What are the airlines going to fleece you for next?

I thought that but did fly with them recently as they were the only airline that worked for my plans. I just accept it won't be cheap because I will pay for a hold bag.

I expect they will start weighing passengers and if you are over a certain weight you will have to pay a fat tax. Or charge more for people with medical conditions because more of a chance they will have to make an emergency landing due to those conditions. I think it would be awful to do either of these things but the way they are going it wouldn't surprise me!

Call me a conspiracy theorist, but it occurs to me that, if they wished, some of the extra-charge-happy budget airlines could easily have lots of their own (empty) maximum cabin size cases already in the overhead lockers, which could then be 'bumped' and taken 'to the hold' (or just off the flight altogether), so that those who pay extra can get theirs on.

It would seem to be in their interests - and good for their profits - to make passengers fearful that they couldn't get their case in the cabin with them unless they guarantee it by paying!

It’s not really an issue. If you don’t want to pay it, don’t. Your hand luggage just might have to go in the hold if the overhead lockers are full when you board. That happens on all airlines, just Jet2 are offering a way to pay to make sure it doesn’t happen to you if it’s an issue.

We’re currently on a J2 holiday. We reserved our seats because we like sitting in row 2 so we can be last on and first off.

Well they should raise their prices overall to match other normal airlines who include everything

The airlines are not a charity they will make money the way they can

I have a holiday booked with them next summer and have been getting messages about this. We'll have hold bags so will just have a small bag as carry on.
What does annoy me is paying to reserve a seat, what a scam. I have done it though. The holiday is a big treat for us and I just want it to be relaxing, I don't need the stress of possibly not being able to sit together.

I'm not sure about this. If governments treated flying fairly, we'd all be paying a hell of a lot more airport tax and flying short distances would soon stop being cheaper than the train.

We flew Jet2 recently to Tenerife, in that flight you got free 23kg luggage in the price, we only wanted HL as don't like checking bags, as people had checked baggage, there wasn't many with cases as HL, I think on the whole queue us and about 6 others. Might be worth seeing if the flight has free baggage and making a call as to how many might have HL

Budget airlines seem to be increasingly inventive in what they can charge extra for, probably a charge for using the loo or the steps to get onto the plane or maybe an extra cost for being bussed to/from the plane, nothing would surprise me, having said that have always found jet2 ok, though they do seem to have a real issue with being on time

The Russians had planes designed so that passengers would board directly to the cargo deck, stow their cases on racks there, then go up a flight of stairs to the main deck for the flight. This was for remote airfields that didn't have ground crew. But I bet Ryanair would have a good look if Boeing offered it as an option.

We’ve had a couple of hols with jet2. They were fine. Have you had a different experience?

You’d need an engineer to really look at the lowering the floor idea but I know it’s part of the load bearing structure on many aircraft and there may be issues if it’s not at roughly mid height, spanning the actual diameter of the fuselage barrel, or very close to it. Having the floor at max diameter gives max width> max number of seat abreast…lower the floor and you lose width.

Also if you drop the floor/reduce cargo hold height you reduce compatibility with the current specifications worldwide for the containers used for hold loading of bags etc on many aircraft…There are a few other issues I can think of but those will do as three reasons for starters.

As for:” have a couple of racked storage cupboards near the entrance which can take cases, pushchairs and wheelchairs.”

That would take out space for seat rows….the accountants won’t like that. Over the years that’s led to reduced storage for crew kit, reduced/removed wardrobes from the front of some shorthaul types.

We’re now at the stage galley stowage and certainly toilet size has been reduced on some recent aircraft, all done order to get more seats in, all done to reduce prices or at least keep them low.

@Bjorkdidit Yes I know there are other options, I fly to Palma regularly, but not usually with Ryanair or from Manchester. My point was IF that was the only option, I'd rather drive.

Typically I fly from London either BA or easyJet and have never encountered anything like that Ryanair flight.

Perhaps there's more business travel between London and Palma than purely holiday travel.

Jet2 fly daily to Palma from all airports they use so it's unlikely you'd 'have' to go on Ryanair if you didn't want to.

But in my experience all flights to Mallorca or Ibiza are full of the party crew. We went on Jet2 from Liverpool to Ibiza on a Monday morning and despite the crew ruling the cabin with an iron fist and making everyone put their airport booze in the overhead locker (and checking this) it was still fairly rowdy. There was an announcement on disembarking thanking everyone for their good behaviour so fuck knows what it would be like if left to their own devices.

Plus there's £26 return in taxes on flights. The cheapest ever flights we took were Lanzarote for £30 return with hand luggage only (this was just before COVID and you still got both cabin bags so no extra luggage required for a week away).

At the time, the price after taxes was less than what it cost to get a return bus to our nearest town less than 2 miles away so no wonder airlines need to sell extras to make a profit.

But we never pay to sit together, never buy food and drink on flights (if we want food for the flight and CBA bring it with us, a £5 Boots meal deal from the airport is fine) or anything from the 'Skyshop' so others must be spending a lot more in order for the airline to balance the books.

Slightly off topic, but I simply can't understand why there aren't new plane designs with the majority of the storage in the cabin rather than underneath. Since the low cost airlines want to minimise the number of people who check-in luggage to reduce their time on the ground it seems like the simplest solution. Lower the floor of the cabin enough to be able to put wheely cases on their side in the overhead lockers, and have a couple of racked storage cupboards near the entrance which can take cases, pushchairs and wheelchairs. And please board people at the back of the plane first to speed the process up!

@PCOSisaid When it comes to Ryanair I simply would not go if they were the only option. I once had the misfortune to fly with them on business from Manchester to Palma and swore that if that was required in future I'd rather drive to Barcelona and sail across. The only upside was that I was moved to an exit row seat by the crew, by virtue of being one of the few sober people on board what appeared to be the Magaluf Express.

That said, I've got no problem at all with easyJet, rarely fly Jet2 as they don't serve where I want to go but when I have they've been fine. BA short haul are basically easyJet in a more muted colour way now; and likewise fine if you have low expectations.

I don't know but I bought UK train tickets recently and the price was eye watering - getting a jet off the ground for some of their prices seems reasonable.

East Midlands, my friend's DS flew back from Turkey - it was not Jet2. Got back at around 3am, Went to the luggage reclaim and heard the truck pull up to the loading area. Then nothing. Waited about 30 mins. This was the only flight in arrivals.

Then DS and about 6 others climbed through the hatches and pulled all the luggage off the trailers and another 6 distributed the cases across the floor and carousel belt.

Last month flew back to Birmingham and luggage was put onto belt no 6 - its tucked away from the others. Someone accidently knocked the emergency stop button when they picked up their suitcase off the belt. The button is badly positioned IMO. We could only access half of the belt area as rest had full length of barriers (no idea why). Took about 30 mins to get the belt going again. There was a gap between the barriers where could see at least 40 pieces of luggage -and security stopped someone trying to get to their case - which was the nearest bit of the belt to the barrier.

Then have seen passengers who are the first to stand once plane lands, first on the terminal shuttle. I took my time and in passport control, looked where the impatient idiot was - about 50-60 people behind me. Then his suitcase didn't arrive before mine.

But you can put all those in your small cabin bag, that you will always be able to take on the plane with you.

We fly most regularly domestic with BA and it seems absolutely standard now that they forcibly take wheely cases off you at the gate to put them in the hold, unless you're a bronze cardholder or above.

As well as stuff I use on the airports and flight, in my hand luggage, I have:
. Medication - just in case suitcase goes missing
. bag containing cables for phone, Kindle, iPod, powerbanks and USB plugs.
. If flying to a place where its hot and unable to check into room not straight away (such as holiday I just been to) - a pair of shorts and a pair of trainer liners.

I think Jet2 has capacity for about 150 (170 for their larger planes) cabin sized suitcases in the overhead lockers. This means they hope and pray that at least 40 (55 on larger planes) passengers don't have cabin suitcases.

It’s because they don’t want to wait at baggage reclaim if they don’t have any hold luggage. Sometimes that can be a long wait (hours in some cases at big airports - Gatwick I’m looking at you).

Even claiming they can guarantee your bags on the plane is a bit of a fudge.

I accidentally ended up with ‘speedy boarding’ on easyJet recently because I wanted to take the pram on board (which I had to pay about £50 for).

If you pay to take on a ‘large hand baggage’, they give you speedy boarding in the hope you can fit in on I guess.

Well… on the way out we were checked into a gate and then it was a free for all (so irrelevant), and on the way back we were let through first but then… made to sit and wait on a bus until the entire flight was through.

So utterly pointless anyway. Initiatives created in the office that are not enforceable on the ground.