Quote:
Originally Posted by Mazrim
I agree. If people choose a flight because it's $10 cheaper than a competitor, then this is what you get. The whole "guests checking a carry-on bag at the gate will be charged a checked bag fee and a service fee to check the bag under the aircraft" thing seems like a disaster. You're gonna hold up the boarding line every time a person gets their bag checked and has to pay for it at the gate? Everyone already ignores the "complimentary sky check" pages and chaos ensues during boarding, so what's empowering Westjet employees to make this situation work?
Even worse, what if they won't check anyone and people will try to jam huge bags under the seat. That'll force the flight attendants to sort that mess out in the plane. How much money is this really making Westjet if none of their planes leave on time because of boarding nonsense?
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Just need to look at the ULCC's in Europe to see how it can work. People will hate it because we're cheap and want something for nothing, but it can work if executed properly. While I have not had a ton of first hand experience I have had the fortune/misfortune of flying both Ryanair and Vueling recently so have seen how it's done. They are militant about carry on size, if it even looks like your bag may be too big to fit under the seat they will pull you out of the boarding line and check. And when it is invariably too big they have someone to look after the checking of the bag while the rest of the boarding que moves along. If the bag passes the size test they give you a colored sticker for it so there's nothing for the flight attendants to worry about. If they see the tag it's legit and it can go in the overhead. At least that's how it seemed to work as I observed.
Time will tell if this sticks but the concept is interesting. And i think it can work.