US Airways Quietly Raises Online Checked Baggage Fee. Why?

In a move that has TruPrice truly baffled, on October 1, 2010, US Airways became one of the very first airlines to eliminate the incentive to book checked baggage online by raising the fee to match the fee it charges when checking bags at the airport.

Prior to October 1, US Airways, like most major carriers, differentiated online baggage check-in from airport baggage check-in by offering a $2.00/$3.oo offset.  Intuition would suggest that the incentive was designed to encourage travelers to check their bags online thus eliminating an encroachment on ticket counter agents at the airport who now have to transact the fee instead of having it done in advance.  Huh?

One can only infer from this that US Airways is willing to absorb the extra handling time at check-in in order to collect the extra dollars.  Am I missing something here?

I encourage a voice from the wild to enlighten me as to why US Airways would add the additional $3.00 to the online baggage check-in policy thus creating longer waits at the airport.  Isn’t it supposed to work the other way around?  Encourage online transactions thus reducing the inaccuracies of agents, extra handling of monies, and extending wait times for passengers who now decide not to give an extra cent to airlines one minute earlier than absolutely necessary?

Baffled.  Just plain baffled.

Chris