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Not all travel advice published on the web is good advice. And with year-end pressure from editors to come up with “best-of/worst-of” year-end lists, there are bound to be some bad ideas coming down the pike.

Take James Wysong’s “25 Tips for a Better Flight,” for example. Mostly okay, but the tips related to dealing with other people’s rowdy children made me cringe. In particular:

Bring dollar bills, and if the kid behind you starts kicking your seat, bribe him with money to stop. Tell him that if he can keep from kicking your seat for the remainder of the flight, he’ll get $5. Works like a charm.

What the hell kind of message does this send to these kids, or their parents?? That bad behavior isn’t punished, it’s rewarded. In fact, it’s incentivized. Hey kids, kick harder, they’re not paying you yet!

Take it to the next level: Why stop with kids? Why not start bribing adults to move their seat forward if they’re reclining?

Or turn it around: If this keeps up, passengers can make a mint by threatening to recline, talk, belch, fart, get drunk, get amorous, or otherwise be unpleasant flying companions. Maybe start printing up cards with a menu of options for your flying compatriots:

- For the person behind you, you can charge $20 for not reclining ($30 if you see they have a laptop.)
- For the person adjacent to you, $40 buys them the armrest.
- Want quiet? $30. Not willing to pay? Well, then: Check out these photos of my nephew!

No thanks. I’m not going to endorse that road to escalation.

If the kid behind you is kicking your seat, talk to the kid first and ask him/her to stop. If that fails, try the parents. If you can’t charm the family, threaten to raise the issue with a flight attendant. Then carry out the threat. Ask that the offenders be moved, or that you be given an equivalent or better seat. If there are no alternative seats, ask for the purser and discuss the options, including a threat of having the family met by security upon arrival. But don’t reward bad behavior.

Reader John asks:

Is it just me, or does it seem like they’ve been restricting each and every year how far the seats can recline?

It’s not just you. But it’s not every airline, either. Yet.

Scott McCartney reports in the Wall Street Journal that Southwest Airlines is standardizing recline across its fleet to 3 inches. Previous recline had been anywhere between 2 and 4.5 inches. Compare this to American, Delta, and jetBlue with 4 inches, United with 5, and Continental with 5 to 6 inches.

I’m always wary of these generalizations, since it seems that the recline, pitch, and width of the seat differ by aircraft type within each airline. A 737 might give you, say, four inches, while a 757 might give you three. (I’m pulling these numbers out of thin air.) On Southwest, however, with their all-737 fleet, it may be easier to standardize.

Whether or not you should recline is a matter for debate. Always look before you lean to avoid crushing any laptops.

Frankly, I’d guess it’s not really necessary for most people to lean back on short flights, say, sub-two hours. As the flight gets longer, the more permissible it is. If you’re sitting in an economy seat with extra legroom, such as Economy Plus or in front of an exit row, go for it. (The irony: Most seats in front of the exit row are locked in the upright position.)

But having one standard recline angle across an entire plane may be inappropriate. I agree with this sentiment:

How close the seats are to one another, measured in “seat pitch” at airlines, should determine how much recline is allowed, seat manufacturers say. “The bigger the pitch, the more recline is possible,” says a spokeswoman for Recaro Aircraft Seating GmbH, a major airline seat company based in Germany.

In any case, it’ll be interesting to see public reaction to Southwest’s reduced recline. Will the masses be upset? Or will they even notice?

Over at Wired, friend-of-the-blog John Brownlee shares a lament from his recent trans-Atlantic crossing on Aer Lingus.

I spent last night flying home to Dublin from Boston after a couple sleepless days of last minute drunken excess. I was seated next to a smelly motorcycle enthusiast in leather pants, who did nothing all flight long except stare directly at the seat in front of him without blinking. I found this very disconcerting, and asked him if he wanted something to read. “What ya got?” he asked. And that’s when I discovered that the only book I’d brought with me was Oscar Williams’ seminal anthology, Immortal Poems of the English Language, which prompted him to spend the rest of the flight muttering about me under his breath (”Seat 47H? More like Seat 47 HOMO!”*). Needless to say, I did not sleep well.

How neighborly. At least he wasn’t coughing or vomiting while making slurs. (Or heck, maybe he was.)

The worst I’ve sat next to was the body-odor guy and the chatterbox. I’ve gotten off easy, I realize.

Feel free to pepper the comments with stories of miserable seatmates. Get it off your chest.

British Airways is making it tougher to pick your seat in advance, if you’re not a loyal or high-paying customer. The airline already has a longstanding reputation for limiting the number of seats that can be reserved at the time of booking. That reputation is about to get worse:

To make more seats available at the time of check-in we are reducing the number of seats that can be pre-assigned. This option will be limited to specific groups of travelers. These include families with young children; First class fliers; Premier, Gold, and Silver Executive Club members; and those holding fully flexible tickets across all cabins. […] Corporate customers holding a contract with British Airways will also be able to select seats at the time of booking.

The airline is portraying the change as a customer-friendly change, as they are increasing the availability of seat selection at the time of online check-in. The plan is supposedly “designed to simplify the process of choosing a seat and give all customers more transparency and control of the seating options available on their flight.”

Reducing choices is certainly “simplification,” but not in a good way.

I suppose the new scheme, by allowing more online check-in, is better than waiting to receive a seat assignment at the airport. But in reality, this means that you’re still at the mercy of the seating supply in the 24 hours before your flight. Thumbs down.

Thanks, Matt!

The Cranky Flier points to an innovation of sorts in the world of airline seating: airlines charging for early boarding.

For some time, European discounter EasyJet has operated on effectively the same principle as Southwest Airlines in the United States: No assigned seats, first-come-first-served. But now, EasyJet passengers willing to pay between £2.50 and £7.50 can be assured of being among the first 20 passengers to board. The longer the flight, the higher the fee.

In the United States, Southwest passengers can still assure themselves of a good chance of getting a desirable seat by checking in early and thereby receiving a “group A” boarding pass. (See here for a list of services — some free — which virtually guarantee you a boarding pass in boarding group A.)

European travelers are accustomed to paying for every little thing on the budget airlines, so this won’t be any shock. Asian low cost carriers are right there with them. And most people won’t pay the fee, but for those that are willing to pay, this will be a welcome change.

When Southwest first experimented with assigned seating, I proposed that the airline might able to profit from a compromise, offering assigned seating to a small percentage of flyers who want it (perhaps for a fee), but retaining open seating for the majority of passengers. EasyJet is effectively doing something very similar.

I assure you that Southwest is watching EasyJet’s experiment very closely.

Related:
- A modest proposal for Southwest
- Getting the best seats on Southwest just got harder
- Opening day jitters? Southwest’s assigned seating gets mixed reviews

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Flying this weekend? Stuck in a middle seat? If your travels take you through Atlanta, Columbus, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston (both Hobby and IAH), New York-LaGuardia, Phoenix, or Seattle, you are eligible for a free (though not exactly Biggie-sized) $1 gift card from Wendy’s.

The idea is cute, since being in a middle seat stinks. Fattening you up won’t make the return flight any more comfortable, though.

Besides: won’t someone please think of the long-suffering regional-jet passengers? Though they’re not in middle seats, they deserve treats, too… Who will rise to the challenge?

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Readers are always invited to send in questions, comments, or, as the case of Neale H. exemplifies, their rants. Neale is one unsatisfied Ryanair customer. His e-mail demonstrates that people don’t just want a cheap fare — sometimes absurdly cheap if you buy far enough in advance — they want to be treated with a modicum of respect.

Neale’s requests: The chance to sit together with his kids, and a pooled-luggage policy that doesn’t charge him the equivalent of $100 for going overweight. His e-mail, below the fold, outlines his objections in all their righteous detail.

Ryanair doesn’t come out smelling too clean after Neale is done with his assault. And he doesn’t even mention their skimpy legroom (photographic proof!). And indeed, it sounds like they don’t want kids onboard. But I disagree that Ryanair therefore appeals to the “lonely.” Hey, I’ve got no offspring, either, but that doesn’t mean I’m lacking affection or a social life…

Think Neale is right on? Think he’s being unreasonable? Sound off in comments. And if you don’t think this could happen in the U.S. of A., I have one word for you: Skybus. Click “Read more” to see Neale’s rant.

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It seems that every other week yields another report of an improved business class seat. This week, it’s British Airways’ turn.

The carrier is beefing up its ClubWorld offering by widening the lie-flat seats by 5 inches, improving catering and video entertainment, and adding features like standard-plug power ports, electronically-powered privacy screens, and storage units. The seat rollout begins this month and is scheduled to be completed across the fleet in 18 months. The new menu hits the skies in January 2007.

Interestingly, the airline is increasing the number of business class seats on each plane. But since each seat is 25% wider than its predecessor, this presumably means that the business class section will take a bite out of the first and/or economy class sections. (Compare to Singapore Airlines’ new premium cabins, which are even 5 inches wider.)

The website for the new service is pretty, but short on real images. It’s all a virtual tour, so it’s hard to see what the layout will really look like.

A couple readers grumbled via e-mail that yesterday’s post about Singapore Airlines’ improvements to business and first class cabins glossed over the improvements to coach, which most people will actually be flying. In my defense, I was at least discussing scheduled, commercial travel, and not the mega-bling of private jumbo-jets, as was on the front business page of the New York Times yesterday.

So allow me, as a Man of the People, to give economy class its due.

No doubt, Singapore’s economy-class seat is a big step up from the average aircraft seat. In-seat power. A 10.6 inch video screen with on-demand video, computer games, and access to Sun Microsystems’ StarOffice suite. (Bring a USB key, I guess.) Seats are redesigned to offer more room at the knees without actually moving the seats any further apart (32 inches of pitch). Small footrests fold out from the seat in front of you.

I’m not quite sure about the reading lamp (I hope and assume that the overhead lamp remains an option). And the option of a word processor at every seat doesn’t seem like it would be too necessary, if you have in-seat power for a laptop.

Cathay Pacific’s new economy seat appears on its surface to have less sexy features than the Singapore counterpart, but it has the potential to be more comfortable. The seat has a few interesting redesigns, including a hard-shell seatback which prevents the passenger in front of you from leaning back into you. Recline stays within the shell, much like a business class pod. The Cathay literature describes features like active back support. An odd feature: The seatback pocket is moved to the seat itself, behind your calves. This has the potential to be odd or uncomfortable.

But while Singapore is limiting the new seats to their newly-purchased planes, Cathay Pacific is rolling this new seat out across the fleet. We’ll see who “wins.”

Finally, Virgin Atlantic is in the process of redesigning their coach seating. Don’t expect any announcements yet, but the design process and mockups of the seats under discussion are described in detail in this article from Fast Company.

Naturally, any of these improvements would be welcome in the U.S. market.

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Dear Lufthansa,

I often fly over the Atlantic and then connect to one of your intra-European flights from Frankfurt. Whenever I check in, nearly 24 hours before that short flight is to take off, you always give me a craptacular seat. Then you tell me it can’t be changed until I get to Frankfurt.

Typically you assign me to the last row, at the window, right side. That is, it’s called a window seat, but as in this last instance, sitting in 24F on a 737, there was not even a window there, just a wall.

Since I’m coming from another continent, I’m checking in early, when there’s virtually no one else checked in to that flight. Your airline doesn’t provide advanced seat assignments for short trips, so I can’t pick a seat beforehand. Star Alliance Gold status obviously doesn’t help. And it’s not just me: You seem to put all the people connecting from long-haul flights into the back of the bus. The people around me were connecting from Detroit, Chicago, Singapore, or Bangkok. In other words, they checked in a long time ago. Meanwhile, the middle of the plane was nearly empty.

So why do you so consistently and predictably give such lousy seats to connecting passengers?

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Fans of unassigned seating, rejoice: Southwest is keeping the “cattle call.”

For now.

The airline won’t make any changes in the coming months, but may tinker some more in the future.

This past summer, Southwest experimented with assigned seats for flights departing San Diego, with mixed results.

As I’ve suggested before, why not allow those who WANT an assigned seat to get one? If you really “like seeing what’s available and choosing a window or an aisle depending on [your] mood,” as one flyer opined, then go for it.

My “modest proposal” for the airline:

Let anyone who WANTS a reserved seat get one. Guarantee reserved seats to full-fare tickets. (It’s not like you can upgrade on an all-coach flight.) Heck, even charge a couple bucks for a reserved seat, a la European discount carriers or rail companies. Maybe even limit the number of reservations to, say, 60 of the 137 seats on each plane, but let the last-minute full-fare folks override this limit. Board people with seat assignments first, and make only one call for that group. Then do open boarding for the rest.

Related:
- A modest proposal for Southwest
- Opening day jitters? Southwest’s assigned seating gets mixed reviews
- Confirmed: Southwest Airlines to test assigned seating; Northwest abandons boarding by rows
- Getting the best seats on Southwest just got harder

(image: mo husseini)

Upgraded: Coach Seats on Cathay Pacific
You don’t hear much about economy class seats improving much. Sure, there’s lots of talk about upgrading business and first class. But it’s good to see the back of the bus being considered for upgrades. Cathay Pacific of Hong Kong, considered by many to be one of the best rides in the sky, is installing new seats that function much like business class pods: hard-shell seats that recline within the shell, not by pushing back into the space behind you. The tinkering extends the legroom without technically increasing the seat pitch. Sounds great! (via RoadGladiator)

Upgraded: Economy Snacks on American Airlines, at a Price
American Airlines will start testing a new program this week — and ONLY this week — to sell snacks in flight. Flights between Dallas and LAX, Dallas and Miami, and JFK and San Francisco are included in the test. Klondike Movie Bites ice cream, Otis Spunkmeyer Chocolate Chunk Cookies, Lay’s Stax Crisps or Twix ‘4 To Go’ candy bars will run you $3. Dannon bottled water (how many ounces??) will be $2 per bottle. Cookies, etc., fine. I wonder if the $2 bottle of water was devised before the latest airport security rules were relaxed. Not sure how many people will bite. Can’t you just get a cup or two poured for you for free?

Downgraded even more: The Ryanair Experience
Sensory overload! Ryanair is adding advertisements on the underside of the tray tables, so you’ll be staring at the ad for the duration of the flight. Yay. It just keeps getting classier. (via The Cranky Flier)

Upgraded: Continental’s Reputation
Boston’s Logan Airport wanted to make a buck by providing wi-fi access and charging everyone for it. Problem was, Continental’s clubs already provided wi-fi for free. The airport tried to shut down the free connection, but Continental resisted, took it to the FCC, and won. Hats off to Continental for defending the interests of their customers. (And if you want free wi-fi, hang out near the Continental Presidents Club and try to pick up a signal…)

tags: travel | airlines