwyn’s” and I just can’t go all over the web littering apostrophes like that. I need to get a new gmail account, I guess.
Comment by Anwyn — April 5, 2008 @ 2:07 pm
I swear I meant Skybus.
This is what happens when I work way too much. My brain short circuits on the weirdest things.
Comment by Kat — April 5, 2008 @ 5:59 pm
And thank you. I’ll be posting more soon, hopefully. I’ve been really busy with an increase in responsibilities in the store, so I don’t have time.
Comment by Kat — April 5, 2008 @ 6:50 pm