Originally Posted by dwh2
But as for the other thing, while it wouldn't surprise me if people did this a lot to save money, I can't imagine that the quantities of people trying to circumvent a minimum connecting time requirement are enough to warrant a special policy. In this day of regular delays and security checks, out of a million passengers, I doubt that more than 1 or 2 would bother to risk missing their connection to shorten their waiting time by a half an hour. Doesn't make sense.
I also doubt that people would book separate tickets to avoid the minimum connect time. THe risk is just too high to lose your second ticket altogether. OTOH, people may try to use loopholes in multi-airline booking engines, such as expedia, travelocity, etc... to get a through-ticket which avoids minimum connect time, thinking that they will be protected. They would not be. The conditions are cumulative: you must be on a through-ticket AND comply with minimum connect time. Not all booking engines enforce minimum connect time as they should.
I think you are probably right that the marginal cost of an extra baggage to re-route can be grossly over-estimated. Still, the more you get, the more people you need to track the luggage, spend time on the phone with customers, plus the cost of getting the luggage from the airport to the customer. All in all, it adds up. Not a major issue on an intercontinental ticket but on shorter routes where fares can be very low and margins wafer thin, an extra $20 dollar (to use your figure) that you need to cover the cost may make lower fares simply uncompetitive.