A Few Hidden Perks of Travelling with Kids
Travelling with kids isn’t easy. Heck, it isn’t easy to travel as an adult sometimes. No one enjoys long line-ups, waiting for security, boarding, take-off, etc. Imagine doing that with kids who often get impatient easily. However, travelling with kids does come with perks at times. Here’s a list of some perks that we benefited from over our 5+ years of travel with our children.
1) Separate security lines at the airport
This is one of my favourite perks. Most airports at major cities including the one at our home airport (Toronto Pearson) have separate security lines for families with young children, seniors, and passengers with disabilities. These come in especially handy during holiday season travel. While the security check-up itself tend to take longer per passenger (given the nature of passengers served through this line), the line tend to be emptier and as such move much quicker than the general line-up.
2) Early boarding for families with children
Most airlines board families with young children at the beginning of the boarding process, during the “pre-boarding” phase. This is meant to provide ample time for these families to fold strollers if needed, get settled and ensure their children are settled in their seats. This is especially helpful on full planes where you don’t have to compete for overhead bin space.
If you arrive at the gate after the “pre-boarding” phase is complete - which is bound to happen every once in a while as you travel with young children- , don’t fret. Approach the gate agent and inform them that you have young children, they will often board you immediately. This has been our experience throughout our travels.
3) Separate check-in counters for families with children
This is a great perk that more airlines have started to adopt recently. We experienced it with British Airways on our last trip to Europe. We understand that Air Canada adopted the same model recently and are excited to try it in the near future. Similar to the designated security lines, some airlines are designating special check-in counters to families with young children. Our experience with BA in London was smooth and pleasant and we would recommend it for families travelling with young children.
British Airways Family Check-in area at Terminal 5 in Heathrow International Airport in London (October 2019)
4) Hotel room upgrades (including lounge access)
Nothing beats travelling with charming and social kids! On our last trip to Sydney, we got access to the Sheraton Club Lounge at the Sheraton Grande Hyde Park after a pleasant interaction between our 2 children and the lobby agent. After the interaction, the agent asked for our room keys and told us that she wants to make sure these cute kids have a wonderful stay at the hotel. The lounge included day-long access to unlimited food and drinks. During the evening reception (which was for adults only), families with children were offered to dine at the lobby bar with a sampling platter of all items being served at the lounge. Having access to hotel lounges with children for us has become key during travel as it provides us with the flexibility to have milk and snacks as needed throughout the day.
View of St. Mary’s Cathedral, Hyde Park, and the Sydney Harbour from the Club Lounge at Sheraton Grande Sydney Hyde Park (October 2019)
One of the evening reception platters provided to us as part of our club lounge access (October 2019)
5) Free Airplane Seat Assignment
Airlines strive to keep families together. As such, our experience has been that as long as we book the entire family on one ticket, we have the ability to select our seats ahead of time for free (regardless of the ticket option bought). We had a perfect run until we flew Qantas earlier this year and they refused to allow us to select our seats ahead of time, but did guarantee us that we will be seated together.
The flexibility and ease of getting this depends on the airline. It was easiest with British Airways, where we were given access to every available seat on the plane through their website. We had to call in to get our seats selected in the past with Air Canada and United Airlines.
Reminder - if your ticket includes seat selection or if you pay for seat selection, this perk doesn’t apply to you.
6) Free Bulkhead Seats
Another perk for families with babies (especially those that fit in airline bassinets) is the free bulkhead seats. Don’t spend your money on upgrading to these seats, just call the airline and they give you the seats for free. Each airline has their version of how they do it so make sure you read their policies to understand how they deal with bulkhead seats. United Airlines for example gave Tahmina and I bulkhead seats for free when we flew with Maya the first time to Australia (in 2015). Air Canada offered one of us a free seat while the other had to pay on our trip to Thailand (in 2016).
In summary, don’t be shy to ask any service provider (airlines, hotels, airports, etc.) about what special services do they offer for families with young children. In a lot of cases, we had to find out for ourselves as a some of these perks were not advertised or voluntarily provided. Also, as a reminder, children under the age of 2 can fly for free (just pay the taxes). The caveat is that they don’t get a seat. In our case, we benefited from this with both of our children on short-haul flights, but opted to get them their own seats after their first birthday when we took long-haul flights.
I hope this was helpful. I’d love to know what other perks you’ve gotten on your travels with young children! Leave me a comment below!
Kid’s Corner
We’ll be sharing plenty of our travel stories and tips for traveling with young kids. In the meantime, here’s some cute colouring pages that we recently created for our kids.