The Death of Airline Checked Hold Baggage

Airport check-in desks are turning into battlegrounds and Twitter streams are littered with irate rantings.  The culprit?  Excess baggage charges.  Anglo Pacific International believes that this struggle will soon be confined to history.

The fact of the matter is that airlines are making it harder and pricier for passengers to check-in baggage for very good reason.  Rising fuel costs, extra taxes and hard-hit economies have conspired against the aviation industry as they see their profits nosedive.

Not only does this mean that they have to find extra income from stealth charges such as extra legroom seats, priority boarding, in-flight catering and so on, but it also means that they have to turn their aircraft round quickly – planes only make money while they’re in the air.

Checked baggage simply gets in the way.

Airlines would like checked baggage to vanish altogether as it slows down the turnaround on the tarmac and baggage handlers have to be paid regardless of the volume going into the hold.

What’s more these handlers have been known to strike causing even more financial headaches.  The flying public is wising up. 

Checked baggage has dropped considerably with 85% of passengers checking in a suitcase five years ago versus less than 20% now, and the boarding process is now dominated by the tedious overhead locker hand baggage jigsaw puzzle.  The message is pack light and let an independent international shipping company handle the rest.   

According to their websites, for a short flight with easyJet excess baggage is charged at 11GBP per kilo at the airport, 20GBP per kilo for RyanAir.  Analysts have worked out that at times it is more economical to buy a second seat and bring a friend to share your allowance.  

Anglo Pacific supply, deliver and collect bespoke export strength cartons for owner packing in the comfort of your home and deliver it all to your door overseas – for far cheaper than any low cost airline.  

Anglo Pacific’s speciality is sending luggage worldwide via its express courier service to the common long-haul destinations (five to seven days transit) such as Australasia, North America, South Africa, South East Asia and China. 

A typical 15kg suitcase with Anglo Pacific costs £139 door-to-door.  For short-haul European destinations, a typical 15kg suitcase with Anglo Pacific would cost £77 door-to-door (two to three days transit).

Airlines to charge premiums for window and aisle seats

The airline industry's latest tactic to screw the passenger charging premiums for window and aisle.

The charges for window or aisle seats in the front half of the plane, costing as much as $29 each way on U.S. domestic flights and $59 on international flights, are the latest of a raft of passenger fees introduced in recent years as the airline industry looks to generate new streams of revenue.

The issue has arisen in the United States, where Delta, American Airlines, and low-cost carriers US Airways, Frontier, Spirit and Allegiant have implemented charges for "preferred seating."

The notion of paying extra to reserve more desirable seating is catching on more widely across the industry. Across the Atlantic, low-cost Ryanair rolled out reservations for certain seats across all its routes in January, while its rival Easyjet has also been experimenting with the practice.

The implementation of end-of-row seat fees is part of a broader airline trend to charge for amenities previously included in the standard fare, such as movies, water, pillows and blankets.

In response to soaring fuel prices four years ago, airlines also began introducing charges for checked baggage, generating huge sums. But last year the revenue from checked bags for U.S. airlines fell for the first time, suggesting passengers were trying to avoid fees by packing light when they traveled.

Two U.S. airlines, Spirit and Allegiant, already charge passengers for carry-on baggage.

Soon they will charge extra for blankets cushions and yes eventually we will seen passengers force to pay to use the WC

Source: CNN

I Should Know Better

As a travel writer, I really should know better than to skim read travel instructions, but like thousands before me and even more to follow, I admit that I am guilty of being stupid.

But thank goodness for a sympathetic ear of an operator who deserves great praise.  I am talking about Eurostar.

My story begins when I turned up for my train to Paris on June 2nd.  The fact that the scanners would not accept my boarding pass was the first indication that something was wrong.  The second came when the check in lady said, "You do know these tickets are for July 2nd don't you"

Panic, a quick check and the realization that despite having been asked to confirm the booking details were correct then doing so and subsequently printing out the boarding pass, I realized that it was all my fault.

Dear Eurostar thank you for never once suggesting that I am a moron!  Thank you all, and in particular Isabelle, for moving heaven and earth to get me onto a crowed train and therefore enabling me to continue on in France to complete my assignment.

I have learned my lesson and will never do it again, I promise!

Airlines are becoming more honest

It's true and I have proof!  Oh sure they still lie about ample leg room and good inflight food with first class entertainment but then again they always did lie about those things even before you had to wrap your legs around your ears to get into the seat

No the evidence I am referring to is at checkin or to be more precise the bag drop area.

There was a time when you queued for hours to leave your bags at the desk marked Fast Bag Drop. Nowadays they have changed the signage to be more honest by describing the same desk as BagDrop

Come Dine With Me

If someone invited me to dine with them I would expect and perhaps even look forward to a meal.  Not an unreasonable assumption given what the verb to dine means.

One thing I would not expect is a curled up sandwich in a cellophane pack and a bottle of luke warm Pepsi Cola yet that is what I am led to believe by Flybe the cut price regional airline based out of the UK who publish a Guide, no less, to Dining on Board their airplanes.

With buy two get one free deals on offer I can hardly wait!

Virgin Atlantic to Offer Mobile Calls Onboard Flights

Virgin Atlantic has announced it will become the first British airline to provide passengers with a service to make and receive phone calls in the air at 35,000ft.

The industry leading move also allows people to send and receive text messages, emails and have web access via GPRS.

The new mobile phone system will be available throughout the aircraft in all cabins and is targeted at business travellers. The service is intended for use in exceptional situations, when passengers need to send an SMS, make a quick call, or access an email on a Blackberry. The system will limit the connectivity to six users at any one time.

The new service has undergone on board tests over the last few months and is currently operational on A330-300 aircraft and by the end of 2012, the system will be available to passengers on nearly 20  aircraft.

Initially, AeroMobile is available for customers with O2 and Vodafone network providers. The service is not permitted during take-off or landing, and has to be turned off approximately 250 miles from US airspace.

Is it time to change the design of the aircraft interior

Who is it that dreams up the design for the interior of an aircraft with trans Atlantic range.

Why has there been so little change in the basic layout since the Comet, 707 and the VC10

Clearly the designers are accountants who know how many bodies to squash into a cigar tube without inflicting injury but why has someone not figured out a better layout?

Look at the way passengers are configured and design the plane around them.

Passengers if you look come in singles couples or groups and into that category come families

So why not have family areas, why not have quite zones where the lights are dimmed and why not seats with laptop sized desks and dispense with the TV and games console?

Think of it babies and children who want to crawl around the ally ways could be in the bag where the duty free trolly and alcoholic drinks cart need not go