Airport Avenger: Tips and Top Secrets for Airlines, Airfares, Fees, Security and Cancelations

Airlines are raising fees to help cover the rising cost of jet fuel and other expenses.

American Airlines has raised the fee it charges you to make a reservation by phone instead of on its website. A phone call will cost you $25, up from $20.

Spirit Airlines, the king of the fees, will charge you $5 if you get your boarding pass from a human being at the airport instead of online.

Southwest is the only major airline that doesn't charge you for checking up to two bags. JetBlue still doesn't charge for the first checked bag, but it raised the fee for the second bag from $30 to $35.

Some airlines are charging more for oversize and overweight bags. On Spirit a $25 overweight fee now kicks in at 40 pounds instead of 50. US Airways got on board by raising the fees on bags above 50 pounds to $90-$175 each way, up from $50-$100.

Spirit Airlines is in a class by itself. Well, "no class" may be a better description. Spirit prides itself in offering the lowest fares around and giving passengers a "choice" to buy extras. The truth is that many of those extras are standard on other airlines, and unless you want to fly with virtually no luggage--not even a carryon--and do a lot more fancy dancing, you'll end up paying just as much, if not more, to fly on Spirit than almost any other airline.

Add to that Spirit's limited flight schedule, even from major cities like New York, and you begin to realize that you're being ripped off. Airlines revel in the gotcha game, trying to hide extra charges, fees and higher fares as best they can, even with new government regulations that force them to be up front about that. Spirit takes it further and throws ethics out the window. When the Transportation Department instituted rules to protect people from predators like Spirit, Spirit said the rules cost them more money, so they hit passengers with new fees. And they're not just for "extras."

When a new rule took effect allowing passengers to change their minds about reservations within 24 hours of booking, without incurring a fee, Spirit whined about how expensive that was. Then they slapped a $2 fee on all their passengers, not just those who might change their minds. Now that's putting the customer first.

Spirit posts its fees on its website. You can see them here. But there are so many fees, for so many different things, that many people are likely to stumble into at least some of them unwittingly and get snared.

We list the major fees charged by other airlines here. Since Spirit has so many, and goes out of its way to pick your pocket, we feel it's a public service to list the worst of Spirit's right here. Consider wisely before you book that $9 sucker fare Spirit's always flaunting. Chances are you'll wind up paying a lot more.

Ten bucks here, twenty bucks there. The airlines are making billions by charging for things that used to be free. They call it “ancillary revenue.” Most people call it nickel-and-diming.

All those nickels and dimes added up to more than $19 billion in airline fees last year. And thanks to a quirk in the tax code, it's all tax-free.

Why do they do it this way instead of raising fares to cover everything? The airlines think travelers find these small, “a la carte” increases easier to swallow than paying significantly higher airfares.

They may be right. Very few fees have been rolled back because a lot of passengers are paying them. Some by choice, some because they got stuck paying a fee they could have avoided.

Psychology and marketing have a lot to do with it. Most people focus on fares, not fees, when they hunt for the best travel deals. They will look at side-by-side comparisons for several airlines and buy the cheapest ticket.

Fees for bags, reserved seats, food, headphones, pillows and so on don’t enter the calculation until the fare is purchased. After the biggest part of the travel bill is accounted for, so the thinking goes, smaller charges don’t seem like such a big deal.

But they can be. For example, let’s say you found the same fare from New York to Chicago on American and JetBlue, and you want to check two bags. You’ll pay $60 to check those bags on American, $35 on JetBlue. Fees add up fast.

• Spirit, JetBlue, United, American, AirTran, Virgin America and US Airways charge a fee for some seats. Expect more carriers to do the same.

• Southwest, United and American charge to let you board ahead of the crowd. You'll see more of this fee with people willing to pay to get first crack at carryon space in the overheads.

• Carryon bags. Spirit charges up to $45 for a carryon. The major carriers say they won't--yet. But they'll probably start charging for gate-checking the oversize carryons they let slide now.

• Fuel surcharges. Many airlines had them when jet fuel prices were, well, sky high in 2008. They're back again on domestic flights and even higher on international routes. Some international flights have fuel surcharges that practically double the price of the ticket.

• Expect more airlines to charge a fee when you check in with a human instead of an airport kiosk or online, before you get to the airport.

• A fee for using the plane's restroom? Not likely, but it's not illegal or against any U.S. government rules.

There are a number of fees the airlines don't broadcast. See our fees chart for more on that.

It's not exactly a fee, but most airlines charge for meals and alcoholic drinks in economy class. A few charge for water and soft drinks.

Bring your own and save some bucks. You can't take most liquids through security in bottles bigger than 3.4 ounces, but you can buy drinks in many airports once you're past security and bring them on the plane. Or take an empty bottle through security and fill it at a water fountain before boarding.

The Privileged Few

Not everyone has to pay airline fees. In most cases first-class and business-class passengers, as well as people in the military heading overseas or coming home, get a pass. So do those in the upper echelons of frequent-flier programs. If you're not in any of these groups, a little planning can help you avoid them.

Airlines are coming up with new fees and adjusting existing ones all the time. We'll keep you updated, and be sure to check with the airlines for any last-minute changes.

Here's another way to avoid checked bag fees: Use the right credit card. If you fly Delta Air Lines. the airline will waive the fee for the first bag when you sign up for its Delta SkyClub American Express card. That saves you $25 each way for up to nine people on the same reservation.

The card has a $95 annual fee so, as always, do the math. If you only fly once in a while, or don't check bags often, you probably won't come out ahead. If you are a frequent flier or have a family trip planned with, say, four people flying roundtrip with one checked bag each, you'll save over $100 ($200 in bag fees - $95 annual fee = $105 saving).

Continental Airlines also waives the fee for the first checked bag, again $25 per bag each way, if you use its OnePass Plus (Chase) card. The annual fee for that card is $85.

Check the perks on your credit card. You migt save on some fees.

More about airline fees:

U.S. Airline Fees