Parents Pay as Much as $100+ To Sit With Kids on Planes

There’s no doubt it can be memorable to take a trip with your kids and explore the world together. But that same trip often comes with a long to-do list—and exhaustion. Some are even calling it a business trip instead of a vacation.

On top of that, parents sometimes have to deal with additional hurdles. One big one: paying more money to sit next to their children on the plane.

If they don’t, families may have to sit separately. Or they have to rely on strangers to voluntarily move seats, which, as TikTok videos show, isn’t always the case.

Until laws are passed to forbid extra travel fees, many parents are dealing with even more stress when it comes to flying.

What Extra Travel Fees Are Costing Families

Many airlines charge extra for a seat selection. On average, a one-way seat selection fee can cost up to $23 on average, depending on the airline, according to Nerd Wallet. These costs add up for roundtrip tickets, especially when there are multiple family members flying.

Maud Maciak, founder of GoWhee, an interactive traveling app for parents, flies with her children up to 10 times a year and has been impacted by what she calls airlines’ “parenting tax.” 

“With costs ranging from $40 to sometimes $100+ to ‘upgrade’ to a ticket that allows for a seat selection, I feel cheated and at an unfair advantage compared to other travelers,” she says. “Those advertised ‘low cost’ tickets are never for us parents, because those would mean sitting separately from our children, which is unrealistic.”

Oneika Raymond, a travel journalist, has heard similar complaints from traveling parents. “Airfares continue to increase in price so many parents are feeling the pinch when it comes to traveling as a family,” she says. “Air travel is quickly becoming a luxury that many middle-class families are struggling to afford.”

Families around the country are already dealing with rising costs of groceries and gas, and 41% of them name inflation, or the high cost of living, as the “most important financial problem facing their family,” according to a recent Gallup poll. Alleviating some of these hidden costs for traveling families can make all the difference in their experience.

Of course, parents can opt not to pay for a seat selection, but that often leaves them scrambling for solutions at the airport—or on the plane. Raymond says she’s luckily had a few instances where flight attendants have gone out of their way to ensure she was seated with her child. But that’s not always the case as asking passengers to accommodate traveling families can lead to confrontations.

“Many travelers feel like parents ‘should pay to sit beside their kids’ and not ‘be rude,'” shares Maciak. “Debates like this are taking the real spotlight away from the fact that once again the entire responsibility is put on the parents. Instead, we should look at why the airlines are getting away with it and creating unnecessary stress for everyone involved.”

Why Families Should Sit Together on the Plane

Let’s start with the obvious reason: children likely need hands-on support from their caregiver throughout the flight, including with snacks and activities. But that’s not all.

“More importantly, forcing a child to sit separately from their parents can be anxiety-provoking and turn the flight into a highly stressful experience,” says Emily Edlynn, PhD, an Illinois-based clinical psychologist and author of Autonomy-Supportive Parenting: Reduce Parental Burnout and Raise Competent, Confident Children.

There could be instances where a child may need their caregiver close by to help them feel at ease, such as during scary turbulence. “Parents are a child’s primary source of comfort and stability,” says Dr. Edlynn.

These airline policies make it particularly difficult for children with specific needs to fly more comfortably if they aren’t able to sit with their parents.

“A child may also have in invisible disability that requires their primary caregiver’s attention and responsiveness throughout a flight,” says Dr. Edlynn. “It’s not fair to expect a child with these needs to sit with a stranger.”

Laws Trying To Fix the Travel Problem

The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) issued a statement in 2022 urging airlines to stop charging adults flying with kids 13 and under extra fees for adjacent seating. It also suggested they implement a policy that guarantees children won’t sit without their adult.

In 2024, the DOT took it a step further by proposing a new rule that would ban airlines from charging parents a fee to sit with their kids 13 and under. If adjacent seats aren’t available during booking, parents will be allowed to get a full refund or wait to see if other seating options become available. If the latter doesn’t happen before boarding, families will have the option to rebook the next flight with adjacent seating, without any change.

Meanwhile, Senator Amy Klobuchar created the Families Fly Together Act bill, along with Senator Ed Markey, which also aims to require airlines to allow parents to sit with their children 13 or under, at no additional costs. The legislation is part of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Reauthorization Act of 2024, which is heading to the House of Representatives for a final vote.

“For any parent, they deserve to be able to have their kids sit next to them, without having to pay extra for the price of having a family,” Senator Klobuchar tells Parents, adding, “It may be their one vacation of the year or they’re going to visit the grandparents with the grandkids—and you just want to try to make it as easy and affordable as possible.”

While laws like this can help make a family’s travel experience less stressful, Dr. Edlynn points out an issue with the age cutoff.

“Developmental age and chronological age don’t always match, especially in the case of developmental delays. But even typically developing children can have varying levels of emotional maturity and independence in early adolescence,” she explains. “If a law did not protect older children’s rights to sit with their parents on flights, this could end up unfairly penalizing these children with greater needs and putting them at risk for significant anxiety and behavior struggles during the flight.”

Bottom line on allowing parents to sit with their kids without extra costs? “It’s not just imperative, it’s practical, and the right thing to do,” says Raymond. “Dare I say that imposing fees on parents to do so—particularly when they may not have the means to pay for the ‘privilege’—is reckless and cruel.”