Effective for tickets purchased as of today, American is raising basic economy 1st checked bag fees between the US and Europe, Israel, or Morocco from $60 to $75 each way.
While Alaska, Delta, JetBlue, and United all give a free bag to credit cardholders on domestic and international flights, American only gives a free bag on domestic flights.
That comes just a week after US taxpayers bailed out American Airlines to the tune of a $4.1 billion grant and $1.7 billion loan.
Basic economy didn’t lower fares as promised, they just added restrictions and took away even more dignity from economy passengers. They are one of the items I would have made the airlines ditch in exchange for taking billions of taxpayer dollars.
Instead, American took taxpayer dollars and just a week later increased their baggage fees. They didn’t even wait for travel to demand to pick up from record lows to start adding fees.
Congratulations American on making the first tone-deaf move after taking taxpayer bailout funds!
At least you’re now first in something…
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40 Comments On "A Week After Accepting $5.8 Billion From Taxpayers, American Airlines Raises Transatlantic Baggage Fee To $150 Round-Trip"
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BAD NEWS
now other will follow
AFAIK, they don’t sell BE tickets to Israel
They postponed their Israel flight resumption until September 2021, so they don’t sell anything now to Israel on their own metal.
But it’s in place for when they do.
I know, because I was booked for sukkos before they canceled, but when they did sell tickets, they didn’t have a BE optional. If they’re introducing it now, that’s far worse then the 15$ increase!
Where does it end ? always slamming on more and more extra fees.
animals
Hi @Dan let’s try to get a media outlet to publish your petition may help get the ball moving. here is a link to your petition https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/create-travelers-bill-rights-exchange-bailing-out-airlines-and-hotels
I believe many (likely a majority) who signed didn’t realize they had to click the email link to confirm their signature. Hence, the relatively low number of supporters.
I was sure that petition would be signed by the masses overnight. What a shame.
Guess everyone has to give a little – in AA’s mind, this new fee is passenger’s share
Your first mistake is flying AA! Not surprised all of the discount carriers are above them
lets get some big players to tweet about it jake turx…….
When the US Air management team took over, American went to pieces. It used to be ny favorite carrier. Now it’s last in my list. And I’m a lifetime Gold member.
I know you don’t want to pay more (or, perhaps, anything) to fly, but how are “bailout funds” and increased airline fees related — except that the airline obviously needs money?. It’s almost exactly the same reason local governments will now be raising taxes despite their taxpayers reduced incomes — they need money to cover their losses, too. Real world economics don’t seem to click so well with you. You just want more for yourself. You won’t get “more” if the airline goes out of business.
iahphx what you’re mistaken about is that the passengers (taxpayers) already paid more i.e the ridiculous amount of bailout money!
Interesting comparison to municipal governments needing to replace lost tax revenue. I would assume Dan’s, and most people’s objections come when they hear the airline industry as a whole allocated over 90% of their free cash flow over the last decade to buyback shares.
Not only did they charge more and more for the same, if not deteriorated product and reward their shareholders (which is their right). They came to the taxpayer with their hands turned up saying “woe is me”. They were given their handout and turned around a week later to raise their baggage fees in the middle of the lowest demand period airlines have ever seen.
Actually, American spent more than 100% of their free cash flow over the past decade, spending billions on stock buybacks.
Then they took taxpayer bailout money. Then they raise our fees days later.
Corporate America at its finest.
The airline wouldn’t go out of business. It would go into bankruptcy and another entity, either another airline or private equity or whatever, would by the company. The flights would go on, but the people and entities that invested in or lent money to the airline would lose some or all of their investment. That is the risks that are involved in lending and investing.
Soon they’ll be charging more for the bag than for the passenger
It doesn’t seem like you understand how the bailout is paid for. The bailout is paid for by funds that the federal reserve effectively prints and not by funds that are collected from taxpayers by the IRS.
You can’t just print unlimited money, those are public dollars that need to be covered by taxpayers.
That’s what is special about the government is that they can print money. Normally they limit it because it leads to inflation, but during an economic downturn it won’t lead to major inflation so they don’t have to worry.
You can read more about it here https://theintercept.com/2020/03/27/coronavirus-stimulus-package-spending/
Also a significant portion of the CARES act bailout to the airlines is actually a loan which the airlines will need to pay back by giving the government shares in their company.
Haven’t read it, but taxpayers either pay for it with higher taxes now, higher taxes in the future, or devaluation of the money we hold via inflation. There’a a consequence to handing out money.
I wrote in the post what portion was a loan and what was a grant.
Wont it lead to inflation if GDP us low?
Where does the federal reserve get the money from? If printing is all it takes then they should print 24/7/365 and give that money to whoever need it.
Please provide more details. I have studied the basics of economics, and never saw anything about the federal reserve just printing money, and adding it to the treasury. They indeed do add money to the economy, but its a indirect process. I wrote about this for my research paper to get college credits from an online institution. You can read it here. If I am wrong in the way I explain monetary policy (which is very possible, but I did have it reviewed by others) please let me know
https://docs.google.com/document/d/10E14Ez2ys31QlBt0eOnBwp5D6zuNGzkYD4U1NyemPII
Actually taking a second look at your comment, it seems to me (not that I am super knowledgeable about this) that you are the most correct. However when the Feds do add money, its based off of GDP, which is created by us the American people, and therefore that money does rightfully belong fully to the American People just as if it was our Tax dollars. Also this bail might have been our actual tax dollars (Im sure this info is public, but I am not doing the research)
Kennedy Center received 35M in stimulus bill monies and shamelessly announced one day later they’re discontinuing Musicians’ wages. The shpiel repeated itself by a neat number of recipients of 7 to 8 figure of handouts
Our politicians should get mass protests about this! How dare they accept money and screw taxpayers! If someone can post where to send protests, I’m sure many would follow up with this
you mean the corrupt politicians who get paid off by all the big companies. Yeh right.
America is in shambles tbh due to all the “politicians”.
Insurance, healthcare, broadband internet, cell service, patriot act. You name it our politicians from the ice age have messed it up. Wish there weren’t so many paid off relics in politics.
By the way, I’m not a Bernie or Trump supporter or hater. I think 90 percent on both aisles are corrupt and way behind the modern world.
Is there anything we can do?
and they closed my account for fraudulent activities without telling what activities they were referring to…
who?
I’m sure u know…
Suitcase fee in first suitcase ? Or first is free?
Might have to do with airfreight demand, which hasn’t gone done very much, and many fewer planes flying, so they want to fill them with freight.
How is Spirit relatively high up in the list, significantly above United, for example?
This is for Basic Economy only. Basic economy is anyway designed to either give a great deal to people not needing anything more than a simple seat to sit in and the ability to bring a personal bag or to be able to advertise cheap tickets and rob you once you’re in. According to Dan this whole ticket class should be eliminated, and this is probably why.
@iahphx
I guess ur trying to me smart, different, individual ect in ur thinking as well as being an “unhypocritical” capitalist but #1 over the years ive come to realize that Dan has a pertty good grasp on business. He doesnt have to show ALL his knowledge in EVERY post.
#2 in ur attempt to be smart you seem to lack understanding in many many aspects that for many of us dont need to be discussed or said or has already been discussed elsewhere on other posts.
Ur analogy is so terribly flawed. As similar as the gov & the open market need to be run (as a corp to some degree) there is a tremendous gap between AA & a State.
#3 if AA went out of business or was forced to have SOME measure of morals & decency the open market would fill that gap faster than you (clearly) can possibly imagine! There as 100s of plans in the airline industry hungrily awaiting an ultimatum!! Whether be it in form of regulation or other. Overnight there wud be plans out there that were obviously NOT prepared overnight…
Bottom line, dont laminate Dans “incompetence” on his own forum as u run the risk of being the fool.