An overweight passenger has sued Air France after being told he was too fat and had to pay for a second seat to accommodate him. Jean-Jacques Jauffret, a French scriptwriter, said that he had felt humiliated by Air France staff that had measured his waist in public at New Delhi Airport in 2005 and decided he was too big for a single seat. Air France’s lawyer said that the company had a clear policy of asking obese passengers to pay for two seats. “Let’s be objective. This man is fat,” lawyer Fernand Gamault told the court in Bobigny, according to Le Parisien newspaper. “He barely fits on the courtroom chair. How could he sit in an airplane?” Jauffret said he weighed more than 160 kilos (353 lb) and said he had flown numerous times, including on other Air France flights, without ever being asked to pay more. Air France’s web site urges overweight passengers to reserve a second seat, adding that failure to do so might mean they are refused access to an aircraft if it is fully booked.
Three cheers for Air France. On a recent flight home from San Francisco with British Airways I was seated next to a grossly overweight man. As I had paid almost two and a half times the price in Economy to have some extra room in World Traveller Plus I was not happy to have this man’s flesh falling over MY seat. It was disgusting. Added to which he snored. The upshot was I got no sleep in spite of paying dearly for what I believed would be extra space.
I will never travel BA World Traveller Plus again – I found it very poor value for money leaving aside the problem above.