Checked baggage being screened by US Transportation Security Administration
Forbes-The Department of Transportation is cancelling the pursuit of new legislation that would require airlines to clearly state luggage fees in airfare searches. In a statement on December 5th, the department said that it is “committed to protecting consumers from hidden fees and to ensuring transparency,” however it did not “believe that Departmental action is necessary to meet this objective at this time.”
Originally proposed in January of 2017, the initial Supplemental Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (SNPRM) was created as an extension of a 2014 filing to bring better transparency around fees to consumers when shopping for airfare.
The legislation proposed in 2017 focused specifically on baggage fees. In the last several years, legacy U.S. carriers have introduced a range of fees for checking bags on domestic and international flights, adding a significant cost for many travellers (as of last week, Delta Air Lines is also starting to charge the fees in some international cabins).
Those fees, however, aren’t exactly clear throughout the airfare booking process. Shopping for airfare through a carrier’s website, for example, only shows baggage fees after flights and base fares are selected, while some online travel agents don’t expose a traveller to the potential costs at all.
As originally written, the legislation would have required “air carriers, foreign air carriers, and ticket agents to clearly disclose to consumers at all points of sale customer-specific fee information, or itinerary-specific information if a customer elects not to provide customer-specific information, for a first checked bag, a second checked bag, and one carry-on bag wherever fare and schedule information is provided to consumers.” It further mandated that airlines would share baggage fee data with online travel agents.
The Department of Transportation’s decision appears to be in an effort to reduce industry regulation. In its statement, the agency said that its “withdrawal corresponds with the Department’s and Administration’s priorities and is consistent with the Executive Order 13771, Reducing Regulation and Controlling Regulatory Costs.”
Some consumers and activists, however, aren’t very happy. “I can tell you definitively as former CEO of Ticketmaster that this will cause consumers to unknowingly pay more than they intended, while airlines will run tests to find the best way to trick consumers into paying those fees” tweeted Nathan Hubbard, adding that the decision was “unconscionably anti-consumer” and “a complete sell out.”
Indeed, the lack of regulation may open the door for airlines to devise crafty ways in which to further add ancillary fees. It’ll be up to the industry, in this case, to self-regulate.
With report from Forbes
