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Comment by weberc2 | Hacker News Reader

It became more rare because the cost to fly people (plus one free checked bag) began to exceed what people were willing to pay, so airlines pulled a lever. If this were regulated, the cost of plane tickets would go up for everyone plus overhead for compliance. Maybe that's a better deal for you, but only because the government is effectively forcing other flyers to pay your way.

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I suspect you have the cause and effect backwards. It's not that people weren't willing to pay the cost of the included checked bag -- back when every airline did include 1 (or even 2!) free checked bags, it's not as people wanting to fly were going to travel sites and saying, "If only the cheapest flight here was $25 less than it was, I'd buy a ticket, but guess I'm stuck with Greyhound now." Instead, by not including the checked bag in the cost of the initial fare, an airline got to have a lower number in the list of ticket prices when customers checked on aggregation sites like Orbitz and Expedia, and most other airlines quickly followed.

This. It's the same reason American hotels are expanding and increasing "resort fees", and auto dealerships try to charge as much as possible for "doc fees". Businesses have essentially added their OWN taxes on transactions in order to lower the prices they advertise below what they actually charge. It's got a name: bait and switch.

Or, if the FTC was on the ball, they might call it Deceptive Advertising.

US really just needs to adapt transparent pricing laws, like most of the civilized world. Yes, I know sales tax in various jurisdictions makes it impossible, but at least make them advertise the "all in" cost including any fees.

But how would that work for something like an airline ticket on a comparison site? The airline has pricing transparency- they tell you when you buy a ticket that a checked bag isn't included. It is the comparison site where that is missing.

Let's say you decided to make every airline display how much it costs to fly with one checked bag... well, why did you pick one? What if one airline let's you check two bags free? Or if one gives you free food but the other charges? Has more leg room? Etc...

Pricing transparency laws only help things like "you have to include all taxes and fees for the exact item you are selling"

It doesn't help with requiring a company to include certain extras (like a checked bag or two) with the price. You are allowed to choose how you bundle things together, no matter the pricing transparency laws.

Require companies that sell online to offer an open API so it's easy to aggregate? Sounds nuts, but not that different from open banking (PSD2) in the EU.

Ok... what information is required in the API? You can't possibly describe every possible differentiating characteristic of a product in an API... even for a specific case like airlines, there are countless differences. Plane type, baggage limits, weight limits on bags, leg room, in flight entertainment, Internet, food, drinks, etc. you want the law spelling out what needs to be included? What about other industries? New ones that are being created? What happens when new features are added that aren't in the api spec? Internet wasn't a thing on airplanes 10 years ago, so it wouldn't have made it in the spec, but now internet access is a huge differentiator for flights.

This is actually an easy problem to solve: define a list of extras in the standard including fees. The structure for each extra can be pretty rigid. Something like e.g.

short-name: Tray fee

long-name: You get a foldable tray for seat to use during the flight.

price: 39,99

includes-tax: false

This is basic data modeling, really. Tne real thing would probably have closer to 50 well defined fields instead of 4 because of real-world self-inflicted complexity in the system, but the concept is the same.

It is a website. With forms. And logic to query a database. And do math.

Aggregators are capable of asking what city, date and time, how many bodies, which service class, which seat, etc. and returning your menu of options with prices based on those details.

Yet asking "how many bags" and multiplying that by the airline's rate is impossible?

Of course it requires changes. I suspect those happen now and then.

My point is that airlines would be able to find something else to withhold by default and charge for if you tried to mandate bag fees be displayed up front. A fee for being allowed to recline. A fee for getting to sit behind someone who isn't allowed to recline. The list goes on and on.

However, then you can't argue anymore that "the market" will handle it. Because even the theory behind that requires that market participants are informed - which they evidently aren't.

That's not how it works. You're creating your own definition of what a market is or should be or how it works.

A suitcase when you travel is not an extra. The payment of the waiter when I dine out is not an extra.

And transparency is not about informing the customer about charges in the fine-print of a website or a menu card. Transparency is being up-front with the total cost so you make it easy for the customer to make an informed choice.

I usually travel with a single carry-on bag when I travel. It's a tiny hard sided suitcase that fits in the carry-on space and includes enough clothes for a week. I don't technically need a free checked bag nor would I typically use one as I want to avoid the insane wait at the luggage claim. So this I disagree with. I don't mind charging for checked bags, but then I don't mind paying more for air travel for certain things, so I don't think that this particular example fits.

I wholeheartedly agree that tipping should go away. It's literally a remnant of the post slavery age in America and has a nasty habit of lowering workers wages. Another problem is taking dine and dash bills out of the waiters wages. The waiter shouldn't be paying for deadbeats.

So I agree with your general point, just not on the airline baggage example.

"Pricing transparency laws only help things like "you have to include all taxes and fees for the exact item you are selling"

That is part of the point. You can also have standard prices to quote: "All fees they charge every customer plus one checked bag should be included in price", for example. Airlines that offer bonuses for free will advertise it clearly. After all, we know when a shampoo bottle includes 20% extra shampoo temporarily - I'm not sure this will be an issue. People know that 2 hotels might be the same price but only one of them offers use of a pool - I'm pretty sure they will look at airlines as well.

Quite a few airlines in Europe tack "fuel surcharge" fees onto tickets, especially those booked using frequent-flyer miles. Depending on the airline and destination, the "fuel surcharge" -- which must be paid in cash -- for redeeming miles can approach the cost of just buying a ticket.

For example, if you book a flight from the US to London on American Airlines, redeeming miles, you'll be on the hook for around $10 in taxes. If you book the same flight, using American Airlines miles, but happen to be unfortunate enough to get it on their partner British Airways, you'll get dinged for around five hundred dollars in "fuel surcharge".

Last time I checked, Brazil was the only country where this is illegal.

Yes, I know sales tax in various jurisdictions makes it impossible

I heard this argument many times before but never quite understood the explanation. Could you elaborate on this?

In the US there are taxes at the time of sale. These taxes change depending on where you are making the purchase, where you live, who you are, and what you are buying.

Those things are fixed at purchase though aren't they? I don't pay a lower sales tax in a different state because I live somewhere else, and I don't pay less sales tax on a book if I buy it in the same transaction as something with a different levy. Europe has VAT on most items, but the rates are different based on what you're buying, where you're buying it and where you reside, but we manage it

The POS system knows how to calculate the cost of each item, why can't they just out that on the sticker instead,.

For some reason I can't reply to a child of this comment. It would be easy enough to require all advertising to publish the lowest and highest all in price within the geographic area of the advertisement. For many ads, it would also be possible to require at least per state granularity. That would not be an onerous burden.

Sure, and there are some places that include tax in the listed price. Usually businesses that do this figure it out so the price after tax comes to a whole number. This goes against the common .99 marketing psychology, and is a red flag that they might be skimming.

However if the sale is online and the company has a presence in multiple states they have to charge based on the user, which they cant do until they know who the user is.

Edit: Just to be clear I wish they would put the final price. Here is a picture I found of Pat's King of Steaks in Philadelphia, they have price tax and total for each item.

https://media-cdn.tripadvisor.com/media/photo-s/03/2c/33/c2/...

Seems like this would be a pretty simple fix wouldn't it? Choose your state when you jump onto a shopping site to see the price with taxes and shipping included. Instead they wait to bait and switch at the register.

Seconding the question by @maccard. You're eventually charged a certain amount during payment so in principle it is possible.

With one crucial difference. I can’t buy the car without the doc fee, but I can fly without a checked bag.

Yes, you can. Get to the final signing then refuse to pay it. Tell the dealer you'll walk if it isn't waived. I do it every time.

I chuckled at your scenario, but more realistically airlines realized that some critical mass of the market would rather pack a little lighter and save on their airfare instead of paying for a checked bag. If the scenario went as you described, then the airlines were trading their credibility for a short term boost in profits and the market will correct to their mid/long-term disadvantage. This is a poor consolation to the unsavvy consumers who "fell for it", but the solution is to produce savvier consumers, not to penalize the current crop of savvy consumers by inflating their ticket prices.

"This is a way for airlines to get the lowest price in front of consumers" and "this is a way to address a market segment willing to go carry-on only in order to save money" are not mutually exclusive, are they? Consider the recent addition of "Basic Economy" fares for some airlines now, which incur extra charges for overhead bin space. I would assert that this is a way to get an even lower price in front of consumers. You would presumably assert that it is a way for the airlines to let people who can travel with little to no luggage save even more. Again: both of those things can be true.

Lol they are both true; that’s my point. The market is securing an agreeable outcome for both parties. It’s literally a win-win scenario. The airlines are finding ways to carve out more value for their customers in exchange for their business. This is eminently desirable!

I think your real issue is against the increased cost of air travel and the inconvenience it poses for travelers who are unwilling or unable to compromise by trading off luggage for price. It sucks, but it’s not “greedy corporations”; it’s just economic reality.

Maybe Orbitz should include baggage fees in their pricing estimates?

> it's not as people wanting to fly were going to travel sites and saying, "If only the cheapest flight here was $25 less than it was"

Is this meant to say that consumers aren't price sensitive? If so, why don't airlines just charge arbitrarily high prices?

I think you're missing one piece of this picture. If there is unused space/weight capacity, the airline fills that space with cargo from traditional/package carriers. So there are third parties, unseen to you as an airline passenger, competing with you on price to put stuff in that cargo hold.

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