Will Major Airlines Charge For Carry-on Bags?

By Author: Steve Robinson
Total Articles: 468
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Cheap fares, particularly cheap airplane tickets and cheap vacation packages are becoming more expensive as airlines keep coming up with new incremental fees.

Airlines know that low ticket prices entice customers to fly. To keep base ticket prices as cheap as possible, airlines have increasingly looked to make up revenue elsewhere. Today airlines charge fees to change reservations, for meals, for early boarding, for pillows and blankets, for seats with additional legroom, and for just about anything else they can imagine.

Some travelers believe that there are limits to the fees major airlines will charge and that charging for carry-on is something that they simply will not consider. Mind you, Spirit Airlines already charges its passengers a fee for their carry-on bags, ranging from $25 to $100 per carry-on bag, depending on when and where they purchased their tickets and paid for the privilege to carry-on bags.

Spirit’s explanation is that it provides “ultra low basic fares” and wants to give its passengers “freedom to choose only the extras they value.”

JetBlue is one of the few airlines ...
... that still do not charge for the first checked bag. Some experts believe that most major airlines will inevitably start charging for carry-on bags given that they are in the business to make a profit and are so reluctant to raise base ticket prices.

Of course, the counter argument to charging for carry-on luggage is that while making a profit is smart, insulting your customers is not. Our only hope is that if select major airlines start charging for carry-on bags, that other airlines will go on the counteroffensive and encourage customers to fly with them because they will not charge fliers to carry their own bags.
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