The low cost, high stress, airline

‘Tickets 1-60 to the right, 61-121 on the left’. Well that’s what the sign said. For a start the tickets were a piece of plastic, marked only with a number in felt tip pen. The sense of anticipation in the waiting room of terminal three was noticeable. The seats nearest the check in were already full despite the departure time being an hour away.

And then it started. An eagle eyed passenger spotted some movement from the check in staff. The rush began. A strange thing happened. Old people who for the most part looked weary and laden, suddenly became fifty metre sprint competitors. Little children who had been told to sit still for the last two hours were suddenly pulled along buy their parents. Bags were dragged along the floor. Small children were pulled along the floor. Even grandma Doris, was pulled along the floor. And there it was. A queue. Well sort of. It was more of a squashed pack of people, apologising occasionally for banging their suitcase into the poor old lady behind.

And then something happened. As in all occasions such as these someone thought they knew better than others. “Yes Margerate, tickets 1-60 need to go round the right hand side”. Like a series of Chinese whispers word got around. Slowly to very quickly a pack broke of and rushed to the right, forming a second opposing queue. “Families with children only please from the right queue” asked the check in lady. A huge series of tuts followed. “George I knew we should have stayed where we were”. Susan was clearly not happy with her husband’s decision making. A large and randomly bearded German man must have had his children packed in his equally large bag. He made it through despite the ‘how incredibly rude’ looks from the passengers around him.

And why all this stress? Its called low cost airlines. You see people go through all this just because they think they are getting a good deal. Well where do you start? Well you start by seeing an advert saying ‘Fly from London to Frankfurt for £2!!’. So you think, well you convince yourself, that must be a good deal. I mean it’s cheaper to get to Europe than down the road on the number 22 bus. But from the moment you book the ticket to the time you have come back from your destination your mind goes down through the gears, finally, after revving in first for a long time you consider, just maybe, it wasn’t worth it.

So two pounds. You can’t complain about two pounds. Well for a start it isn’t going to be two pounds. They add in three pounds in ‘fees’. What exactly these fees are for nobody knows. Ok maybe I can forgive the fees. But what about the six pounds ‘service charge’? What’s the difference between the two? And what ‘service’ have they given me? I'm insured for four pounds extra. What so if my flight does not go for some reason I’m insured against it? I think not. Add in the Government and airport tax and your two pound flight is now a forty pound flight. Well forty pounds still isn’t bad, is it?

It’s amazing these days how people can advertise things that, lets just say, stretch the truth. If I saw an advert for a day’s sightseeing in London, I would expect to see some famous landmarks, not a field somewhere in Luton. So when you book for a flight leaving from London you would expect somewhere near London, not somewhere sixty miles away. But hey, it’s cheap.

Flying is all about the show, the attractive air hostesses bring around the free food and drink. The random lottery that can sit you next to someone really interesting, or really strange. In the in-flight entertainment. So when you see that ‘how the hell did she get the job’ Tracy from Dagenham you start to think maybe, just maybe, this is not like a normal airline. The customer is always right. Or maybe not. The whole mentality has changed with low cost airlines. If the plane is delayed – it’s your fault because you pay for what you get. If the air hostess is not smiling, why should she. She is working on a budget airline and hey, you pay for what you get cheapskate. If you can’t get the seats with the extra legroom, well who gives a damn, if you wanted the extra leg room then pay the money!

But here is the best bit. When you land at an airport that takes double the amount of time to get to your required destination than the flight took to get across, then maybe you just start to think. Just maybe two pounds does sound expensive to me.