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Should parents with noisy/disruptive children pay a penalty for disturbing other passengers? Seems pretty simple to me.
Should children of any age be exempted from paying for a ticket? Again, seems pretty simple to me.
Should carry on baggage limits be strictly enforced with forced checking for the slightest overage? Once again, seems pretty simple to me.
BBM~~ It seems that if a child/baby is being brought onboard of an aircraft and NOT having to pay for a seat and so on..Why can't these same free ride kids be weighed just like carry on luggage?? Just asking??? duck and cover....but you have to know parent's carry-on is full of chid pacifier remedies too!!
Since Air carrier's are adamant about costs and use weight/ space as their parameters..Why not include the extra charges they can apply to family's who bring aboard kids ( baby and toddler's) who they can put on their laps??
As for larger folk who require larger space..I say sure..regardless of the rationale for their circumstance ..The whole World is consumed ( business wise) with PROFIT MARGINS..WHY Not capitalize on it???
Geesh I'm starting to sound like a "Capitalist now" ..Yikes!!
Should parents with noisy/disruptive children pay a penalty for disturbing other passengers? Seems pretty simple to me.
Should children of any age be exempted from paying for a ticket? Again, seems pretty simple to me.
Should carry on baggage limits be strictly enforced with forced checking for the slightest overage? Once again, seems pretty simple to me.
A crying child is very different than someone spilling over into your seat. The seats are small, there are some big people. That is different than someone who takes up half your space.
Speaking of seats, I was on the bus the other day when an obese lady boarded. She glared around, then said, "Isn't anyone going to offer me a seat?" I jumped right up and said, "I'd be happy to make a small contribution!".
oh I agree, flying has become horrible. I do not look forward to it at all, where as I once loved it. However, when they make first class almost double the ticket as economy, most cant afford to have any type of a "non cattle" experience.
If First Class were only double economy fare (international) then I would pay for it every time...gladly.
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Either follow Southwest policy on it or do the second seat half off. I know about business and profit, ya da, ya da, but it is almost inhumane to make someone by two seats based on weight.
I don't care how "skinny" you are there are many worse things than a little extra body contact: your halitosis, your body odor, your inane conversations, your disgusting child, your revolting perfume/cologne, your horrible choice in music that I can hear through your cheap headphones, your stomach churning choice of food or beverage, your bare feet, your disturbing pile of personal junk you need around you while traveling, your gross head on my shoulder as you drool in your sleep, etc.
I sat next to a guy once who smelled like he hadn't had a bath in his life. I turned slightly away from him and held my sweater over most of my face. Gratefully, it was a short trip.
Passengers on Southwest can do one of two things ... either they can purchase two seats and then be refunded for one of the seats after the trip has occurred...
Setting aside the fact that it's cheating the airline out of revenue, how does that work when Southwest has open seating? Can't someone just sit in the empty seat you've bought if they want to?
Actually, it damned well SHOULD be one of them. Airlines do differ in the width of their economy class seating; if customers start exhibiting a real preference for wider seats, airlines will respond by supplying them. People who put price above all else are the reason economy class has degenerated into cattle class, and flying economy has become such a miserable experience.
Now that that's clear, on to your question. Should larger people buy two seats? Yes. Will they? Not 100% of the time (for reasons which vary from 'I'm flying for work and my company will only pay for one seat," to "too cheap to buy two," to "haven't flown before and honestly didn't know how narrow the seats are."). So what's the purpose of whining about it? Your comfort is YOUR RESPONSIBILITY. Either speak up before the flight pulls away from the gate, or suffer in silence, or book first class seats. Your choice. But stop pretending that you have no responsibility for dealing with this problem, because it is in fact YOUR problem. Why should anyone else care more about your comfort than you do?
I badly want for that to be an effective method for dealing with this problem. Unfortunately, you don't always get much time before takeoff to know who's going to sit down next to you. That happened to us once and the airline said, oh well, we're taking off and there's no other seats. My husband literally had another man's ass cheek and thigh on top of his, and had to sit crooked because his upper body was also taking up my husband's seat. Believe me, we complained and got nothing--no voucher, no accommodation, nothing. The other guy said sorry but he can stick his sorrys in a sack--this was his fault.
Unless the airline was unable to sell all seats on the flight, someone should pay for the extra seat, and it shouldn't be the airline.
Airlines give dimensions for carry-on bags. If you show up trying to use a big bag for a carry-on, the airline measures and charges you to check a bag or stows it elsewhere. You can say no and get off the flight if you want. Why not do this with humans? If you require more than 1 seat then you should pay.
In the story I mentioned above, IMO the airline should have told the passenger they did not have room for him because he did not fit in the 1 seat he purchased.
I don't think it would be unreasonable for them to have a no-refund policy if someone buys 1 ticket, shows up requiring 2, and has to re-book.
What the flight-attendant can achieve is very limited.
IMO the airlines should have flight attendants do this. The metric of whether you fit in 1 seat or not is if you spill over the armrest boundary line. If the passenger next to the large person doesn't mind, the flight attendants don't intervene. If the passenger does mind, the flight attendants accommodate the person who is abiding by the rule of taking up only the seat he paid for. The large person can be asked to pay for an additional seat and the passengers can be moved around to accommodate it. This sort of thing can start at the gate while people are waiting. The gate staff can announce if anyone wants an additional seat to approach the desk. Ultimately, if no additional seating is available and no one is willing to sit next to the large person, the large person must reschedule his flight.
I do not get any POV indicating the large person should have an entire extra seat for free or be allowed to inconvenience others. It's not the airline's fault that he's large, and it's not the other customer's fault either.
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