The Scandinavian Star Alliance member SAS joins the low-cost airlines in charging for hand luggage. Since December 14, customers of the cheapest SAS Go Light fare are only allowed to take one personal item on board, with the dimensions 40 x 30 x 15 centimetres; a regular piece of hand luggage costs extra. The surcharges are currently still relatively moderate. On the Berlin-Stockholm route, for example, hand luggage (50x40x23cm / max. 8 kg) costs €12 extra in each direction. Flights to Asia and North America are (still) excluded from this change.
SAS naturally describes this as if it were done for the benefit of the customer:
On 14 December 2021, we will be adapting our SAS Go light ticket for passengers who want to travel light and get the lowest fare possible. The fare will only include an underseat bag, which means that you can choose to add another piece of hand luggage on board or checked bags, only if you need to.
flysas.com
You can find the complete hand luggage rules here.
In this context, it is also interesting that the prices for these flights were of course not adjusted downwards but simply remained the same.
Conclusion
After Ryanair, Wizzair and other low-cost airlines such as Eurowings went ahead as “honorable” pioneers, members of the large alliances are now apparently not afraid of limiting customers even more when it comes to luggage. It’s probably just a matter of time before other airlines follow suit. If you consider that, for example, meals are no longer included with Lufthansa on European routes and checked baggage costs extra, a step towards chargeable hand baggage would in principle reduce the advantages over the low-cost airlines to a minimum. Of course, the aviation industry has not had a golden age right now, but the whole thing is quite sad, really.
Comments (4)
SAS + is still cheaper than BA Club Class! I have flown both!
This is so poor from SAS. The approach of charging for carry on is just so bottom of the barrel! To add to the issue, Silver membership now does not include a checked bag on the lowest price tier, where it did previously. So now, where you previously had a hand item, carry on and checked bag with the lower far under Silver Eurobonus, you now have only an under-seat bag. If you pay the next fare up you do get your check-in bag, but this is included in that fare anyway. This therefore means the removal of the only real benefit of Silver Eurobonus membership. On top of this there are astronomical fare increases, higher than I am personally seeing with any other airline.
SAS is becoming a real low-cost airline as far as it wasn’t already. Since Aegean cut the good miles revenue I already see very little use in flying them. It’s not exactly high standard service on board – for economy not quite cheap and for BC-comparable fares (SAS Plus) still having a chance ending up in a middle seat.
Now with penny-pinching on stuff such as a carry on I have no doubt anymore to fly other airlines such as KLM to scandinavia.
Most hilarious/insulting is always that they want to make you believe they do these things to make life for their passengers better or easier… as if you should be very grateful for this “undressing” of features.
DO, you are so right, especially with the last part. Airlines getting rid of services because of “customer demand” always makes me wonder how I miss the numerous complaints of passengers that are offended by free drinks or complimentary cabin bags.