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The Biden administration is yet again trying to do a solid for consumers. From Ticketmaster to the travel industry, they’ve been trying to get big companies to eliminate junk fees and be transparent about hidden fees up front. Under Secretary Pete Buttigieg, the Department of Transportation has been coming hard for airlines and their greedy practices. They’ve fined them for keeping passengers on board too long during delays and held them accountable to give automatic refunds for long-delayed or canceled flights. Just last week, they announced that they’re investigating Delta as a result of how they handled the system outages that caused massive cancellations two weeks ago.
There are a lot of frustrating things about air travel in America, but one of the most infuriating practices is that you’re charged if you want to pick a seat. This is especially awful for families traveling together. If you’re a parent traveling with kids, you either have to bite the bullet and pay up front to ensure you sit together, or roll the dice and hope you and your kids are assigned seats together. Last year, Sec. Pete urged the bigwig airlines to abandon this cash grab and ban them from charging more for “family seating.” Some complied, while most didn’t. After nicely asking for everyone to do the right thing, Secretary Pete now means business. The DOT just proposed a rule banning airlines from charging parents fees to sit next to their children ages 13 and under.
Parents shouldn’t have to pay a fee to sit next to their children when flying, according to the White House, which is moving to ban airlines from charging families extra to be seated together. Under a rule proposed Thursday by the Department of Transportation, airlines would be required to seat parents and kids 13 and younger together free of charge when adjacent seating is available at booking.
The idea of seating adults with their younger children “is common sense and also seems like something that should be standard practice,” U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said at a news briefing on Wednesday. “As someone who has personally experienced flying with toddlers,” Buttigieg said he knew first-hand that families traveling with little ones do not need added difficulties.
The extra cost can be the difference in whether families can afford flights for vacations or to see friends and relatives, the administration argued, noting its proposal would save a family of four up to $200 roundtrip if seat fees are $25 each.
For children too young to fasten their own seatbelts or feed themselves, being seated next to a parent is crucial, yet those that don’t want to pay more often end up pleading with other passengers to switch seats. If passengers opt not to swap seats, they may end up next to an unsupervised child, stressing out the youngster, parent, flight attendants and travelers, DOT said.
President Biden called on Congress to ban family seating and other so-called “junk” fees early last year, with Buttigieg then urging the 10 largest airlines to voluntarily ban the fees. Four complied: Alaska, American, Frontier and JetBlue.
Congress gave the DOT explicit authority to propose its rule as part of the bipartisan FAA Reauthorization Act of 2024, the transportation secretary noted. “We are confident that we are well-founded in our authority, but it helps to get reassurances from Congress,” Buttigieg noted in answering a question about whether the proposal might be challenged in court.
In addition to banning airlines from charging fees to seat those 13 or under next to a parent or accompanying adult, the proposal would require that airlines seat parents next to their kids within 48 hours of booking when adjacent seats are available.
If adjacent seats are not available, carriers would be required to provide passengers with full refunds or the option of waiting to see if family seating frees up. If not, airlines would have to offer the option to rebook for free or stay on the flight in nonadjacent seats.
Speaking from personal experience, that extra cost *is* a lot. I generally don’t like flying on Southwest but at least they pretty much guarantee that you’ll end up sitting with your kids. (My issue with them is that they claim to be a budget airline when 95% of the time, they are much more expensive than other airlines.) This is another reason why everyone needs to get involved and vote Democrat in November! It’s so expensive to fly, and airlines want to unfairly charge you for having the audacity to travel as a family with children. Someone needs to get JD Vance involved, here. After all, that dude is all about giving preferential treatment to parents with children, no? I’ll say it louder for the CEOs in the back: Parents should not have to pay a fee to sit next to their children. Just because a company can charge someone extra for something doesn’t mean that they should.
Our new proposed rule would ban airlines from charging parents a fee just to sit next to their children. pic.twitter.com/r4qpNusrmp
— Secretary Pete Buttigieg (@SecretaryPete) August 1, 2024
Families should be able to sit together on a flight without paying more.
Today, the Biden-Harris Administration continues our work to lower costs and fight price gouging by proposing a ban on airlines charging those fees — saving families as much as $200 for roundtrip flights.
— Vice President Kamala Harris (@VP) August 1, 2024
The law is clear: if your flight gets cancelled or significantly delayed, you get a refund.
We're reminding U.S. airlines of their responsibilities, and the rules that we enforce. pic.twitter.com/uTl8ZwaQPp
— Secretary Pete Buttigieg (@SecretaryPete) August 2, 2024
Photos credit: POOL via CNP/INSTARimages.com, Getty and via Instagram and Twitter
“you’re charged if you want to pick a seat”
Wow, is that a thing in the rest of the world? There is no charge to pick a seat in my country. Why would that service require extra cost for the airline? That is really crazy.
Yeah I can’t believe this is a thing and you might end up sitting next to someone else’s kid!
I only ever really fly easyjet these days and there are some sections of the plane you can pay more to be seated in (I think you have to upgrade to their speedy boarding package) but there’s plenty of choice for free. Sometimes you still end up swapping if a larger family booked later and couldn’t get full rows but that’s once in a while.
We had to pay to pick a seat when we flew British Airways going to London a few years ago. and it was more for a better seat (exit row.) So I don’t think its just an American thing, unless BA doesn’t charge that in the rest of the world.
Just checked the local news. Apparently, an extra fee has been added to the seat selection in my country too after covid. Due to covid, the airlines wanted to cover their losses, I guess. I didn’t fly anywhere since covid, so I didn’t even hear about it. I am very scared of planes, I only flew for business purposes. Since I left my old job, I don’t have to fly anymore, thank God. So, yeah, it isn’t unique to USA.
It depends on the airline but on the majors while you don’t have to pay extra for an actual seat, if you want emergency row, seat with extra legroom, towards the front of the plane, etc. you pay for it AND it’s for every leg of the flight, ie want emergency row and have a layover, it’s not one fee but two since it’s two flights.
Confessing my ignorance here, as well; then again, I’m childfree so maybe my ignorance is expected? To my knowledge, you pay more for a ‘better’ seat (more leg room, business instead of coach class, etc.); is that how it happens? The only seats available that are adjacent happen to be in one of those more expensive seats?
Unfortunately no. You can pay for a better seat with more legroom, but that is different from choosing to seat next to your child.
The fee to sit next to your child puts you in the same more crowded part of the plane!!! Basically they are trying to sneak in extra fees to make up for offering you a supposed “cheap” fare.
Some hotels are doing something similar by charging everyone a “resort” fee even if the hotel is old and crummy and not anywhere close to being a resort. Check the fine print since all travel suppliers are getting sneaky.
THIS is the reason I refuse to fly with with budget airlines esp RyanAir (who am sure will start charging to breathe their recycled oxygen). The rip you off at every corner and you usually end up paying more or the same as you would with other airlines (BA etc..).
Personally I think that its wrong to charge people to change their booking or even have luggage – it should all be part of the overall price. Its just a greedy money grab as airlines refuse to modernise and put customers first.
PS I love the way he plays up on how people refer to him i.e. Mayer Pete and Sec Pete.
I used a third party budget ticketing system three years ago and NEVER again. On the flight back home leaving Italy, I was charged for my suitcases. NEVER EVER AGAIN.
I flew Spirit once (horrible) and they tried to charge us 4Xs for suitcases for 2 flights. We had to stand there and argue with the person at the desk for a while to get it taken care of.
I’m flying Delta in a few weeks and upgrade my seat, no extra charge to choose or for luggage, but the ticket price is $$$.
Was Ryanair the one who floated the idea of charging for the bathroom on the plane?
Yeah – I also think they were the ones who were going to removed a bathroom on short haul flights to put more seats in. Its a terrible airline run by a horrible little money grabbing man – I feel sorry for their employee’s who get treated like sh!t hence the high turn over of staff.
It’s not just the budget airlines. I fly United for work but not enough to get status and I routinely have to ask for approval to “buy” a seat because all the “free” ones are booked and it says I’ll be “assigned a seat at the gate”. It’s ridiculous and absurd. There is absolutely no difference in the seats (this isn’t economy plus or any more room) – it’s just closer to the front of the plane. If you’re flying with a family, that could add hundreds of dollars to the cost. Airlines are horrible.
I flew overseas with my kids. I had to pay the cost of an adult seat with fees on top to ensure I had my baby next to me. Same when they were older. This is so good to see. I recall a very kind lady on one trip swapped seats with me and the airline steward got upset with me for swapping – I said: Well, you can have me disrupting the plane to get to my kid or we can swap seats and everyone is happy. They just want to nickel and dime the customer. We joke that we may have to bring our own toilet paper with us soon.
I think movie theaters are trying to move in the same direction. Where I live, you choose which seat you want. I can see the progression to what the airlines are doing.
In 2007 We were coming back from our honeymoon and United didn’t seat us together; my husband arranged with another passenger so we could sit together, as we got up to change, the flight attendant ordered us to sit back where we were, then called police, who were there when we landed to question us about why we were making a disturbance! But little children can run up and down the aisles screaming…..while their parents look the other way.
That is NUTS! What airline called the police on your for swapping seats to sit together? That’s terrible.
I dont have young kids anymore but this is a great move. Companies are always looking to nickel and dime consumers with stupid fees. With all of the weird stuff happening on planes nowadays, I wouldn’t want my young child seated away from me and I shouldn’t have to pay more for something that seems common sense.
THIS.
There is a family suing one of the airlines (maybe United? Can’t remember, but one of the ones we think of as “real,” i.e. not super budget) because their 13 year old was sexually assaulted on a flight when they wouldn’t seat her with her family.
(And when it was brought to their attention, by an unrelated passenger, they handled it terribly and continued to allow his to assault more people!)
I hope that family wins (and that they are able to recover peacefully from this trauma), but I also hope it terrifies airlines because this is not an isolated incident, and they use the fear of these incidents to get families to pay more – you didn’t have to pay to pick seats on most airlines even like, 15-20 years ago (maybe even less).
So instead of charging families afraid of airlines’ gross negligence, I hope instead airlines act out of fear of being held accountable for their terrible greed.
I’m not sure I understand – can’t they just purchase their seats up front without an extra fee if they want to sit together? That’s what we do on United.
Well, many airlines charge you if you want to pick your seat, regardless of the reason. If you don’t care where you sit, then you can just get assigned a seat when you check in or even when you purchase your ticket, you just don’t have a choice in where it is. So if you are a family of 4, you could all be separated on the flight if you don’t pay to pick seats next to each other.
I believe it depends on the fare class. This movement is coming from people who either fly budget airlines or who purchase the lowest fare possible on major airlines, who are then charged if they want to pick seats.
If you pay for a higher fare class (for example economy plus) this isn’t an issue. If you only pay for the lowest possible fare, then airlines will try to make up the difference with a la carte fees. And people have to rely on the “kindness of strangers” to offer up their seats to families.
This rule puts the onus on the airlines to try to make it work for families instead of charging for better or extra seats. As long as they don’t expect those who have paid a higher fare for their seats to give them up, I don’t see the problem and I hope it will remove a lot of tension among passengers by placing the responsibility on the airline where it belongs…
Yeah, but the difference between economy and economy plus can often times be more than than the cost of paying for the extra seats, up to like $75+ per person. It’s punishing families who can’t afford to drop that much money every time they need to fly somewhere.
United does make you pay to pick your seat – the cheapest fare class does not include picking seats, so if you want to pick (including to sit with your child) you have to select more expensive fare categories (so in practice, you are charged extra since you do have to pay more).
I think its stupid you have to pay to pick your seat, period. You should be able to pick when you buy your ticket, and people who buy earlier will benefit from having more options.
I realize that isn’t necessarily going to help families traveling together though. Maybe they should just assign seats the way the airlines used to years ago before they started nickel and diming everyone for every little thing.
We do fly Southwest almost exclusively – its usually the cheapest for us, especially when you factor in the free luggage. I’m worried how their change in seating next year will affect the experience though.
When my son was two, they gave him a seat away from the rest of us and insisted that it was my responsibility to find someone to trade with me. It was ridiculous.
Now my kids are older, I don’t pay the fees for us to be seated together. I just gamble that we’ll be seated near each other.
This is such an insane mindset. They are creating drama and hostility between passengers by putting the onus on the passenger to make this work. No wonder people are frustrated and on edge. I’m not justifying the physical/verbal abuse the is happening on airlines, but can see how it gets to that point.
@NotTheOne, Agreed. And when you factor in international flights where people are tired and sleep deprived (been there – done that), it’s just asking for trouble.
Flew home on jet blue once on a canceled/rescheduled late night flight. They did not seat me near my 10 year old. Ok, she wasn’t a baby, but still. I just had to comment as we were boarding that “this kid gets airsick, I guess that won’t be my problem” and they found us 2 seats together lickety split 😹
Genius!😆
Against most of the comments here, but if you have to pay for the ticket, ie your child is of the age they need one, it’s a seat taken. If I’m traveling with 2 other adults and we want to sit together we have to make a seat selection to make it happen and then deal with it.
Also, if airlines give up that the rest of us without kids are going to get dinged for the fees to make it up in their process somehow.
Having had multiple parents ask me to give up my seat (which I have paid for) , usually meaning I’d also be stuck in their middle seat, I’m over it.
I don’t think anyone here is saying that a child shouldn’t have to pay to be on an airplane. They’re all saying that it should be included with the basic level cost of a ticket, not an upgrade option to pick seats to ensure that they are all together. That way, everyone is on the same playing field when it comes to choosing a seat at the time of purchase and it eliminates the need for parents to ask you to switch your paid-for, chosen seat.
“Also, if airlines give up that the rest of us without kids are going to get dinged for the fees to make it up in their process somehow.” I mean, it doesn’t HAVE to be that way, lol. There’s nothing wrong with everyone pointing out how greedy airlines have become.
Right?? No one is saying a child shouldn’t pay to be on an airplane, no clue where you are getting that from, lol.
We’re saying that airlines refusing to seat families together is essentially an extra fee for families because you HAVE to pay to pick your seat if you want to ensure you all sit together. And honestly, for some families, that may be a breaking point when it comes to flying.
The only thing wrong with letting people just pick seats when they were buying their ticket without an extra fee is that airlines weren’t making that extra money. it’s about maximizing their profit and nothing else. I think its completely worthwhile to point that out. same way airlines started charging for even one checked bag during the oil crisis maybe 10 or 15 years ago, to make up for the cost of the oil, and yet those fees never went away, did they?
If you’re mad at parents asking you to move, blame the airlines (and no, for the record, I have never asked anyone to move, but its the reason I pay for early bird with southwest, which adds 25 dollars to each ticket each way.)
I like this, and I think they should get rid of the fees for selecting your seat altogether, as there are lots of other legit reasons that people might need a specific seat that go beyond simple preference. They could also make the middle seats cheaper, both to make up for the fact that the middle seat is awful and also to give people an incentive to choose it.
I also feel like making the seats a little larger and giving a little more leg room would go a long way in improving air travel. I’m 5’3″ and my knees touch the back of the seat in front of me on some flights; I have so much sympathy for tall people having to cram themselves into this doll furniture. It’s just become so ridiculous! (You guys should I just start my own airline…??!)
My kid is now 8 and I refuse to pay for a specific seat, if we are not automatically seated together I go to the counter at the airport and ask for our seats to be changed. They always have two seats by the bathroom available! I get a lot of grief from the ticket agents about how “you can just pay for seat selection when you book your ticket” and I find this insane. It’s a disservice to passengers flying without kids because who wants to get on a flight where you’re planning to nap or get some work done and instead you have an 8yo who can’t take a hint talking your ear off the whole time? And it would not be that hard to add some lines of code to their random seat assignments to check “is passenger under 13 (or 18)?” and then shunt everyone who booked with that passenger into a group that has to be seated in the same row. Or when you book your ticket the ticketing process can say “we see you have a minor, please pick from the highlighted seats” and then they can offer you adjacent seats that other people aren’t likely to pay for anyway (e.g. near the bathroom!).
That seems like a reasonable approach.
Let’s not discount the practice that airlines are making seats smaller and with less leg room to cram more passengers. When I was younger and we flew over seas, the seats were wider, we had better service and we didn’t have to pay extra for being seated together. The travel agent took care of that.
This is just another way for airline to nickel and dime passengers. And what blows is that for us Americans, public transportation is not a viable option. I wanted to go to NY and a train ticket was the same price as an airline ticket.
This is also an issue for disabled people. When flying to Europe with my then 15 yr old son, who has a profound speech disability, making communication with strangers both difficult and uncomfortable, I spent two months before fighting with Delta about getting two seats together without a massive up charge on already v expensive tickets. It was absolutely outrageous. It was only solved at the last second because I knew somebody who knew somebody. Disabled people who need assistance should not have to pay extra to have that assistance in the seat next to them. Thanks for making me aware that PB is working on this.
It’s not only the airlines, Amtrak doesn’t allow you to book sits even when traveling with children. I took an overnight trip to Chicago with three children and could not reserve the sits. We boarded at the starting point, all these adults ran in to grab a window sit and no one would budge from it. Even the conductor couldn’t get anyone to give up that window sit. I told them there was no way my eight year old was going to sit next to a strange man all night and they would need to move us to another car. It turns out when the conductor was checking everyone’s ticket that the man sitting next to my daughter didn’t have a ticket for Chicago, he wasn’t even suppose to be in that car. Makes you wonder. So Amtrak should also allow parents to book sits together
I love Amtrak, its such an easy ride from my city to NYC, but I HATE that you can’t pick your seats ahead of time. Last time we went to New York our boys had to start out the ride by themselves- well together, but not with us, because there weren’t two empty rows that we could find. We sat a few rows behind on separate sides of the aisle. we were able to switch after a few stops, but I hate that anxiety of getting on and not finding seats together.
Or worse, accidentally stumbling into the quiet car which I did once, lol.
My son and his 2 little kids just sat FIVE hours on the tarmac at Heathrow. The flight never did take off that day. Instead they were taken to a crappy hotel. Got out of London the next day.
I thought they couldn’t make people wait on tarmac that long these days.