Travel with Children - Baby ban in first class on Malaysia Airlines

I have a thread from last week about bringing pets on 767/777 BF cabin

Funny, but a lot of folks said they'd rather ban crying babies...

Looks like Malaysia Airlines beat everyone to the punch!

http://www.cnn.com/2011/TRAVEL/06/28/malaysia.airlines.baby.ban.cnngo/index.html?hpt=tr_c2

I, for one, am all for it. Esp. International F. It's no place for a infant or child for that matter. Flame suit is on.

It will never blow over in the sue happy USA.

I, for one, am all for it. Esp. International F. It's no place for a infant or child for that matter. Flame suit is on.

It will never blow over in the sue happy USA.

+1!^^^

Please follow this in Newsstand.

l'etoile
UA moderator

I, for one, am all for it. Esp. International F. It's no place for a infant or child for that matter.

On a flight, it's as perfect a place as any for an infant or child when the infant or child has been issued a ticket for the cabin.

GU, haven't you learned by now that such comments are generally made by US domestic only fliers who do not realize that the infant tickets on intl flights come with no seat and often cost more than these people spend in several months of travel!!??

Malaysia Airlines, which has banned babies in first-class sections on its Boeing 747-400 jets, also plans to do the same in its Airbus A380 superjumbo jets.

Airline anaging director and chief exexutive Tengku Azmil told the Australian Business Traveller that the carrier has received many complaints about crying infants from first class passengers that they "spend money on 1st class and can't sleep due to crying infants."

http://www.boston.com/travel/blog/2011/06/airline_bans_ba.html

GU, haven't you learned by now that such comments are generally made by US domestic only fliers who do not realize that the infant tickets on intl flights come with no seat and often cost more than these people spend in several months of travel!!??

Thanks for the reminder. :)

On a flight, it's as perfect a place as any for an infant or child when the infant or child has been issued a ticket for the cabin.
I agree with you substantially, in entirety and in full measure. People have been whining on FT during the past decade of my association with FT. I had young children when I first encountered such hostility and infantile behaviour and was offended by it. I wondered if my reaction w as because we travelled with children. Now my children are not little anymore, I still feel children have as much right to be in any cabin, as any one else.

GU, haven't you learned by now that such comments are generally made by US domestic only fliers who do not realize that the infant tickets on intl flights come with no seat and often cost more than these people spend in several months of travel!!??

The irony is in the infantile behaviour displayed by such people as those mentioned by you.
I have never been annoyed by infants or children, but by the way their parents interacted with them. An annoying child or an infant has as many as two grown ups behind their behaviour.
It's quite infantile to want "we want whatever we want whenever we want and where ever we want"
P.S. I surpassed mr Dolittle. ;)

As I expected, this has gone to a general (and probably 8000th such) discussion of children in F, father than a discussion of this particular airline and the news story.

So after its short stay here, I'm going to send to the "Traveling with Children" forum and the mod there can decide if it's a keeper or worthy of closing in favor of another thread where this issue can be yet fought over.

cblaisd
Moderator, Newsstand

As I expected, this has gone to a general (and probably 8000th such) discussion of children in F, father than a discussion of this particular airline and the news story.

So after its short stay here, I'm going to send to the "Traveling with Children" forum and the mod there can decide if it's a keeper or worthy of closing in favor of another thread where this issue can be yet fought over.

cblaisd
Moderator, Newsstand

We already had a surprisingly civilized discussion on that in BA forum

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/british-airways-executive-club/1230723-ot-soon-no-babies-first-mh-lhr-kul.html

Thanks for the heads-up. At least the posters on this forum now know and can book accordingly.

Whether you agree or disagree, the fact is that it's their airline and they can do with it as they please. We can spend our money on them or fly someone else.

Be aware that airlines rarely do these types of acts alone. Keep your ears and eyes out to which airlines follow suit and please report!

I'm kind of in the middle of this issue. I've been the Annoyed Person as well as the mom with the screaming kids (also the Flight Attendant trying to explained to Mr. or Ms. Annoyed that we can't magically quiet crying babies).

Please no name calling (which does include "xxx like you"). How I hate closing threads or playing cyber-policewoman! Can we keep it to venting about the issue itself without it getting ugly? I know you're all Big People who can keep it civilized.

A sympathetic gate agent helped me upgrade a young uniformed service woman with a lap infant into first class. About 5 minutes befrore pushback, the baby starts to get fussy. I'm thinking "oh crap"! I don't want to listen to this for another 2 hours. 5 minutes of fussing and the baby was out cold. Not a peep between MSP and DEN. On occasion, I've heard first class adult passengers whine like babies; I'd like to see some of those stuffed suit babies banned.

After me and the wife traveled with 2 yr old granddaughter, I'm sympathetic to young women travelling alone with babies.

I've never noticed babies being a problem on MH first class flights, but I have noticed adults being a problem in the same. If there's a problem with a baby on the flight, look at adults for being the source of it.

The worst problems I've noticed on flights with young infants comes from some of the infantile adult reactions to screaming infants who may be screaming for who knows what reason but inevitably quit screaming without carrying on with the negative attitude for the entire trip that some adults seem to throw like toys out of a pram.

After me and the wife traveled with 2 yr old granddaughter, I'm sympathetic to young women travelling alone with babies.

I expect there'd be sympathy also for young men traveling alone with babies and toddlers. You have my sympathy for traveling with a 2-year old -- it's much harder than traveling with a younger, bottle-feed-only baby not capable of really moving much.

Actually - they do sell tickets for infants in F - just not lap infants.

Babies are just doing what comes natural, they know no else/better - even if it's irritating when they're screaming.

Arrogant/rude/drunk [add more] adult passengers on the other hand... lol :D

Am I missing something, or could you still book a child (or adult) fare (as you can with other airlines) for a First class seat, and the baby sit there?

Now I'm curious.

Is this a lap baby ban or all children under two? or another age? Anyone have any info.

I can't find it on their site and I'm too tired and have too much to do before bed to look it up ;)

http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/fr/en/mh-experience/kids-corner/infants.html

Am I missing something, or could you still book a child (or adult) fare (as you can with other airlines) for a First class seat, and the baby sit there?

You can still book an infant in a seat in F - so I think it is a ban on lap infants only.

I am totally OK with the ban on lap infants while allowing seated infants. (I'd even be OK with no young children at all, and I've got two of them myself.)

Just as there are places on land that aren't appropriate for my little ones right now, I think the same goes for the air.

I wouldn't bring my children to super high-end restaurants where they will be disruptive, either.

I guess it's slightly better that at least the family has some proverbial skin in the game if their only option is to buy a full seat. (And YES, I am well aware of how much a lap infant in F can cost. It's still not the cost of a ticket, so I don't think families in F should have teir cake and eat it, too. JMO)

I don't see how this is a "baby ban". Lots of safety advocates have wanted to do away with the free or 10% ticket "lap infant" policy, on the principle that all children should be strapped into their own seats the majority of the time, for safety's sake. If that's what they are doing, then it's good that they are publicizing it.

No they wouldn't be as that is really a "small" American mindset thing. I love all the theories here and the small town domestic ideas that are getting thrown into it by people who obviously never travel internationally. 1) LAP child was not mentioned anywhere, in fact in the article it mentioned BASSINETS, for several of you who obviously have no concept of what these are, they are the things that people use when travelling with babies on long haul international flights.................even on US carriers. 2) The MH decision has to do more with Malaysian politics then anything else, including the wives and babies of a certain type of Malaysian politician who generally fly free or at low cost up front, and who are the biggest source of these sorts of problems.

... but it is the lap infants that occupy the bassinets, not seat-occupying infants, so no, we are not "small minded" but thanks anyway

Odd that Malaysia Airlines would do this, as they are otherwise so child friendly... Perhaps as someone said earlier, it's more about making people pay for a seat for the baby. Which would be fair enough in my book.

Odd too that I live in Malaysia and have seen nothing in the local paper about it. Guess they don't want to trumpet it...

K.

Now that's interesting!

Another point is that those of us who have flown with really small infants, like 5 months and under, can confirm that nothing is quieter and easier than that age. Also, just turned 2's can be the worst so the whole thing is kind of illogical.

This is not on all aircraft, is it? So basically, this only affects one class of certain aircraft on one airline and passengers can get around it by buying a ticket.

It's kind of like when a religion, that you don't associate with, declares something you don't agree with. You can not agree but it's a bit useless.

This might be a kind of PR stunt to appease all those who have had unhappy flights in the past and in fact, not really impact very many families anyway.

I cannot see this "baby ban in first class" issue impacting a large number of families, but I'm not sure it does the airline much material good to turn away families who can afford paid first class travel for themselves and their child(ren) and will pay for it.

The airline's unwillingness to pay for bassinets/bassinet positions in first class on its planes (to be delivered no less) seems rather extraordinarily cheap of the airline, but so be it. Bassinet positions aren't required in all markets as a condition to allow for lap-child infants in the cabin, so merely avoiding bassinet provisioning doesn't a baby-ban make. And I don't recall of any market where bassinets are required as a condition to allow for own-seat ticketed infants in the cabin, so that doesn't seem to make for much of a baby-ban either.

Once MH is part of Oneworld, it will be interesting to see if MH is able to stick with its position on this front with regard to lap child tickets, although I can't see what the current OW carriers would have to gain by pushing MH on the lap child ticket front.

... but it is the lap infants that occupy the bassinets, not seat-occupying infants, so no, we are not "small minded" but thanks anyway

Some infants ticketed for seats of their own do occupy bassinets on flights.

Yes but actually you need somewhere nice on a flight with a baby! I wouldn't fly first class with a newborn because they DO cry a lot and you don't need that much space! But my youngest, Thomas, is 4 months old and we'll be flying to New Zealand from England with a stop-over in LA when he's 6 months. We'll be flying first class as my job is paying! If they weren't paying we'd be going business class anyway. There's generally 2-3" extra room on the seats which is invaluable with small children in carseats or for wriggly toddlers. There's more legroom for quick stretches or nappy(diaper) changing. There's personal TV screens so you can select something child friendly. There are also often flatbed seats (or at least recliners) so children can get a good night's sleep.

My other children are 7 and 13 and to be honest Jed (7) is probably more trouble than a baby on a flight. A baby will lie there, it's children from about 2-8 who want to run around in the plane, shout, use noisy toys, etc.

I'm not flying with them though so that's not a problem

Just as a side note, the airlines themselves ban their own employees from flying premium cabins, seat or no seat. My second airline required 8 years for business and 10 for FC.

Once a business passenger complained about a baby in his section and blurted out that it was a passrider's baby. I was able to tell him no, if a baby is crying, it's a "real" customer's (so go back to your seat and quit complaining-just kidding-but I was thinking it!!)

The point is that airlines are aware of this issue and even make provisions with their own employees to avoid problems.

Now that's
Another point is that those of us who have flown with really small infants, like 5 months and under, can confirm that nothing is quieter and easier than that age.
I only wish this were true for all babies- my oldest spent the first several months of her life screaming bloody murder no matter where we were.

I only wish this were true for all babies- my oldest spent the first several months of her life screaming bloody murder no matter where we were.

Ditto! :p It all depends on the baby.

I only wish this were true for all babies- my oldest spent the first several months of her life screaming bloody murder no matter where we were.

Was that because of colic? How miserable! Poor baby... Not a fun way to start parenthood. I wouldn't have touched an airplane in that case. Parents would have been told, come see her yourself or wait!

MH says no ban (http://www.nst.com.my/nst/articles/8mass/Article/art_print)

So this thread can now be locked and disappear.

Done ;)