Read an interesting article on TravelMole earlier today, stating that US Department of Transportation (DoT) has announced a new set of passenger protections regarding airlines “hidden” fees.
The new rules do not set limits on how much carriers can charge for items such as bags and ticket changes but they do require the airlines to more clearly disclose fees in advertisements and on websites.
Ads will now be required to cite the full price, including government taxes that are often left to the fine print.
Source:http://www.travelmole.com/stories/1147341.php?mpnlog=1&m_id=_rnms~s~T_
If my memory serves me right, the CAA/DfT over here in the UK passed something very similar, however most airlines have been able to duck away from complying with this by simply changing their wording on their websites and adverts to say “Fees may apply for optional items…”, or something to that effect.
Also, talking about “fees”…it looks like bmibaby might be on the fiddle, regarding APIS information.
Please note if this information has not been provided in full prior to arriving at the airport, there will be a charge of £5 per passenger per sector for bmibaby to administer this at the airport. You will have to go to a check in desk to provide this information.
According to a friend/work colleague of mine who used to work at CWL said to me recently that not only do you get charged the £5 per passenger “admin fee” (for something which takes all of about 3 minutes to enter into a computer system!), but you also get charged the airport service fee of £11 per passenger, because you have to go to the check-in desks to do this, so just thought I would let you know if you are travelling with them anytime soon!
By: cloud_9 - 22nd April 2011 at 22:11
Interflug, a charge for pre-assigned seats together has existed for many years now.
Before I used to work at Heathrow, where I have been for the last 3 years, I used to work at Gatwick for a different ground handling company, and we represented a number of the major charter carriers, First Choice being one of them (they are obviously now part of Thomson!), and back then they used to charge £5 per passenger to pre-allocate seats together…of course this was/still is a nice little earner for the airline/s, because they still retain the right to move you from the seat that is pre-allocated to you (a pre-allocated seat is only a “request”, not a gaurentee, according to them!). We used to have lots of complaints from customers who had paid for this service, and were then either moved or not assigned seats together, and the airlines were unable to offer a refund at the airport, so customers were instead made to go via Customer Services (dialing an 0870 number, naturally!), and taking the cost and hassle of doing this into consideration, many people thought it was not worth it to try to claim it back.
On the flip side, Continental have a rather good system in place, which allows people to reserve premium seats online in advance or at the airport for a fee, and if for whatever reason the person is unable to sit in those seats and is moved into a standard seat, the money is then automatically refunded back to the card that the money was taken off of.
By: MSR777 - 22nd April 2011 at 09:40
Caught an interesting item on Watchdog last night. Apologies if this has been covered before, but it was news to me, having been out of aviation for some time. Thomson, and I hear they’re not alone, now charge a £5 fee for the ‘luxury’ of being able to sit together with friends or family! I don’t remember wether this is per pax, or per booking. What next?..an additional fee for using the terminal? Oh sorry, thats already been done by a certain British airport charging pax to go airside:eek: amazing! As far as the seating fee is concerned, when I was involved with check in, we used to receive passenger service messages a day or two before a flight with seating requests, group travellers, special passenger needs, wheelchair/ambulifts etc and pax with special dietary requirements. Seats were assigned/blocked off in the system as needed. For everyone else it was first come first served, so to have the best chance of all seating together, it was a case of ‘the early bird catches the worm’ Eventually of course, arithmetic cuts in and you had a situation where towards the end of the check in period, people were inevitably split up. Usually, the cases of parents and their children being split up were usually resolved on board, although it was sometimes only possible to get kids in proximity to their parents. Well maybe this is common knowledge, but as I say, it was news to me.
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April 21, 2011 at 10:31 pm