A late-boarding business class passenger removed the bag of an economy class passenger from the overhead bin and threw it in the aisle, so that his bag would fit. Who was the jerk?
Business Class Passenger Tosses Economy Class Carry-On Bag From Overhead Bin Into Aisle
Let’s begin with the story, as posted on reddit, and then I’ll analyze it.
I’m one of the last on the plane, sat in business class (full fare, paid ticket, not an upgrade). There is a walled partition between business and economy.
I open the overhead bin and there is a little bit of room if I shift thing’s about to fit my bags (I’m carrying well within my weight/size limits) when someone pipes up for me to please be careful with their bag.
The voice is coming from the 2nd row of economy!!
With that, I pulled his bag out and placed it at his feet and promptly stowed my bags. Keep in mind there is a placard in the bis saying “Business Class use only”. Once I put my two bags in the overhead, there was no more room for the one from economy.
FAs tried to find a place for the economy bag but it ultimately had to be be gate checked.
FAs apologized to me for the ‘inconvenience’ and said they should have been more watchful. The passenger (understandably) and one of the ground personnel tried to have a shot at me for taking his bag out – said I shouldn’t have touched his bag.
My argument was I paid for the space according to my ticket. My bags were where they were meant to be…his weren’t.
In follow-up comments, he claims he was not on a US carrier and that his airline allowed business class passengers to carry onboard two carry-on items plus one personal items. Sounds like he may have been flying Lufthansa…
And Lufthansa does have the following sign above each overhead bin in business class:
In the USA, American Airlines and Delta Air Lines do the same thing (pictured at top).
The man also claimed that when he notified a flight attendnat what was going on, the flight attendant took his side, apologized to him for not more closely monitoring the overhead bin, and scolded the economy passenger for using the wrong overhead bin.
View From The Wing calls the passenger a jerk for removing the bag. That’s a reasonable charge. Once the man determined that the bag in the overhead bin was from economy class and his bag would not fit, he should have notified a flight attendant rather than take matters into his own hands.
Note, this is not because you are entitled to the overhead bin space directly above your space. You are not! But you are reasonably entitled to the overhead bin space in your own cabin and such space, particularly for late-boarding passengers, is an advertised perk of business class.
> Read More: Passengers Fight Over Overhead Bin Space – Is The Space Above Your Seat Yours?
Thus, there are two jerks at play here. The passenger in business who threw the bag out and the passenger in economy class who placed the bag there in the first place despite the clear placard that the space was only for business class passengers.
The proper protocol in this station would have been to notify a flight attendant and for the flight attendant to remove the bag. I refuse to touch any bag that is not mine on an aircraft…who knows what kind of fight that will trigger…
CONCLUSION
Was the passenger a jerk for throwing the bag into the aisle? Sure. But so was the other passengers for putting his bag in the wrong bin. Overhead bins are shared space and it is a free-for-all, but only within your cabin of service. You should not place your bags into the overhead bin of another cabin unless explicitly invited to do so by a flight attendant.
Not a jerk. Biz guy did not ‘throw the bag down’ according to the quote. Totally reasonable to remove it and put his bag there. Economy guy should have just remained quiet and no one would have noticed.
I deal with idiotic customers from around the world every work day, but the vast majority are Americans. Not that all Americans are the same with a population of 330 million, but they are by far the absolute worst customers when they have an issue.
I agree with you. The Biz guy is not at fault here (and based on the statement, he put the bag at the feet of the economy passenger). “Throwing the bag” is just sensationalizing the simple act.
“REMOVES ECONOMY CLASS BAG FROM OVERHEAD BIN, TOSSES IN AISLE” and “The passenger in business who threw the bag out” and “Was the passenger a jerk for throwing the bag into the aisle?”
‘Tosses’, ‘thew’ and ‘throwing’???
Why are you editorializing the story with such a click-baity headline and then using words to purposely escalate this non-drama?
Just quote what the passenger (who was there) said and let us judge for ourselves.
There is only one jerk here: economy pax!
This whole culture of conflict-avoidance (Call FA to sort out petty things) is embarrassing.
The C-class pax did the right thing. Handled matters himself.
Let the FAs handle it. It is not conflict avoidance, it is “Sergeant’s business”. That said, I am not terribly troubled by gently removing the bag and putting it on the floor before alerting the FA, though it is not what I would have done. But someone has to touch it to move it.
Another reason I try to board earlier rather than later.
Was it you ? If you ask politely there could have been an amicable resolution. You don’t simply remove a bag a throw it in the aisle. People are beyond stupid nowadays.
Ill take “Another completely fabricated story for clicks” for $1000, Alex.
Both are jerks for bringing their oversize heavy roller bags onboard … staff ought to ask them to leave them outside. Enforcing the rules brings otherwise calm people to snarls and unpleasantness .
“Oversize”
“Heavy”
[Citation Needed]
You are editorializing just as much as the post author.
I see this happen all the time. I am usually upgraded to domestic first class on Delta and board first and place my carry on above my seat. I have seen many times when economy passengers take advantage of a bottleneck in the aisle when passengers are not moving to place their bags on the first class overheard bin. Not, once, not twice, but many times. I never say anything because it is not my business but if what happened in this article happened to me the only thing I would do different is to call the FA and ask her to remove the economy passenger’s bag. Simple and easy. He was not supposed to place his bag there.
@Santastico … Good thinking , but the flight attendant ought not injure herself lifting out the heavy over-size bag , and you ought not be injured by the heavy bag falling upon you or another innocent . Best to stop all the carry-ons .
I would happily remove the bag myself but I would notify the FA and not simply place the bag in the aisle. Nowadays, I am all for not having arguments and confrontation with people but there is no way that if I am sitting in business class I will have my bag checked because an idiot placed his on my space. This is why I love that now most airlines use the middle door on large planes to board for international flights. If you are sitting in business class, you board first, turn left to your seat and do not even see other passengers. Look, I have done hundreds of thousands of miles flying in economy class but there is nothing worst than seat in business class and have the entire plane walk by you going to economy and looking at you with not happy faces. There is no need for that.
Yes and no, there are still planes like the 767 and mini-cabins on larger planes where business class and economy passengers mix.
On the rare occasions this has happened to me, I first asked the other forward cabin guests if the bag belonged to them. After verifying that it did not, I notified the forward cabin FAA that there there was an unattended bag in the overhead bin (i.e., a breach of security). At that point the FAA also checked with other forward cabin customers, removed the bag and made an announcement on the PA that there was an unidentified bag in the forward cabin. The owner could either come forward and claim it, or it would be removed from the plane. A passenger always came forward and took the bag back to their section. They didn’t even know who made the complaint, thus avoiding a potential conflict between passengers. This is the right way to handle the situation.
The jerk was the economy twat who cannot read
If people cannot even read, they should not fly. It is a safety issue s they cannot read the safety instructions
If someone’s child kicks my seat from behind, I’m adult enough to politely say: “Excuse me, please stop your child doing that” before hitting the button. FA’s HATE to be called over stuff that adults should be able to handle themselves.
When the OP put the bag down in the aisle, if the other economy passenger hadn’t said anything it’s likely the FA might have tried to make it fit in business class when they came back around.
I saw a well dressed guy try this on a flight 2 years ago and it still burns me. I was sitting in front row, in economy (the entire plane) and he put his bag up front and casually walked to the rear of the plane. Maybe, just maybe, he was an FA deadheading or some special reason but I suspect he was an entitled dork who didn’t want to carry his bag down the aisle later. I should have called him out but I was still in shock.
Omg. I just had this awful flashback of a situation I lived through not on a plane but on a passenger bus while on vacation in Southeast Asia. I feel compelled to share the story after reading your comment. I paid for a bus ticket to take me on a 5 hour journey from one city to the next. The large bus only had literally 8 people. I sat in the rear for a quiet RECLINED ride (I would say around 25-degree of recline). Halfway through the journey a woman boarded, and among the plethora of empty available seats like literally empty rows and rows of seats, she chose to sit behind me whilst my seat was reclined and had the effing audacity to tell me to bring my seat up cuz she will sit behind me. At that point I almost exploded but reined it in and just outright stared at her with wide eyes and then looked all around the empty rows with this shocked expression on my face. But ultimately I said to her “there are other seats ma’am, I boarded first and am comfortable reclined in this position”. She then responded and said I was uneducated and rude and uncivilized. She still proceeded to sit behind me but the things she did next would make you want to take a hammer and bash her head in (sorry but it was the worst experience of my life to-date). She sat down, and through the span of one hour, she literally held her phone behind my back headrest and blasted music and YouTube videos, then proceeded to use her plastic water bottle and began tapping the headrest. And kicked my chair every other 10-15 minutes. I pretended to be asleep so that I wouldn’t give her the joy of feeling that she won. But in the end after enduring the hour of her antics I just exploded and we had a screaming match inside the bus. Regardless, she was a woman and I was a man. Obviously the driver and conductor felt more inclined to take her side. They told me to move to a different seat away from her. That woman needs God.
“The passenger in business who threw the bag out”
He didn’t throw it, as per his own words he took the bag and placed it at the feet of the owner in economy,
This whole “you don’t own the storage over your seat” nonsense is bullshit – no matter how many times a blogger repeats it or links to hearsay garbage. It may not be written anywhere, but it’s essentially a social contract that you put your shit in the area nearest your seat. That’s usually directly over it so that everyone can do the same with their stuff for ease-of-access.
It’s the same social contract of not parking perpendicularly across three spots in a parking lot. It’s not illegal but you don’t do it. Or you deal with getting your car keyed because you’re being an asshole. This story is the airplane equivalent.
In the same cabin, sometimes you have to store stuff slightly elsewhere just because it’s full or you have a large back, but generally in the area where you’re seated. This situation is even more egregious because a pax in a different class is basically saying, “Fuck you, I want to grab MY bag out of YOUR space in Business on my way off the plane. Social contract be damned.” So not only does he think he’s better than economy pax, but he’s also taking away from passengers who’ve specifically paid more for their flight just to have dedicated space. Airlines should be held accountable to police this, but kudos to the Biz class pax for taking things into his own hands.
Business class passenger should arrive on time and then he doesn’t have to worry about it. Flight attendants tell passengers to place their bag in any open space near the completion of boarding.
BOOM that just happened!
Your comment assumes that this happened on the departure airport for the business class passenger. There is a possibility for being the last to board if it is a connecting flight and the previous flight came in late. Since this would have no bearing on the issue itself, the original poster would not have needed to mention it. However, I find it telling that you blame the person who did nothing wrong.
When the plane arrives at the gate, stand up, get your bag from space over or very near your seat. End of that issue. The virtue of managing this simple problem yourself is that it allows the FA to attend more important matters.
In bygone days, passengers were boarded by seat and row numbers starting at the back of the aircraft. First and business class could board at their leisure. Now it’s being boarded by Zones. First class and business zones first. WHY? Because of the same stunt the economy passenger pulled. So to ensure that passengers who paid more for their seats would be entitled to the space above their heads, the boarding procedure had to be changed. Economy class passengers on their way to their seats would place their hand luggage in the first class bins instead of taking it to the economy section of the aircraft. A definite no-no! Imagine feeling so entitled to be telling the rightful owner of the business class seat to be careful with a bag inappropriately stored. OF COURSE THE BUSINESS CLASS PAX WAS IN HIS RIGHT TO REMOVE IT. Such a pity it wasn’t taken to the door and placed in the baggage hold. What has happened to manners? Is it no longer necessary to be polite and simply do the right thing?
All discussion here is moot because this didn’t happen. Nobody had to gate check their bag on a non-US carrier.
Personally, I think removing someone else’s bag and basically saying “deal with it,” is crass. I’m guessing this person probably isn’t very happy and doesn’t have nearly as many friends now as he did a decade ago.
I have been forced to gate check my bag on SN, and it was on one of the rare occasions when I was there at the beginning of the boarding process. I observed the mess that the gate agents had created which would have required me to infiltrate the Y queue and argue with people in order to avail of priority boarding and decided to board last – that went really well!
Do Lufthansa still have widebodies without premium economy? There’s no walled partition on short haul.
My vote is that the Economy pax is the far bigger jerk. The Biz pax should have called the FA, but the signs clearly state the overhead bin is for biz pax only.
All this said, how about having the gate staff add to their multiple announcements that economy pax are not permitted to place their carryons in the first/biz section?
@Jerry. What you are saying is not true. We have been on EU carriers in the past year that make passengers gate check their bags due to lack of space even when there was plenty of overhead space still available. Just like AA, they were anticipating a full capacity for luggage and were even telling first class passengers that they had to check their bags (which everyone successfully protested). The disease has already spread.
i think handling it in consultation with the flight attendants would have been more cooperative in spirit. Dumping someones bag on the floor of a departing aircraft is not cooperative. Why cooperative, 200-300 people in close, really close quarters calls for more cooperative spirit than being in the middle of a cornfield. Did he have a right to the space, maybe. But the spirit was not correctly done.
Disappointing behavior from the business class passenger who removed an economy class bag from the overhead bin and tossed it in the aisle. Respect for fellow passengers and their belongings should be upheld regardless of seating class. Let’s strive for empathy and consideration in shared spaces, making air travel a pleasant experience for everyone onboard
Welcome to the modern caste system.
You’re more than welcome to pay for business class and get the service such a purchase entitles you to.
You’re not welcome to take what you haven’t paid for, @Andrew.
When I see the lower classes misbehaving I call them out. Personally, I have many times removed other peoples bags because they were placed on their space-wasting side, or without placing the wheels in first. I have on a few occasions placed a lower class passenger’s bag on an empty seat and then sat silently when the melee ensued.
This just happened on my United flight while sitting in business a random economy passenger placed his stuff as he boarded in business cabin above an empty seat. FA saw this did nothing till that person arrived in business and proceeded to remove those belongings hand them to economy passenger and told him find space in economy. The bigger question is why wait ?
So what was the biz class passenger (who paid full fare, btw) supposed to do if all overhead bin space on the plane was full? Have his carry-on gate checked and have to go to baggage claim while the economy passenger collected his bag and went on his merry way? Probably. It’s what happening so much in our society. It’s easy to get away with violating rules. Happens every day. No consequences.
The most JERK of them all is Matthew Klint, the author who uses word like ‘tosses’, ‘thew’ and ‘throwing’. That right there is a malicious intent to stir up drama.
I’ve been called worse.
Perhaps you have DONE worse so you’ve deserved to be called worse. There is something wrong and cheap about over-sensationalizing a story just to get more reads. Though I don’t remember you saying that he “thew” anything, I think you oversold it. That is what can lose readership for you (like me), NOT so much for that, but for ADMITTING that you’ve been called worse and STILL not learning from it and repeating the offense. Readers HATE click bait and a fair and good writer should not need it to get readers. I did read this far (did you?) and resisted the temptation to “throw” this article away
For myself , it would have totally depended on the tone of voice used by the economy class passenger who s stated be careful moving my bag . If the request was not made in a kindly manner I would then remove his bag and give it to him or place it on the floor .
Pathetic. Entitlement at it’s finest. You punish other people because you didn’t arrive with enough time and you use your “status” to flex your pathetic title to compensate for your tiny endowment. This is not a caste system. Grow up.
It’s the airline’s fault for putting us all into this ridiculous situation.
I mostly travel economy.Bussines only as upgrade.I have seen people putying their bags on row 6 and then watcch them wslk to row 32 .I ve seen people put their coats on the overbin space. I ve seen people entering the aircraft wigh more than two pieces for economy.ThecFA t that most of the times that i complained just moved my bag … So i make sure that i am first when my raw is called .I mostly fly european regional carrier .The guy in bussiness was right but he should have called the FA