Paying for luggage and seats together on flights?

[RosemaryAndTime]

If you were costing flights for a family of 4 would you consider the charges for seats together and luggage as "extras" or as part of the overall cost for what you need?

If I'm travelling alone and don't need luggage, I consider this a saving I can take advantage of.

I like the separate pricing as I can choose what I need but so many people seem to really resent this sort of pricing, especially over seating!

As someone who is happy to take hand luggage and sit wherever, those things are extras

If you want check luggage and reserved seats then pay for them, if you don’t. Dont.

I resent it. I think seats and luggage should be included as a rule but there should be the option of a downgraded version to pick if you want.

If I price up flights for our family and it shows me £500, but then it’s actually more like £800 when I’ve added extras then I feel cheated. I think it’s worse because when pricing up holidays, some companies include it and some don’t. So I might get a price that’s affordable, assuming in everything’s included, to find out later it isn’t and I can’t afford that holiday.

In addition to what I just wrote. I think if booking flights only then it’s different. But when booking a package family holiday I expect those things to be included.

It used to all be included, people wanted ‘low cost’ flights and therefore these things to be optional so if they weren’t bothered about them the could make savings.

I think that’s definitely been forgotten

I really, really dislike the fact that airlines split the costs for luggage and seat reservations out just so they can show lower headline prices. I do also fundamentally believe that they're trying to "upsell" something that should be included.

With that said, the difference in cost is a rounding error and now I just consider it part of the cost of the trip.

I just want the search engines on travel sites to have tick boxes for checked luggage and reserved seats so the prices you see include these in the prices for each flight.

I don’t mind there being a price difference, I just hate how you can only select “economy” so you have no idea what the real price will be once you’ve picked a flight and then during check out added the luggage and then after booking when you go to select seats, only then do you find out those charges.

I just feel like I’m being ripped off every time.

I often travel alone but I am fine with the "extras" - it gives me flexibility and the ability to choose a seat (because of disability). If people don't want those extras, with family or not, they don't have to pay for them but they don't then get to demand them (as someone on another thread is expecting just because they have a child and chose you to pay for the seating)

I like separate pricing too. All-in pricing basically means you are forced to pay for a bunch of stuff you don't use. I'd actually like it to go even further and have passengers pay for overall weight (passenger plus baggage). Should an obese person weighing 400kg with no baggage pay less than a 30kg person with 20kg of baggage?

Seats part of the cost, luggage too if we’re going for more than a few days.

I think seats should be included unless you want an upgrade e.g. extra legroom. Luggage separate then you can adjust to suit your needs. My 2yo doesn’t need a 20kg luggage allowance. Like others, I’d rather know the cost upfront rather than have to go through to final stages, including inputting traveller names and DOB, before seeing a final price.

Quoting an all-in price with deductions for opting out of stuff is the same as quoting a flight-only price and charging for optional extras though. The end result is the same. You say you don't like the fact that flights can end up more expensive than you originally thought with the flight-only pricing model but you could equally say you might incorrectly assume a flight is too expensive with the all-in pricing model. I might go, oh, I fancy going to Spain but decide I can't afford it based on the all-in price, not realising that once all the deductions have been made for the unnecessary stuff, I could have been able to afford it.

We’re a family of 4 and I like the extras, I don’t need luggage for all 4 of us so I like the option of adding maybe one large case and a couple of carry ons. I very much benefitted from the options when it was only me and my husband and we could get away with carry on luggage and risking the seating allocation so I don’t mind now paying the extra for seats together and an extra bit of more luggage.

Should an obese person weighing 400kg with no baggage pay less than a 30kg person with 20kg of baggage?
Put another way though and setting the extreme argument about obese people aside: why should a petite person who weighs less just because they are small get a discount over a taller person? They have no control over their size - the all person could never be as light as the shorter one.

As said, if booking a all inclusive family holiday, they should come as standard. For city break flights, they should be add ons.

People can't seem to understand that if booking seats and luggage was free your ticket would be more expensive. It's not rocket science. If you want those things you will pay more. It's an added bonus for those who don't need them.

I think it needs to be more transparent, so you get the price of the basic flight and then the 'extras' priced and available to choose right at the start, not at the end when you've put everything in to find out a actually it's almost doubled because you want to sit next to your child or you want to take some luggage on holiday with you.
But I guess they do it that way because it's harder and more time consuming to shop around and get different prices.

If I want a specific seat or to sit together then I fully expect I pay for it. Depending on airline - same for luggage.

we fly with jet2 and their free hold baggage is very generous and no extra charge and as my OH is 6ft 4 i dont mind paying extra for a seat that means he dosent have his knees under his chin the whole flight

Agree. For example, a reservation and meal and basic checked luggage were included as standard (back in the day!) But you could opt to downgrade and not have the meal to save £10 a seat each way... Now everything is 'added on'..

This. It feels a bit bait-and-switchy otherwise.

This has been the short haul model for years so anyone assuming the headline price isn't the final price needs to catch up. I like the separate elements. Sometimes I'm traveling light and on my own and only pay the basic. I can get a return to Finland to see family for less than £100. Sometimes I'm with family and with luggage so pay more. I can pay what is appropriate for me each time.

Luggage as an extra I don’t mind at all.

I do resent having to pay extra to sit next to my young child though, especially when I don’t give an arse about ‘choosing seats’ as such, I just want them together.

My seat costs the cost of the flight, anything else is an extra in my view.

If we fly short haul we don't pay to book seats as there's only DH and I and we can sit independently for a couple of hours. The money we've saved can pay for a nice meal or similar. We've actually only ever been separated either side of an aisle, but maybe we've been lucky.

We're flying long haul next month and have paid for allocated seats as DH will never last 9 hours without someone to natter to 🙄

We pay for the amount of luggage we need. I much prefer this as it encourages us to pack light and means we're not penalised for not taking a full wardrobe away with us.

It doesnt bother me on the budget airlines, though I do hate how much faff there is to find the final price.

Pisses me off that all the "premium" airlines seem to charge for both now. It gets incredibly expensive to choose seats on long haul flights with Qatar/BA etc. Their base flight prices never got any cheaper. They just added on extra charges for things they used to include as standard.