Airlines enforce the 50-pound checked-bag limit with ticket-counter scales that get slammed all day—and aren’t always perfectly calibrated. But some travelers have gone beyond arguing about ounces: they’re deliberately shifting part of a suitcase’s weight off the scale so the reading drops and the overweight fee disappears. It’s common enough that agents say they “cringe” when they spot it, and a whole influencer ecosystem now sells it as a tip.
- Most checked bags in the U.S. are limited to 50 pounds. Anything heavier than that and you’ll pay extra.
- First and business class passengers, and those with elite status, may be allowed 70 pounds.
- When you approach the check-in counter, they’ll weigh your bags, and if your luggage is overweight you’ll be assessed an extra fee.
- But some passengers are using a trick to make their luggage seem lighter.
In 2020 the North Carolina Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services found half a dozen scales at the Charlotte airport were miscalibrated. This happens all the time. People are slamming heavy suitcases on them all day, every day, and sometimes at odd angles. They need maintenance!
One passenger had a bag that was found to be 50 grams overweight. The airline wanted to charge him. So he took chocolates out of the bag and ate 50 grams’ worth until he got the weight of his luggage down.
If the airline is going to be a stickler for overweight luggage, even using miscalibrated scales, then some passengers are going to resort to guerilla tactics to even the playing field – like supporting the bag with their foot to reduce the weight on the scale.
A flight attendant taught me this pic.twitter.com/y5wHbFLSdl
— Mr.Decent. (@Mrdecent000) December 15, 2025
It appears that the passenger in this video is really doing this, and their foot is behind the bag so the agent can’t see it.
I’ve seen ticket counter agents comment that this is fairly common that they’ve seen and “cringed when people try to do this.” And there’s actually a cottage industry of influencers who push this as a tip, sometimes suggesting using your foot to support the scale itself instead.
@bed.sweater the baggage lady was cool about it #airport #music #band #explore ♬ All Keyed Up – Ben Tankard
Passengers usually debate whether supporting the bag with one foot will reduce how it weighs on the scale, making the mistaken argument that this is like standing on a scale with one foot (your weight stays the same).
In fact, lifting one side of the bag with your foot while it’s being weighed at an airport ticket counter will reduce the weight reading on the scale because of the distribution of the bag’s weight between the scale and your foot. When you lift part of the bag, you’re effectively supporting some of its weight, reducing the load on the scale.
Some people get concerned about the weight and balance – and therefore safety – of the aircraft if the weight of a bag is off. Passengers, and passenger luggage, in most cases are treated as averages. Revisiting those average weight calculations (for passengers) is why from time to time you see stories of airlines requiring passengers to ‘weigh in’ before being allowed to fly.
If you want to skip bag fees, pack appropriately, get elite status with the airline, or maybe their credit card. You can often save a bit of money prepaying your bags (but often passengers guess their checked bag needs wrong and overpay). Regardless, this is actual fraud. Do not do this.
I’m not sure how taking chocolate from your checked bag and eating it could be considered “deceptive.”
It is sad how casual dishonest behavior has become, and how quickly people are willing to justify it when it benefits them. Beating a bag scale through deception is not clever, it is simply theft. There are some cultures left in the world that would still reject such things, and the fact that it’s being shared and applauded online says something very negative about where we are as a society in the United States.
first this is an old trick.
second “airline employees cringe”? they dont crimge when they ask a passenger to pay if they are 50 gms overweight??
too many injuctions for passangers who pay, too little can clearly be done about usurious airlines?
Please, the employees don’t care. Half the time when I check more than one bag they have me put both on at the same time!
Of course there is no mention that in the case of a lot of international airports or international airline check-in counters that they use the ,mini-conveyor belt system where the scale is in the middle next to the agent, not at the very front where you put the back on the belt, so this would not work in those types of counters….
Ben at OMAAT has written about him doing this. It’s not all that uncommon.
@Mike Hunt — Yeah, wonder why that is… isn’t not like our on-and-off-again leader for the past decade frequently celebrates dishonest behavior, both ‘casual’ and large-scale, because, as he said, ‘it makes me smart.’ Nice of you (and a few others, like @George Romey) to be so eager to punch-down the petty theft, but not to go after greedy entrenched oligarchic and corporate greed. The fish rots at the head. I hope we can have an era of accountability after all this chaos.
This is an old trick that most check in agents know about. They will give you the hawk eye when you put your bag on the scale. It really doesn’t work anymore.
If the scale is off it is usually to the airline’s advantage although I have had some scales weigh light. I usually ask them to zero their scale and take my bag off if the number isn’t correct (I check with several different scales before heading to the airport and have a handheld scale with me.) A few taps of the keys is all it takes and then the scale weighs correctly. I don’t cheat and I don’t want to be cheated.