alt Hacker NewsI prefer airlines that don't nickel and dime. In fact, I prefer to fly less since the experience has consistently deteriorated over decades. If you travel internationally you get the added fun of dealing with border agents. And even they have discovered price discrimination, with their VIP lines.
All told, is all this chicanery benefiting airlines?
Replies
> All told, is all this chicanery benefiting airlines?
Yes.
An example is paid baggage. It used to be that stowage space was mostly a waste of capacity on an airplane. But with the help of modern software making coordinating shipping easier, they can make lucrative money shipping cargo on passenger flights.
So encouraging passengers to not bring bags and keeping that capacity for cargo is a feature, not a bug.
I think it's kinda race to the bottom / lemons market. A lot of people search for flights through aggregators so you need to optimize for the price shown there, and the customer doesn't know if that's the real price or if there'll be add ons so they won't go for a more expensive one on faith.
Best bet is finding out which airline treats you best and going all the way to a loyalty card with them or something I guess? that seems to work out a little better
> I prefer to fly less since the experience has consistently deteriorated over decades.
I never liked flying, but was able to put up with it better when I was younger.
Nowadays, I get some satisfaction by leveraging credit card points through my business to get "free" tickets. I mentally steel myself to the unpleasantness of the airport, boarding, and flying, and try to get as much work done on my laptop as possible when I am sitting down so at least I can feel that I accomplished something by the time I reach my destination.
> All told, is all this chicanery benefiting airlines?
I am pretty comfortable it contributes to revenue and profit outcomes the board likes.
> If you travel internationally you get the added fun of dealing with border agents
That's avoidable. If you are a citizen of an advanced economy flying to another you can just use the automatic passport gates.
>> All told, is all this chicanery benefiting airlines?
No. There is no competitive advantage. If they don't implement price discrimination, they go bankrupt. If they do implement price discrimination, they still go bankrupt: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_airline_bankruptcies_i....
It's made it so that relatively poor people can afford to regularly fly all over the world, which is a relatively new thing.
Lowe middle income people in lower middle income countries can afford to fly somewhat regularly, and even internationally, too.
Flying used to be just for the rich only as far back as the 60s, and for nobody as far back as 200 years...