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How to Beat High Airfares

nytimes.com

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Re: How to Beat High Airfares

#31

Post by whakojacko »

ora600 wrote: post #28
bradly wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That makes sense, but you could argue that there is a cost associated with upsetting and frustrating your customers that maybe the airlines aren't taking into consideration. Something can't be right with their models if they are going bankrupt again and again.

It is my understanding that airlines going bankrupt again and again is a direct result of their relationship with their pilot unions: http://philip.greenspun.com/flying/unions-and-airlines

That, $100/barrel oil, and a mediocre economy.

Re: How to Beat High Airfares

#32

Post by hugh3 »

bradly wrote: post #25
whakojacko wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its not that crazy when you look into it more. Montreal to Paris is a low yielding route filled mostly with price-conscious tourists. New York to Paris has, as a percentage, substantially more business travel, which can sustain higher fares. For each route, the airline (presumably Continental) is trying to extract what it sees as the maximum price the market is willing to bear. As another example, Des Moines to Dalla…

That makes sense, but you could argue that there is a cost associated with upsetting and frustrating your customers that maybe the airlines aren't taking into consideration. Something can't be right with their models if they are going bankrupt again and again.

Would you prefer that they raised the prices of the Montreal to Paris trip so that you can pay more?

Or do you want them to lower the price of the Newark to Paris trip so that it sells out early and people who would have been willing to pay $1400 for that trip can't get to where they want to go?

Re: How to Beat High Airfares

#33

Post by sliverstorm »

enjo wrote: post #24
hugh3 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This guy was modded down, but are there ethical issues? If I'm booked through from SFO to DFW to MIA and I vanish at DFW, they're going to be calling my name over the PA system and trying to figure out whether or not to hold the DFW-MIA flight. This is especially true if my SFO-DFW leg is delayed -- my vanishing act might well wind up holding up a planeload of people as the airline figures out what the hell has happe…

Ya there are. I've had planes take off fairly delayed because of folks doing just this. We just sit there as the airline tries to reconcile why the number of checked-in passengers doesn't match their passenger count. I'm guessing this is some sort of security rule? It doesn't matter tho, it absolutely sucks for everyone else on the flight.

Who cares about delaying an entire plane of busy people when you can save $20? [/bitter]

Re: How to Beat High Airfares

#34

Post by mbrubeck »

euroclydon wrote: post #23
OstiaAntica wrote: post #5

This is unethical, basically he calls for jumping off of flights at layovers, which violates the terms of the ticket. There's even a security issue for the airlines, because they need to check if your bags are flying unaccompanied. Ironic that the NYT cracks down on people evading its paywall but is selling content on doing the same for air travel.

I don't think the unattended bag part is a big deal. Who would check a bag to some city they're never going to?

Not allowing unintented bags is one step to prevent bombings. The answer to your question ("Who would check a bag to some city they're never going to?") is "someone who is trying to blow up the plane."

Re: How to Beat High Airfares

#35

Post by hugh3 »

sliverstorm wrote: post #33
enjo wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ya there are. I've had planes take off fairly delayed because of folks doing just this. We just sit there as the airline tries to reconcile why the number of checked-in passengers doesn't match their passenger count. I'm guessing this is some sort of security rule? It doesn't matter tho, it absolutely sucks for everyone else on the flight.

Who cares about delaying an entire plane of busy people when you can save $20? [/bitter]

Sadly this is the attitude that some people really have. And if challenged on it, they'll rationalize it by blaming the airline for setting their prices that way.

It's much like the drug user's rationalization of the fact that the money he spends goes to support organized crime. "Well," he says, "that's the government's fault for not legalizing the drugs I wish to take!"

Re: How to Beat High Airfares

#36

Post by hugh3 »

euroclydon wrote: post #23
OstiaAntica wrote: post #5

This is unethical, basically he calls for jumping off of flights at layovers, which violates the terms of the ticket. There's even a security issue for the airlines, because they need to check if your bags are flying unaccompanied. Ironic that the NYT cracks down on people evading its paywall but is selling content on doing the same for air travel.

I don't think the unattended bag part is a big deal. Who would check a bag to some city they're never going to?

Who would check a bag to some city they're never going to?

A person who wants to blow up an airliner. That's the point.

Re: How to Beat High Airfares

#37

Post by ghshephard »

rhizome wrote: post #29
hugh3 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it ethical for airlines to charge you more for A->B than a flight going from A->B->C? I don't know. Is it obviously unethical for them to do so? It's a sensible observation that a subset of X should be priced lower than X, but is it a moral one? Or, if the airline can make more money by charging more for A->B than A->C via B then, heck, it's their airplane, let 'em do what they want!

Why are ethics and morality being discussed in the context of business? They have their pricing strategy, I have mine. It's my travel money, let me do what I want.

Nobody who is commenting here cares (or I strongly suspect they don't care) about the Airlines and people making money. It's the hundred or so people who are sitting on the airplane that are being inconvenienced - possibly missing their own connections later on, that our concerns are for.

In general, airlines don't like to have people's checked luggage travel separately from them - and they don't know if the missing person checked luggage or not. So, they either have to do a count, get everyone in their correct seat, or delay the plane until the person gets back on.

It's a cute hack, but an annoying one for everyone caught up in it.

Re: How to Beat High Airfares

#38

Post by aboodman »

sliverstorm wrote: post #33
enjo wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ya there are. I've had planes take off fairly delayed because of folks doing just this. We just sit there as the airline tries to reconcile why the number of checked-in passengers doesn't match their passenger count. I'm guessing this is some sort of security rule? It doesn't matter tho, it absolutely sucks for everyone else on the flight.

Who cares about delaying an entire plane of busy people when you can save $20? [/bitter]

The article has an example of saving $189 (about 50% of the published price of the ticket in question), and a post in this thread had an example of saving 500 euro on a transatlantic flight. So it's not always trivial amount of money.

Re: How to Beat High Airfares

#39

Post by mthoms »

whakojacko wrote: post #14
bradly wrote: post #8

A couple days a found a round-trip flight from Montreal to Paris with a layover in New Jersey for $762. I tried to book the exact some flight, but starting in New Jersey, and it was over $1,400. This sort of this is crazy. Is anyone really surprised that airlines keep going bankrupt?

Its not that crazy when you look into it more. Montreal to Paris is a low yielding route filled mostly with price-conscious tourists. New York to Paris has, as a percentage, substantially more business travel, which can sustain higher fares. For each route, the airline (presumably Continental) is trying to extract what it sees as the maximum price the market is willing to bear. As another example, Des Moines to Dalla…

Based on the principle of charging the maximum price the market is willing to bear, would you consider it ethical for a company like Amazon to charge more or less based on the affluence of the billing zipcode for each customer? /honest question
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