Hello and welcome to today's independent travel podcast with me, Simon Calder, and I'm doing some real-time flight boarding here.

Let me explain the situation. It's exactly eight minutes before my flights to Algiers is due to depart.

I'm on a bus, the very last bus, with a queue of passengers waiting on the stairs.

Everything is taking quite a long time and I think there's very little possibility this plane

will be heading for the other side of the Mediterranean any time soon, but we shall see about that.

I just wanted to outline my strategy for boarding pretty much any flight,

and that is always to be last on board.

And I'll tell you why.

I cannot understand why priority boarding is something that people would actually value.

I don't want to spend any longer than I have to

inside the constricted aluminium tube over there sitting in a uncomfortable seat. And so therefore,

being last on the plane is something I would particularly pay money for. I value that. And I don't want to necessarily sit in the

seat. I have been assigned. Now, you need to be careful and respectful about this. And of course,

if cabin crews say go and sit in your seat, then you must, of course, comply with any rules that they tell you about. But I do like a bit of

extra space. I've got quite long legs. I like to stretch out. And so therefore, I'm certainly not

encouraging anybody to do anything involving so-called tariff abuse. That is where you buy an economy seat but sit yourself

in premium economy or business class. That is illegal and bad and wrong. I just mean finding

a little bit of extra leg room. Normally that means getting an empty seat next to you.

Emergency exit rows are tricky because quite often you will find that they are reserved for people who pay extra for them.

And if you try and sit down, well I asked on an easy jet flight once from Crete, long old flight,

and they said, of course you can,

and that will be £25, which I declined to pay. But I am always in the market for an empty seat

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