SAS to launch budget alternative for hand-luggage fliers

Scandinavian airline SAS is set to launch a budget airline next month, the company said on Thursday.

Passengers who buy tickets under the SAS Go Light brand will pay a lower price in return for not checking any baggage.

"Many of our customers fly only with hand luggage and they have wished to only pay for the service they get," Stephanie Smitt Lindberg, vice president of customer journey and loyalty, told the daily newspaper Dagens Nyheter.

The option will be offered to passengers travelling on several routes within Europe. The airline said it was not worried about luggage compartments overcrowding instead.

SAS, Scandinavia's largest airline, is partly-owned by the governments of Sweden, Denmark and Norway and flies mainly within Europe.