Airline sports equipment fees confusion
By Darren Cronian on Tuesday, October 27th, 2009

A few weeks back I received an email from a consumer who was booking a one-way flight with Thomas Cook Airlines and wanted to take a surfboard. The information on the airline’s website clearly states that it is £40 for the return trip for carrying this type of sports equipment.

Airline sports equipment fees confusion

Sporting equipment extra fee’s

When the customer contacted the airline and asked if it would be a £20 fee because they have booked a single journey the airline confirmed that it would still be £40. Thinking that this was a little unfair I contacted Thomas Cook via Twitter to see if they could shed some light on it.

Customer confusion with wording

While the support was excellent (speedy!) the response back was the same, that it was a set fee, regardless of it being a one way flight. I think the website is not very clear and needs changing to remove the word ‘return’ with ‘set fee’ as I think this could cause some confusion.

I am interested to hear if you have been affected by sporting equipment extra fee’s with airlines.


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4 responses to “Airline sports equipment fees confusion”

John | 28 October, 2009 at 9:59 am

Darren,
The Thomas Cook airline website still says “Surfboards and body boards are charged at £40 short haul/short haul plus and £60 long haul for the return trip.”

I personally, would assume that a one way trip was half the return. I would be confused by it and would wonder why the total flight amount differed from my expectations. I would probably stop the booking process and look at another travel option.Its hypothetical, as I have made a conscious decision not to fly, unless there is a very good reason, such as a family emergency and I doubt whether I would be taking a surfboard with me!

I know this is unlikely, but say the journey with the airline involved two flights to get to the destination via a hub for example then potentially they would need to handle the bulky equipment twice (four times on a return.). In that case a set fee would work against the airline. My view is that charges should be related to expenses incurred by the airline for their services.

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Nick | 28 October, 2009 at 3:15 pm

Darren

Airline fees have nothing to do with cost… they just are, take a bow and say thank you Mr O’Leary.

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John | 30 October, 2009 at 12:33 pm

Nick,

They have to relate to some sort of reality or customers would move their business elsewhere. If you read the T&C’s for Ryanair you can avoid a lot of their charges. Even Ryanair make it clear that the charges are for each journey. I was going to say per leg, but then they would charge you twice each time you flew!

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Steve | 5 November, 2009 at 2:57 pm

I think you might be a bit naive thinking that John. Sorry, but there are plenty of fees that do not relate to the actual service/process involved.

Back on the main topic though, Darren this is a continual headache for anyone involved in winter sports. The rules are always changing and are different for every airline/operator. Read any of the forums to see how many times gear carriage comes up. The silly thing is a bit of common sense would remove most of the problems, however attempts to get away with more by customers and jobsworth attitudes of staff have created a lucky dip scenario at check-in.

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