While fines for overweight luggage have been in place for awhile now, Samoa Airlines is implementing a fine that will charge people by their weight. Image above by asifhebes.com.
Said the airline’s Chief Executive Chris Langton, “People have always traveled on the basis of their seat but as many airline operators know airlines don’t run on seats they run on weight and particularly the smaller the aircraft you are in the less variance you can accept in terms of the difference in weight between passengers.”
Mr Langton went on to say he believes weighing passengers and charging them per kilo is the future of air travel, and that people would most likely be pleasantly surprised by the new system. Passengers are being charged $1 per kilo to $4.16 per kilo including the weight of themselves and their baggage, depending on the length of the flight. When purchasing the ticket online, passengers would input the total weight to get their price. In order to eliminate people lying about their weight, fliers will be selected at random at the airport to be weighed.
Personally, while I understand Mr. Langton’s point that people wouldn’t have to worry about overweight baggage fees anymore, this would be a serious inconvenience to those travelers who don’t check a bag and only travel with carry-on luggage.
What do you think of Samoa Airline’s pay-per-kilo pricing method?
Jessica Festa is the editor of the travel sites Jessie on a Journey (http://jessieonajourney.com) and Epicure & Culture (http://epicureandculture.com). Along with blogging at We Blog The World, her byline has appeared in publications like Huffington Post, Gadling, Fodor’s, Travel + Escape, Matador, Viator, The Culture-Ist and many others. After getting her BA/MA in Communication from the State University of New York at Albany, she realized she wasn’t really to stop backpacking and made travel her full time job. Some of her most memorable experiences include studying abroad in Sydney, teaching English in Thailand, doing orphanage work in Ghana, hiking her way through South America and traveling solo through Europe. She has a passion for backpacking, adventure, hiking, wine and getting off the beaten path.
