On August 1, US Airways began charging Economy class passengers for water, soft drinks and coffee. There have been reports that passengers may not have to pay for drinks after all, but only if they protest.
That compassionate concession was leaked as the unprecedented legacy carrier charge for water and soft drinks was imposed at US Airways. Even airline management, clueless in many cases it seems about customer service, knew this was going to be a shocker.
The front line representatives were wary as well. The Association of Flight Attendants (AFA)-CWA says that they object to collecting the fees for non-alcholic drinks and, if the passengers resist, they probably won’t have to pay.
Mike Flores, president of the US Airways AFA chapter said that flight attendants are trained to keep order and try to avoid confrontation.
“We’re trained to keep order on an airplane and defuse confrontation,” Mike Flores, president of US Airways’ A.F.A. chapter, said in an interview Thursday. “If it takes giving a free beverage to somebody to do that, so be it. I expect there will be flight attendants who just give everything away.”
Even US Airways spokesman Morgan Durrant said that it has told 6,700 Flight Attendants to “err on the side of the customer” if it looks like there’ll be a confrontation. According to the WSJ travel blog,
After all, the airline wouldn’t want its customers drinking tap water from the aircraft bathroom. That water is safe to drink, just not very palatable, according to Durrant. “Frankly, that’s just not classy,” he says.
So if you’re dying of thirst and you don’t have any money with you, speak up. Classy flight attendants may be on your side. Or, as a desclassé friend of mine often does, bring an empty bottle through security and fill it up on the other side. A WSJ blogger comment suggested the same thing.
For water do this: Bring an empty water bottle with you to the airport. Fill up once you pass TSA and in the departure area. TSA does not permit liquids but empty bottle should be OK!
The blog space has been filled with comments on both sides of the issue. Some feel that there is no reason for passengers who don’t want soft drinks to have to subsidize others who do. Others are outraged at US Airways.
Heck, I haven’t heard of even one report of a protesting passenger scoring a free drink, though I’m fairly sure it has happened. Not very often.
As the practice of paying for drinks takes hold (many airlines, including flag carriers, in Europe have already been charging for drinks for some time) the clamor will die down and passengers will meekly fork over an extra $2.
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Why is bringing an empty water bottle on a trip declasse? (Note correct spelling — don’t use French if you’re too declasse to spell properly!) I’ve always traveled with my own water containers, even before 9/11. My reasons are: 1) it’s cheaper (is this declasse or am I just a good capitalist?); 2) tap water is safer and better quality, in almost all Western countries, than bottled water, which (in the US) does not have to meet Safe Drinking Water Act standards, is not fluoridized, etc.; and 3) the billions of people buying water in single-use plastic containers are disproportionally contributing to global warming, wasting precious fossil fuels to manufacture the bottles, transport a heavy, readily-available substance vast distances, and dispose of the empty plastic containers. I want nothing of this kind of ignorant conspicuous consumption.
If you want control over your money and hydration, and you want at least some peace of mind about how your decisions do or do not contribute to the destruction of the planet we all share, bring your own bottle. If you’d rather fork over $2 for something that’s virtually free, and be held captive to the schedule of the aircraft’s beverage cart, while leaving this world a worse place, then by all means pat yourself on the back about how “classy” you are and buy your water in that single use container. I’ll be the person sitting next to you rolling my eyes at your selfish ignorance.
Bringing an empty water bottle through a TSA checkpoint *should* be OK. But as we all know, the cornerstone of the TSA’s Security Strategy is “unpredictability.” So it’s entirely possible that the Transportation Security Officer who happens to be processing you will decide that your empty bottle is a prohibited item. At which point you’ll cheerfully toss it into the garbage can full of dangerous explosives and thank the Officer for keeping the Homeland secure (doing anything else is, of course, at your peril.)
The TSA and its hard-working Transportation Security Officers are continually evolving security rules and procedures in response to a constantly-changing Threat Environment. Passengers who carry empty bottles clearly are the latest threat to aviation. They threaten the ability of airport vendors to gouge their captive customers, and the ability of airlines to cut their losses by “monetizing” potable liquids.
Airplane bathroom water safe to drink? Wasn’t there some boy scout a few years ago who did a test of plane water and found it to be filled with all sorts of disgusting things?
I wonder when manufacturers start making beverages < 3.5oz in sealed packages to get pass TSA and the charging airlines.
Avoid AA and US like the plague (maybe the UA,NW,DL,CO when they ratchet up their nickel and diming…)
Why don’t they just double/triple the cost of the airline ticket and be on with life in general…
I can’t fathom why anyone still flies on USAir unless they just haven’t been reading the news and get caught with one unpleasant surprise after another. But then a second flight? Why would they subject themselves to it again?
I feel sorry for the poor business travelers living by a monopolized hub like Charlotte. What a nightmare.
Just how much of a subsidy is one can of soda for my fellow passengers, anyway? Sheesh.