UK airlines to be banned from charging parents to sit with children

Airlines will be blocked from charging parents extra to sit with their children on planes, according to government plans.

The new rule would require airlines to seat passengers aged under 14 next to their parents or an accompanying adult free of charge. Passengers will also no longer need to pay to tweak the name on their flight booking if they need to correct a mistake.

It is understood that ministers will try to introduce the changes before the start of next year’s summer holidays. The prime minister, Andy Burnham, has said the rule changes are part of a crackdown on the “little charges that add up” when families plan their holidays.

MPs are in the process of debating a new set of rules for travel companies, as the civil aviation (consumer protection and regulatory reform) bill makes its way through parliament. The proposed law will give ministers flexible power to set out passenger rights and the duties of airlines and airports.

Burnham said: “Charging parents just to sit with their children is a rip-off, plain and simple. And being hit with a hefty fee for a simple spelling mistake on a booking form isn’t right either.

“People are fed up with these little charges that add up, so I’m putting a stop to them. This is what our everyday fixes are all about – giving people room to breathe by tackling the small irritations that catch people out, waste their time and cost them money.”

An arrangement to sit together can currently cost a parent and child up to £104 on a return journey, according to the Department for Transport.

Rory Boland, editor of consumer magazine Which? Travel, said: “It’s clearly unfair to force parents and children as young as three to pay an extra fee just to sit together. Airlines that have separated families are putting profit ahead of passenger peace of mind.”

Earlier this year, Ryanair adjusted its family seating policy after an investigation was launched into the company charging parents to sit with their children on flights. The Irish operator previously required parents travelling with children aged between two and 11 to pay to reserve what was referred to as a mandatory family seat.

Children were then allocated seats next to or near parents free of charge. The fee for a mandatory family seat was typically about £8 each way, the UK Competition and Markets Authority watchdog found.

Under the new policy, parents will still have the option of paying to reserve a seat of their choosing and have their children alongside them free of charge.

The transport secretary, Heidi Alexander, has also announced a crackdown on bad behaviour by passengers on aircraft, with the government, airlines and trade unions working on a new system for sharing information about disruptive passengers.

Airlines logged more than 1,000 serious disruptive passenger incidents in 2025, government figures show, including what it described as a mid-air brawl that caused a flight to be diverted.

Using the new system, airlines could choose to ban persistently disruptive passengers from their aircraft.