debunking the myth

When I golf - I admit to be a tee totaler. Every stroke I take from tee to cup is totaled.

Can we get Dooley a fucking editor?

 

But you're not being asked to fish out a credit card to get your bags on Southwest. Why other airlines don't realize how much of an inconvenience and PR bomb this is, I dunno. I guess they figure fooling someone into paying a lower price, then hitting them with the bags things, is a safer bet against discount airlines than it would be to put the bag price into the initial fare. And until I see the link showing that Southwest adds a bag cost into their fare, I ain't buying it.

 

And my fucking doesn't need to be edited.

 

Seeze you

 

It's $50 for a nice rack. Just thought I'd clear that up.

 

I think bag fees are stupid. Kind of like a restaurant charging for utensils, or being charged a "convenience fee" or service charge when you buy a ticket to a show at the door.

 

Fact: bydesign77 has some sort of beef with Southwest that has nothing to do with this thread, or anything that anyone has said on this thread.

I could go into a lengthy explanation of things everyone already knows about the transparency of Southwest and its pricing and fees relative to other airlines, but given the above, what's the point in this venue?

I mean, my goodness, look at the thread title. "Debunking the myth" -- seriously? Talk about transparency.

 

They put him in the C seating bloc.

 

Yeah, SWA's baggage policy wasn't the first thing that came to mind on seeing the thread title.

 

You got me. I was raped by SWA as a young child and this is my passive aggressive way of getting back at them.

I
Seriously, I think they are a great airline at what they do. And I can see where the general public buys into the "we don't charge for bags" scheme.

And I like the example of a resturant charging dor utensils. Good analogy. And it is a PR headache. Believe me, I worked on the first day my airline started to charge bag fee separately.

The like that the price is included? Every airline does calculations based on averages. Weight and balance is done by the FAA saying the average passenger weighs 185 during the summer and 195 in the winter. That includes their carryon. It also was assumed that everyone checked 1.2 bags, I think (that may be off). So they would preplan for fuel based on all of these numbers. And that all went into an average fare. (- don't want to get too deep into fare structure because there are a lot of factors that go into that and they make even less sense.)

But have you flown somewhere and checked 2 bags? How about none? So either way, you were either getting less or more of a service for the same price.

Well when fuel prices rocketed, it was impossible to stay competitive with the likes of SWA, who had the foresight to hedge well on fuel, not to mention having a young fleet of only one type of plane and low employee overhead.

So other airlines looked at how they could keep fares low and what services they could rearrange to generate more money. Bag fees was the answer they came up with. Not a good answer but it's here to stay for awhile.

Meanwhile, SWA doesn't have to do anything. Their fares, still assuming the same averages above, still factors all that in. No need to change anything to stay competitive, they already have low fares, and sometimes they have ridiculously low fares. But in those fares, the added weight of your checked bag (either 30 or 50 pounds on average) is included in the price (just like it used to be with everyone else).
So the idea that Bags Fly Free is a misnomer (a lie). They don't. You just don't pay separately for them.

Great move by them. It is something that most of you like and buy into. It's not true but OK it works.

My beef is they are merging with AirTran and will be in Atlanta now. And everyone is gushing! I can't stand flying them but that's me. But AT was a cheaper way to travel in a little more comfort on a discount carrier and they are going to be no more. And this is only going to hurt the flying public. Less competition = higher fares and SWA will be no different in that regard.

 

So -- it is your contention that the other airlines' ticket pricing DIDN'T take into account the extra fuel required and processing involved for carrying bags?