Cruise lines are charting a course similar to airlines, which charge a low base fare and then add optional extras to the price of the ticket, routinely doubling the cost of transportation.
A LA CARTE
If you think hotels will never stoop to the level of airlines — charging extra for anything that isn’t bolted down — maybe you’ve never heard of easyHotel.
It used to be so simple: The price you were quoted for an airline ticket, rental car or cruise used to be the price you actually paid.
Yes. Sure, Southwest’s decision to begin charging for early boarding is taking it on a slippery slope toward a la carte fees, but what a ride it is, according to passengers like Jennifer Rigdon.
Deloitte’s Simonetto: “It’s easy to view this as the big, bad airline taking advantage of travelers”
Mike Simonetto is the principal and global leader of Deloitte Consulting’s pricing and profitability practice. With airlines and other travel companies testing our willingness to pay fees, I wanted to ask a pricing expert like him why travel companies were doing this and where it’s all headed.
My friend Addison Schonland said it best: Anyone who thinks baggage fees are going away is living on another planet. And as if to underscore that point, IdeaWorks has released a survey that shows ancillary revenue is up 345 percent from 2006, to an eye-popping $10 billion last year.
Elliott is consumer advocate 
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