Air travel company to calculate plane ticket prices by passenger weight.

[DoPo]

Everyone else is leisure travelers, who fly a couple of times a year at most, if not every several years. People who travel for leisure are on vacation, and if there's one thing they aren't going to do on a vacation it's maintain a crash diet. And even so, being anorexic every day of the year to save a few bucks once every year or so isn't a reasonable plan even by the measure of the craziest penny-pinchers.

Erm...I'm saying this as an international student, some travel more than that. OK, not me since it takes ages to go home, so I do reserve it for a couple of times a year, but then again, my home is nowhere near an airport and I don't study close to one either. However, I have talked and discussed it at length with other fellow international students - if it was feasible to go back home more often, we would do it. Depending on where you live/study, it might be possible to hop on a plane and go visit friends and family just over the weekend (by comparison, the optimal time for my travel is something like 18 hours. In one direction). Plane tickets aren't that expensive usually - you can get some good deals with them. But we're also students - while I won't actually starve myself to save some money on travel (I don't think it would be that big a sum, in fact) and I think it's stupid, I also know that there would be people stupid enough to do it. Not many, but don't underestimate the idiots. And students. And idiot students.

 

[lRookiel]

That is fucking hilarious.

Well, sounds like I'll be saving money with them (If I ever use them)

:3

 

[Psykoma]

If an A380 flying to Singapore has a full allocation of 471 passengers, weighing 80kg each, thats 37.6 metric tonnes.

Now pretend all the passengers are fat. We're talking serious increases in fuel useage.

Say that the fat you're talking about is an extra 30 kg, means an extra 14,130 kg, so an extra 14.13 metric tonnes.

The empty weight of an A380 is about 276 (252 with different model) metric tonnes, add to that the base weight of the healthy crowd - 37.6 metric tonnes, total there is 313.6 metric tonnes.
At that point the extra 30kg per person would mean an extra roughly 4.5% in weight.
But, that's not accounting for the base weight of fuel which would be required to transport the base passenger weight.
Pretty sure if you found that amount, then the increase in total weight by the 'fat' passengers would be likely about 2% increase in weight.

Would anyone here actually know the amount of fuel an A380 would actually requires for a base passenger weight, and is able to quantify just how much fuel would be required for a 2-4% increase in total weight?

Me? I'm Mr Average, through and through, I approve of this pricing structure. If all airlines adopted this, I'd be able to see my two nieces, who live in NZ, more often. 2 and 4 year olds weigh bugger-all!

Why would you need all airlines to do that, rather than just one? Do you ship separate parts of your body on every available airline for the same trip?

 

[x EvilErmine x]

Sounds like a good plan to me, If you are fat and want to pay the same as some one slim, then all you have to do is take less baggage under these plans. It's the total weight that's being charged for after all.

I know it may seem harsh but not all fat people are fat because they have some underlying medical problem that prevents them from loosing weight, some fat people are just fat because they eat too much and are sedentary. My shoes cost more because I have big feet, should everyone have to pay the higher rate just because my size costs a little more to make?

 

[Private Custard]

If an A380 flying to Singapore has a full allocation of 471 passengers, weighing 80kg each, thats 37.6 metric tonnes.

Now pretend all the passengers are fat. We're talking serious increases in fuel useage.

Say that the fat you're talking about is an extra 30 kg, means an extra 14,130 kg, so an extra 14.13 metric tonnes.

The empty weight of an A380 is about 276 (252 with different model) metric tonnes, add to that the base weight of the healthy crowd - 37.6 metric tonnes, total there is 313.6 metric tonnes.
At that point the extra 30kg per person would mean an extra roughly 4.5% in weight.
But, that's not accounting for the base weight of fuel which would be required to transport the base passenger weight.
Pretty sure if you found that amount, then the increase in total weight by the 'fat' passengers would be likely about 2% increase in weight.

Would anyone here actually know the amount of fuel an A380 would actually requires for a base passenger weight, and is able to quantify just how much fuel would be required for a 2-4% increase in total weight?

Just some rough figures as each flight is different depending on head/tailwinds, about 12,000kg per hour (15,000 litres). So a thirteen hour flight to Singapore will use roughly 156,000kg, or 195,000 litres.

Add 4% and you'll need 203,000 litres

Me? I'm Mr Average, through and through, I approve of this pricing structure. If all airlines adopted this, I'd be able to see my two nieces, who live in NZ, more often. 2 and 4 year olds weigh bugger-all!

Why would you need all airlines to do that, rather than just one? Do you ship separate parts of your body on every available airline for the same trip?

Searching for the best deal. So far, I've flown with Singapore, Malaysia and Emirates, depending who offers the best prices at the time. The more competition the better for us.

Although to be honest, things are in a shit state at the moment. In 2009, it cost me £1000 to get to New Zealand. Last December, £1400 for the same period. A 40% jump in three years is just silly, anything that can curb costs for me is welcomed with open arms!

 

[Quaxar]

It's a great idea, but I only have one issue. They should be charging extra after someone exceeds a certain level in their bmi. Otherwise, people might go anorexic to cut down on flight costs.

Someone becoming anorexic to save a little bit of money on a leisure trip surely has worse problems to worry about.

And as a seriously underweight person I can only look forward to this becoming more frequent.

 

[Not G. Ivingname]

I feel like, from a customer service perspective, this is really a bad move. If there's one thing you never make your customer aware of, except in the most extreme of circumstances, it's that something about them is causing more of an inconvenience than any other customer. When I worked at Disney World, we never talked down to people in wheelchairs, and when they are loading on and off of rides they are never told to hurry up and you never talk about how it's holding up the ride. In truth, it is holding up the ride, but you're never to make any comment to that effect while they or any other guests are around. Customer service isn't just about making sure the customer gets what they wants, it's about making sure they are made comfortable in getting what they want and making special requests as needed.

Quite often, the people in motor scooters aren't physically disabled, beyond being overweight. But we don't prohibit them from renting scooters, and we don't charge them any more than those with actual physical disabilities. And we don't make a fuss when they need to park their scooters and get on and off of rides, just as we don't make a fuss when handicapped guests do the same. Does it cause a greater and possibly unnecessary strain on Disney's resources? Of course. More people renting scooters means Disney needs to have and maintain a larger fleet of the things. Not to mention scooters slow down crowd movement and affect how quickly rides are filled up. But their goal is to first and foremost serve the customer, so none of them are ever told how much they are inconveniencing us. And that is something that is never questioned, it's common sense as far as cast members are concerned.

So when I see an airline charging customers by the pound, I see an airline that is not only telling their customers when they are being inconvenient, but is also giving the customers a number explaining exactly how much of a bother they are. In theory it's not discriminatory, but not everybody has control of their weight. This doesn't just negatively affect fat people, but also tall people, muscular people, or people with growth disorders. The airline is grading their customer's value by pound, and if it isn't discriminatory then at the very least it's incredibly rude and goes against the most basic rules of customer service.

It is a tricky trade off that has to be made.

On the one hand, yeah, it is going to make customers angry when they see there plane ticket prices skyrocket.

On other hand, airlines have all kinds of finical problems since 911. They are having a hard time keeping even, and the average increase in people's weight hasn't been helping much. Jet fuel and flying a plane is expensive, they need to make up the cost SOMEWHERE. It all comes down to if the money lost do to bad PR will outweigh (some pun intended) the money made by charging per Kilo.

I do think making it the COMBINED weight of both the passenger and their luggage helps soften the PR blow a bit.

 

[Not G. Ivingname]

It's a great idea, but I only have one issue. They should be charging extra after someone exceeds a certain level in their bmi. Otherwise, people might go anorexic to cut down on flight costs.

So what, you're on some kind of 'moral' crusade against people's weight? Because when talking about costs your proposal is nonsense. In regards to cost weight is weight, regardless of BMI.

Body Mass Index has also been found to be wrong for many body types, for example really tall people have a very inacurate BMI, often declaring them obese when they are perfectly healthy. Basing it on BMI is just asking for trouble, doing it just on straight kilos seems like a much safer bet.

 

[Raikas]

It makes sense. Airplanes have to consume more fuel when more weight is added, so why not charge by weight? The part about paying for the combined weight of you and your baggage makes it a bit more fair.

I agree with this.

I'm not sure major airlines would ever really charge more, but I wouldn't mind seeing the passenger+baggage weight catch on (so smaller people could have a larger bag.

Some of the smaller airlines will refuse overweight baggage outright rather than just charging extra, which can lead to situations where a 50kg passenger can't bring on a bag that's 2kg overweight, while a 150kg guy can get on with his right-at-the-limit bag. And that's just absurd.

 

[Psykoma]

Add 4% and you'll need 203,000 litres

But my question is also does a % increase in weight mean an equivalent % increase in fuel consumption?
I can easily see needing at least an equivalent amount of extra fuel during takeoff, but I can't really see the equivalent amount being needed for maintaining flight/landing.
Maybe that 4% increased weight would only be half a percent total increase in fuel, or it might be 8% increas, I don't know and was wondering if anyone knew the physics behind the equations.

 

[Private Custard]

Add 4% and you'll need 203,000 litres

But my question is also does a % increase in weight mean an equivalent % increase in fuel consumption?
I can easily see needing at least an equivalent amount of extra fuel during takeoff, but I can't really see the equivalent amount being needed for maintaining flight/landing.
Maybe that 4% increased weight would only be 1% total increase in fuel, or it might be 8% increas, I don't know and was wondering if anyone knew the physics behind the equations.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_economy_in_aircraft

Drag is proportional to the lift required for flight, which is equal to the weight of the aircraft in level flight. As induced drag increases with weight, mass reduction, with improvements in engine efficiency and reductions in aerodynamic drag, has been a principal source of efficiency gains in aircraft, with a rule-of-thumb being that a 1% weight reduction corresponds to around a 0.75% reduction in fuel consumption.

Not quite 1:1. I did the research, you can do the maths.....I'm going for a smoke!!

I know a few pilots (commercial, freight, military....all heavies). If we can't work it out, I could ask them.

 

[sky14kemea]

Wait, seriously?

Score! Finally being underweight will work in my favour!

However, that is kind of bullshit for overweight people. I'd expect one hell of a backlash if I were them.

Besides, I'm betting all the luggage that people bring weighs the flight down a lot too. Are they gonna start charging people who bring heavier luggage more as well?

[sub][sub][sub]Though I'd still be winning with that one, I pack light...[/sub][/sub][/sub]

 

[Shock and Awe]

Well I suppose Samoa Airlines would use smaller aircraft, and they would be more effected by people's weight then say, a 777. I've only flown and worked weight and balance on Cessnas, but it gives a bit of insight to how a 100 pound person could be permissible, but a 200 would put an aircraft overweight.

 

[Private Custard]

Besides, I'm betting all the luggage that people bring weighs the flight down a lot too. Are they gonna start charging people who bring heavier luggage more as well?

They already do. You get utterly screwed financially for going overweight on your baggage.

 

[Sajuuk_Khar]

Personally I have no issue with the idea of pay per weight, I'm probably a bit heavier than I should be (If you trust BMI). If this becomes more widespread I could see a possible problem as people try to crash diet or slim down too much to get cheaper tickets. Generally for privacy with weigh-ins though it wouldn't be too hard to have some pressure pad scales at check-in that had a discrete counter on it so that you and the check-in attendant can both see the weight, as it is, no-one can see how much my bag weighs when I check in, other than the attendant and myself. I can see this as one of the next thing bigger airlines do to cut costs. If they know the exact weight of the plane and contents they could be able to cut down on the amount of fuel carried which may result in (Hold your laughter please) lower costs for the end users, even the slightly heavier ones, at the very least it might delay the inevitable price rises.

Being in New Zealand the only major airline is Air New Zealand, Jetstar also operates a domestic service but only flies to the three main centres, Air NZ has adopted a number of automated check-in machines at their airports around the country, disposing of a domestic check-in counter entirely in my current city. In order to switch over to pay-by-weight they would either need to retro fit each machine with some scales, revert to a manned check-in desk or some combination of both i.e. you have to get weighed at a manned scales, but can check-in the rest of it yourself.

Specifically to Samoa Air, they only operate in Western Samoa, American Samoa and Tonga, three countries that are in the top 10 for the percentage of overweight people.[footnote]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obesity_in_the_Pacific[/footnote] When booking their website requires you to enter an approximate weight for both you and your luggage which you can then pre-pay if you wish, prepaying guarantees you that much weight.[footnote]http://samoaair.ws/index.php/booking-2/pay-by-weight[/footnote] I've checked out their prices, for a similar distance travelled and flight time I would pay roughly the same price as my local airline.
I can see why they've done this before any bigger operators, given that the airline is operating a rather small plane (19 or 20 seats) any slight increase in weight would result in a relatively large percentage weight increase compared to the likes of a fully laden A380 (as previously discussed). According to the airlines Wikipedia page they've been having financial difficulties for a while, so they may be trying a gamble to help cut costs.

 

[DudeistBelieve]

Not shocking, Samoans are a rather large people even when fit and there probably is very little in the way of competing airline.

I feel like, from a customer service perspective, this is really a bad move. If there's one thing you never make your customer aware of, except in the most extreme of circumstances, it's that something about them is causing more of an inconvenience than any other customer. When I worked at Disney World, we never talked down to people in wheelchairs, and when they are loading on and off of rides they are never told to hurry up and you never talk about how it's holding up the ride. In truth, it is holding up the ride, but you're never to make any comment to that effect while they or any other guests are around. Customer service isn't just about making sure the customer gets what they wants, it's about making sure they are made comfortable in getting what they want and making special requests as needed.

Oh so rare I have an opportunity to ask this, but any dark/odd secrets about the theme park? Like I know they have some seedy underground city that tourist are not allowed to photograph or something. What other strict rules did they give you?

 

[someonehairy-ish]

I can see a weird divide happening where airlines that use the current pricing system end up inundated with more and more obese (or extremely muscular) passengers who don't want to travel with airlines like these. Could have a knock on effect throughout the industry, if it does take off at all. + As harsh as it sounds, perhaps having being fat be a genuine, tangible obstacle for people might be a better motivator for people wanting to lose weight than the usual ones (ie health/image reasons).

 

[ResonanceSD]

It's a great idea, but I only have one issue. They should be charging extra after someone exceeds a certain level in their bmi. Otherwise, people might go anorexic to cut down on flight costs.

If you need to have an eating disorder to fly, you should probably not be flying in the first place. This is a great idea.

Wait, seriously?

Score! Finally being underweight will work in my favour!

However, that is kind of bullshit for overweight people. I'd expect one hell of a backlash if I were them.

Besides, I'm betting all the luggage that people bring weighs the flight down a lot too. Are they gonna start charging people who bring heavier luggage more as well?

They factor in luggage costs.