On Thursday, the U.S. Department of Transportation proposed new rules that would ban airlines from charging junk fees to seat families together on flights.
The proposed rule would require airlines to seat parents next to their young children for free when adjacent seating is available at booking. Officials said fee-free family seating would lower the cost of flying with young children by as much as $200 per roundtrip for a family of four.
“Many airlines still don’t guarantee family seating, which means parents wonder if they’ll have to pay extra just to be seated with their young child. Flying with children is already complicated enough without having to worry about that,” U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said. “The new rule we’re proposing today, which would ban airlines from charging parents a fee to sit with their children, is another example of the Biden-Harris Administration using all the tools at our disposal to lower costs for families and protect consumers from unfair practices.”
The proposed rule is part of the federal government crackdown on “corporate rip-offs” that can artificially inflate prices for consumers, officials said. For many families, being seated together is not optional, especially when children are too young to feed themselves, fasten their own seatbelts, or go to the bathroom by themselves. But many airlines continue to force parents to pay to lock-in assigned seats or risk being seated apart. The fees add up, officials said and raise the cost of air transportation, even if adjacent seating is available at the time of booking.
The notice of proposed rulemaking would ban family seating junk fees, require adjacent family seating when available, mandate refunds, free rebooking and other options when adjacent family seating is not available, and impose penalties for each family seating junk fee, if the child is not seated next to their parent or accompanying adult, or the airline choses to impose a family seating fee.