Woman fakes pregnancy to avoid Jetstar's excess baggage fee

Jetstar only allows travellers to bring a 7kg bag as hand luggage, otherwise they charge a A$60 fee. Photo / 123RF

A woman has revealed the bizarre way she tried to avoid an airline's excess baggage fee before getting caught out by staff.

Flying from Melbourne to Sydney, Rebecca Andrews decided to fake being pregnant after she suspected her luggage may tip over the weight requirements.

The airline only allows travellers to bring a 7kg bag as hand luggage, otherwise they charge a A$60 fee.

So in a bizarre bid to avoid the extra charge, the travel writer stuffed her belongings down the front of her jumpsuit to form a pregnancy "bump".

However, Andrews got caught out at the last minute when she arrived late to board the plane.

In a video on Instagram, the woman is seen putting a laptop down her stretchy, leopard print jumpsuit.

She also hid a heavy charger among the rolled-up extra clothes she put down her front to form the baby bump to make her look pregnant.

She then layered loose clothing over the top to make it look less suspicious.

Andrews managed to get her luggage weight down to 7kg, and even had a fellow passenger ask how far along she was.

View this post on Instagram

When you don’t want to pay the excess for overweight carry on #travelhack #flighthacks #getpreg

A post shared by Writes Interestingly (@thebecandrews) on Oct 24, 2019 at 9:07pm PDT

However, things turned sour after she arrived at the gate late and all staff members' eyes fell on her.

As she went to board the flight, she dropped her ticket and had to bend over to pick it up.

"The shape of my laptop down my back suddenly became apparent," she explained in an article on Escape.com.au.

A staff member noticed and asked the passenger if she had a backpack on under her jacket.

Andrews freaked out and confessed to Jetstar staff that she was faking pregnancy to avoid the excess baggage fee — which she was eventually issued with after being caught.

"Honestly, if my carry-on was ever overweight I would do it again and just make sure I was not the last person to board," she said.