More Not-to-Do’s From the Airlines

Speaking of the airlines, if you’ve flown anything other than Southwest lately you probably have been nickel-and- dimed (or $5 and $25’d) by the extra fees for checking bags, bad snacks, and more.
 
United expects to rake in more than $1 BILLION this year alone from these fees. Two airlines are even adding a “fee on top of a fee,”  charging $5 MORE for a bag if you pay at the counter, providing an option to do it online. They put a ridiculous spin on it, calling it an “online discount.”
 
All of this, of course infuriates their customers. Fares fluctuate all of the time and people realize that. Why not just build their required increases into the fares so we don’t feel like we are being nicked with all of the extras?
 
(UPS does this also with their commercial customers, by the way, and it makes my blood boil with all of their inane extra fees.)
 
Sales point: as a salesperson, you might or might not be able to control the pricing to your customers. If you do, keep in mind the above.
 
One other thing you probably can do is when you prepare a proposal or quote, be sure to detail the items and services that you might be including as extras, and under the pricing column put the regular price with a line through it, and “No Charge.” This helps them understand the value of what extras they might be getting.