Taxing for Takeoff
Airlines get more clever every time they turn around – and you know how often they turn around. Even though they’re now getting jet fuel on the cheap, they keep thinking up new reasons to charge extra fees – for an aisle seat, an exit row seat, checked bags, pillows, priority boarding, Wi-Fi, you name it.
New ones are in the works, and we’re not sure what they’ll be. A fee if you’re wearing eyeshadow? A per-shoelace surcharge?
Two dollars for crackers, four if they’re salted.
Every amenity goes by a code – OAA for a checked bag, OAX for a beverage. The ones I like best are the code for a snack (OAT) and one for the passenger who opts for video games (OAF).
It’s only right that oafs should pay extra because they take a toll on the rest of us every day of their lives.
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It’s true that airlines have the “extras” market cornered (or, in Boston, cahnahed), except of course for the hapless rubes that run USAir. As you may remember, USAir decided their fortunes would be made or broken by charging passengers for soft drinks and coffee. But as they were on their way to counting their extra millions, a strange thing happened: other airlines, realizing the utter stupidity and public relations catastrophe of charing $2 a shot for hydration refused to follow suit, and USAir was left hung out to dry (no pun intended). Such was the outcry from USAir passengers – by which I mean people saying, “What? Two buck for a $.10 plastic cup of coffee? Go fuck yourselves!” – that USAir was forced to give up charging for drinks, and the 28 year-old MBA whose revenue-generating brainstorm this was is now working at a Starbucks. (Although I understand they won’t let him near the cash register.) When last heard from, USAir is now thinking of increasing load factors by discounting tickets for passengers willing to ride outside the cabin. No word yet on FAA approval for the scheme.
Comment by Steve Alber — March 24, 2009 @ 9:08 am
Before getting a job in Starbucks, that MBA would have to learn what coffee is. He sure didn’t find out by drinking the swill they serve on USAirways, which was seriously overpriced even when it was free.
Comment by Al — March 24, 2009 @ 10:59 am