Travellers whose finance directors or financial circumstances force them to fly at the back of the plane took another knock last week. It is one thing for British Airways to offer an inch less legroom to some of its economy passengers than budget airline Ryanair does — and to charge for food on short-haul flights. It is another for the Emirates airline to look at making passengers pay for its on-board “frills”.
BA boasted of being “the world’s favourite airline” of the late 1980s; Emirates has long since usurped its role as the carrier to emulate. But Emirates’ profits plummeted
82 per cent over the past year as a result of an economic downturn and political tension in the Gulf and a laptop ban on flights to the US. Like most US and European carriers, it is having to cut costs.