Airline raises fee from $25 to $50, beginning next month
Early last May -- less than three short months ago -- Delta Airlines joined US airlines' stampede to charge most passengers for checked bags and imposed a $25 fee for the second bag. Come August 5, Delta us upping the surcharge race by doubling that fee to $50.
Pity the passenger (or his/her company) who must check more pieces than that. The third bag will now cost $125 (up from $80) and a whopping $200 apiece for the fourth through 10th checked pieces, which is more than many flight legs cost on an advance-purchase ticket .
Extra weight and size count too. An overweight bag between 51 and 70 pounds on a domestic rises from $80 to $90, and an oversize bag 62 inches to 80 inches of the total of its length plus its width plus its height rises from $150 to $175.
As bone thrown to first-class and certain premium passengers, Delta will still let them check up to three bags for free. Business travelers often carry on everything they need -- unless, perhaps, they are attending a trade show and are taking presentation materials. However, other flyers who routinely check many pieces will be paying big-time. FWIW, Delta says that it accepts up to 10 checked bags per passenger on its own flights and four checked bags on Delta Connection carriers.
Think of broadcast media or film makers who will be charged $175 per item for camera, perhaps film or video tape inventory, lighting, or sound equipment, will be paying a lot of such surcharges. Athletes with heavy equipment (hockey bags come immediately to mind) are really getting socked for extra baggage fees, as are people heading for sports vacations with ski equipment, fishing gear or golf bags.
"Commercial airlines are the cheapest way to deliver bags in America," William Swelbar, an airline expert with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has been quoted as saying, noting the obvious that it costs more to fly on a heavier aircraft than one with a lighter load Swelbar postulated Delta's position as, "If I'm going to be in the moving business, I'm going to be compensated like a moving business."
Tom Parsons of BestFares told reporters, "They'd rather put high-paying cargo on that plane rather than people's bags." The phrase, "eople's bags," of course, implies people, and Parsons didn't add that cargo doesn't need to be reminded to buckle its seatbelt, drink those costly soft drinks and eat those little baggies of snacks, complain when a flight is delayed, get drunk and disorderly, or try to cram extra stuff in the overhead.
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