http://money.cnn.com/2010/04/06/news/companies/spirit_airlines_carry-on_fee/ Complete bullshit. Let's hope they go bankrupt before all the other airlines follow suit.
What, are they expecting people to fly with the clothes on their backs and that's it. If you're going to raise prices to fly, just raise the fucking prices already. It's fucking bullshit that a $329 round trip ticket actually costs closer to $400 after they charge you for your bags, airport fees and something to eat.
Why not just ban these extra fees? Make the ticket cost what it costs so it's a level playing field for everyone. I think I see a lot of trips on Southwest in my future...
Why not be intelligent and just not fly with them? Let that free market thing do it's trick. You don't need the government to hold your hand every day......
Southwest is cattle class. But, it's the best deal going for domestic flights. You still get two checked bags for free, you get two carry-ons for free, and if you upgrade to the Business Select fare ($20), you're guaranteed an A boarding slot and you get a "free" alcoholic beverage as opposed to the complimentary Coke. The last several times I've flown, I used the Business Select fare and by using the Southwest app on my iPhone, I've gotten the A01 slot every time.
The only way you'll get me on a commercial airliner nowadays is to drag me onboard kicking and screaming.
Southwest is certainly one of the better airlines out there... I just wish they expanded operations and traveled to more places.
I don't see the problem. Someone offers a service, at such and such a price and under such and such conditions. Those who are ok with that accept it. Those who aren't do without, or find a similar service provided by someone else with a price/conditions combination they do like. Isn't that what the free market is all about?
It is not just a $20 fee for Business Select, a quick trip to southwest.com will show you that. If you are booking your flight more than 2 weeks out it is less than half price to choose whatever the cheapest fare is vs Business Select most of the time. I fly a good amount and I have to say that Southwest is the best bang for your buck out there. You get more leg room than Delta or Continental and usually at least 30-50 off the price. Not only that but they operate out of the smaller airport of the 2 in the cities that are big enough to handle two major airports. Smaller is much better when it comes to airports. The only issue I have with them is that they do not have a good multi city discount like the other major airlines.
That's the problem. I'm supposed get two or three weeks notice before I have to travel, but more often than not, it's < 5 days and has been as little as 48 hours. Out of the 100+ flights I've taken in the last couple of years, one has been scheduled > two weeks in advance.
It would be, if companies that pulled shit like this were actually allowed to go tits-up when profits tank.
And the First Amendment guarantees my right, if I so choose to do so, to bitch about it. Word of mouth is very powerful, and probably the best way to go about complaining about such things. As well a politely worded letter to the CEO of the company stating you will never use their service until such a time as those fees disappear.
And Async is not commenting on that right so you have no point. No one here is going to say you don't have the right to bitch about it. There are a couple chowder heads in this thread however that think government should regulate ticket prices. That is what Async is commenting on.
The problem is that a charge like this is designed to trick customers. It's unusual, and until people realize what's going on, some number of people are going to be buying tickets with the expectation of being able to bring carry on for free, only to be hit with a 45$ charge at the gate. That won't last long, but once people have accurate expectations there's no money to be made in having such a charge; it only makes money for as long as it fools people. And the charge is so much higher than the marginal cost to the airline of stowing a piece of carry-on baggage that it's a long run money loser unless everyone conspires to adopt the charge or the charge comes way down--only people with no carry on will bother flying the airline unless base ticket prices are reduced so far as to be money losing propositions for people with no carry on, and those people will make the airline less money per ticket than before.
I'm not in favor of regulating ticket prices. I'm throwing out the idea of honest pricing. Sort of like not allowing car companies to give you the car, but charge you for the motor. I figure that actually would encourage competition by making it easier to compare prices. Southwest is killing everyone by simply charging base prices at which they can make money while charging only a very few fees.
And now they want to charge for using the restroom! http://www.cnn.com/2010/TRAVEL/04/07/ryanair.lavatory.fee/?hpt=T2
Ain't nothing about this being secret. They've announced in the open. And it's going to show up as you book your ticket. And you need to pay attention to what you're doing. Plus you've got to be a fucking moron to think you're going to get cheap tickets and not get hit with fees some other way. Hell I don't fly on a regular basis and even I know that cheap flights have fees all over the place. There is no trick to it unless you as the consumer is not paying attention and then that makes it your fault. The real problem is that we have a country (if not world at least the Western world) of cheap motherfuckers who expect cheap prices and fucking five star service in return. I went to the Spirit Air website and looked into booking a flight. The $45 dollar thing doesn't start until a few months from now but here is something: Ain't nothing being hidden. You just got to use your damn eyeballs and read.
I saw a British TV show on Ryanair. Man that's a crazy airline but hey you get what you pay for. You want cheap flights? Then expect cheap service.
An acclaimed businessman friend of mine, a multi-millionaire several times over, told me that in all his years of business seminars, classes, etc, he's only taken away one thing. As a customer, you've got three issues facing you regardless of the industry. You've got price, quality/safety, and customer service. You can have any two of the three. You pick.
I haven't flown since 2003 when I went to Field Training, and that was on the government's dime. So I basically just sucked it up through the security measures of the time since all I was out was my time, and technically I was getting paid for that.
I learned at Home Depot working in the paint department that "Cheap is Expensive" We'd always have these idiot customers coming in that want to paint a wall a deep color, mostly red (or burgundy but some blue, orange and green) but they don't want to do it right because it costs money. We always heard the same excuses: "I know what I'm doing" "We don't have to do it that way you guys just want to make us pay more" Even after we tell them they would come back and just end up spending even more money to fix and then repaint again the same wall they still wouldn't believe us until they came back all pissed. If you buy a deep color you need to use a coat of primer that's been tinted towards the color your painting (If you're painting red the primer is usually a pinkish color) and even with the primer you can expect to put two or three coats on the same wall in order to get the color right. More coats if you're crazy enough to try and paint over a deep color with another deep color. (say red over orange) I can understand not wanting to waste money but sometimes doing things right means paying for things.
Sounds more like doing things right means beige unless you have some weird visual tick whereby off-whites make you vomit. And, frankly, most people who want to paint a room red are a little nuts.
Yeah I've seen people choose some very weird colors. Purples (not light purple either but dark purple), blacks, reds. They see all this fancy shit on HGTV or when it was on Trading Places and then they rush out to do it but what they don't see on the TV is all the work that went into making those rooms look like they did. I'll stick with light colors myself.
