They may not get their own seat or even eat the airline’s food, but Brazilian airlines are reportedly looking to charge parents a little extra for bringing their babies on board.
Currently, most airlines don’t impose full fares on fliers under two who sit on their parent’s lap. Instead there’s a cap on the smallest passengers [and sometimes the loudest] onboard of 10 percent of the full adult fare.
However, Brazilian airlines are hoping to shake things up by removing the cap and charging a little extra. It has been been dubbed ‘the baby tax’.
Image: Andrey_Kuzmin/Shutterstock
According to Bloomberg, the proposal to waive the cap is in regulators hands and will be submitted for public opinion in the coming months, while a final decision won’t be made until the end of 2016.
The ‘baby tax’ is already receiving negative feedback from travellers, with one saying it doesn’t make sense because babies don’t use any of the airline’s products and services.
“They can’t bring their own bag, they can’t even eat the food, so why charge at all for babies?”
Laura Simon
“You have to do the math and see if it’s worthwhile. All that nuisance of traveling, and then you have to even pay more to hold the baby on your lap.”
Caroline Campanha Vincentin
According to the news source, the airlines are pushing to increase baby fees as a way of challenging consumer-protection rules that are said to have made South America one of the world’s most passenger-friendly places to fly.
In previous years, local carriers have lobbied for restrictions to the weight of checked bags.
Brazil’s three carriers have yet to comment on the ‘baby tax’.
Here in Australia, Qantas charges ten percent of the adult fare for an infant that does not occupy a seat and Jetstar lets them travel for free on domestic and trans-Tasman services.