I'm booked on a domestic flight this afternoon that currently has three unsold seats. I'm booked on an HBO only fare — would quite like to be able to check my bag on the outbound so I can bring my hosts a nice bottle or two, but if I have to spend £25 on checking my bag for a flight of less than 200 miles, I might as well spend that money on buying a bottle airside.

In the past, I've received e-mails from BA such as this:

"Thank you for choosing to fly with British Airways. Your BA flight is busy today and we would like to invite you to check-in your hand baggage free of charge at desks B15 and B16, prior to security. Thank you and we look forward to seeing you in Terminal 5."

Have they stopped doing this? I can't say I would particularly blame them as collecting as many bag fees as they can and them make people check at the gate is a better fit with their business model than making the boarding process smooth and civilised.