How budget airlines keep costs down
Complaining about budget airlines has become a national sport with disgruntled travellers taking to social media to air their grievances in the thousands – but is it fair?
One of the biggest gripes of passengers is being denied check-in, despite being only a few minutes late.
Despite criticism, there’s a reason why budget airlines have to deny stragglers – even if you’re on one minute late.
It’s not only to ensure flights keep to their schedule, low-cost carriers have a strict check-in policy because it actually keeps the cost of their airfares down.
“It is one way we are able to keep our fares consistently low, as our customers demand,” a Tigerair Australia spokeswoman told news.com.au.
“The biggest reason is that you will find the same staff who are at the check-in gate are at the boarding gate boarding you,” she said.
Instead of having staff at both the check-in counter and boarding gate, staff at budget airlines will perform both roles.
“You’ll find it is similar with low-cost airlines all over the world. The low-cost model is what we call a streamlined model, so we do look at cutting costs where it makes sense, but obviously not in a critical area because safety is always the number one priority.
“We look at ways we can reduce cost and pass that on in the form of lower fares to our customers.”
Keeping to a tight schedule also allows planes to fly more people and fly more routes, which keep ticket prices down.
“It may seem like one or two minutes here and there but the fact is we run a very efficient operation so that we can fly as many passengers as we can. We are a volume business,” she said.
“This is obviously so we can pass on even lower fares.”
So next time you’re flying budget, make sure you leave plenty of time to arrive on time.