Airline Passenger Caught Faking Pregnancy by Stuffing Items Under Dress to Avoid Baggage Fee
Some travelers will do whatever it takes to save money on airfare.
In an attempt to avoid paying an overweight baggage fee for her carry-on, Rebecca Andrews came up with what she thought was a fool-proof plan: fake a baby bump in order to conceal some of her heaviest items in her clothes.
Andrews, who is a travel writer, detailed her plan to “fight the system” and avoid paying an extra $41 dollar fee to Australia’s Jetstar airline, in an article published last week by the website Escape.
Providing a step-by-step guide on how to make a realistic looking baby bump, Andrews recommended putting on something stretchy and then wrapping “your smallest but heaviest items — aka electronics” in a “slippery” fabric, which would make it easier to “slide down your front.”
To complete the illusion, she shaped the bundle into a bump, hid another heavy item (her laptop) down the back of her dress and then put on three layers of clothing to try and disguise what was really going on underneath.
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While this might sound too crazy to possibly work, Andrews said the fake baby bump actually confused one mother she ran into at Sydney Airport, who asked how far along she was.
However, things fell apart when it came time to actually get on the flight.
As Andrews walked to the gate, she discovered she was the very last person to board the flight, which meant “the staff were all paying me attention.”
“Collectively, they weighed my bag, and with smiles gave me the all clear. But as I walked my fake-pregnant a— down the gangway, I dropped my ticket and made a noise. So they all looked at me again,” she wrote. “As I bent over to pick up the ticket, the shape of my laptop down my back suddenly became apparent.”
In the heat of the moment, Andrews confessed almost her entire scheme, admitting to the airline staff that she “triple-layered to make the carry-on weight and not get charged” — but not that she wasn’t actually pregnant.
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“While we appreciate the creativity, our team [is] pretty wise to all the tricks,” a Jetstar spokesperson told Fox News in a statement, adding that “most of our customers find it more comfortable to pay a little bit more for an extra 3 kilos [nearly 7 pounds] of carry-on.”
Even though she had to pay the baggage fee in the end, Andrews said that she would be down to try again.
“I would do it again and just make sure I was not the last person to board,” she wrote.
