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Airlines are charging solo passengers higher fares than groups

thriftytraveler.com

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Re: Airlines are charging solo passengers higher fares than groups

#91

Post by dlisboa »

hiAndrewQuinn wrote: post #59
sidewndr46 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't really find this relevant in the US because airline pricing is already the ultimate brutal form of pricing. Not only are they allowed to bill you whatever they want, they are never under any actual obligation to put you on the plane.

This seems surprising to me. I was under the impression that airlines are pretty low profit margin industries, pulling in only around 3-4% in a decent year, and that of that the airline tickets themselves are the lowest margin items percentage wise, with other things like baggage fees being much more load bearing.

You are correct. As much as we like to bash airlines and their decisions, and liking low fares and quality service myself, it's objectively one of the worst businesses imaginable. Extremely high risk, low margin. Every year about a dozen airlines go bankrupt, get merged or bailed out. A small increase in the price of oil is a major risk for most of them.

Most of the more profitable markets have high competition not only by other airlines but also other forms of transportation. Very few airlines are swimming in cash and even those are only a couple bad years away from bankrupcy.

Re: Airlines are charging solo passengers higher fares than groups

#92

Post by [deleted] »

patcon wrote: post #76
n8cpdx wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Traveling solo is already brutal because hotels and Airbnbs are priced on the assumption of two travelers. Traveling solo essentially costs double automatically because of lodging, and it kind of sucks there’s a double whammy with airfare where, unlike lodging, the penalty doesn’t actually make any sense. I guess as a family be grateful that all hotel rooms come with a 50% (or more) discount per traveler?

(Saying all this with respect for those who value privacy more than me ) Hostels are for this market, no? Share physical infra (bathroom/heating/walls) with other humans (aka strangers) and you get the same family discount. You're not obligated to pay the premium unless you want your own bathroom and own personal space like families tend to want As in: families don't get a discount, they just amortise the cost of pri…

[deleted]

Re: Airlines are charging solo passengers higher fares than groups

#93

Post by sjf »

frank_nitti wrote: post #47
AlotOfReading wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some countries (e.g. Japan) charge per person in non-Western hotels. Even then, you may get different prices for a solo traveler because the lower overall price means they need to increase the per person rate to make enough margin with their fixed costs.

They do this in Mexico as well. Always just seems like an honor system thing unless they are checking people at the door to the hotel and/or room each time they enter, which only seems realistic in very small hotels who have no e.g. restaurant open to the public. Otherwise can’t one just rent the room as a solo guest, and just have someone come through later, as long as there isn’t an obvious group activity going on…

Why do people put locks on glass doors? Society only works because of the assumption that ~90% of people will follow the rules.

Re: Airlines are charging solo passengers higher fares than groups

#94

Post by Mistletoe »

reliabilityguy wrote: post #74
n8cpdx wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Traveling solo is already brutal because hotels and Airbnbs are priced on the assumption of two travelers. Traveling solo essentially costs double automatically because of lodging, and it kind of sucks there’s a double whammy with airfare where, unlike lodging, the penalty doesn’t actually make any sense. I guess as a family be grateful that all hotel rooms come with a 50% (or more) discount per traveler?

You can make the same argument about food too: buying chicken at Costco is way cheaper per pound than in Whole Foods or Aldi. Are they also penalizing single people? No: buy more, pay less per unit.

You can’t freeze a hotel room.

Re: Airlines are charging solo passengers higher fares than groups

#95

Post by al_borland »

darth_avocado wrote: post #31
Aurornis wrote: post #2

I never would have understood this as a young, single person. Now that I have a family there are several times per year where we price out the cost of a solo ticket for one parent, the price of taking one or two kids, or the cost of all of us going for something. Having a quantity discount would absolutely tip the scales for us for certain trips. People will look at this as penalizing single travelers and want everyo…

We as a society already penalize people without families: 1. Higher taxes and fewer deductions 2. Higher workplace performance expectations 3. Higher costs in every aspect of life 4. Fewer options eat out, expensive solo tickets at events etc. This is just one more example in a long list of examples of how being by yourself is penalized in the society.

I went to buy tickets to a comedy show last year and they wouldn’t let me buy a single ticket. I had to buy 2. It quite literally doubled the cost, and then a seat went empty.

If someone were to buy 3 tickets, it could just as easily leave an orphaned seat.

Re: Airlines are charging solo passengers higher fares than groups

#96

Post by jjcob »

Aurornis wrote: post #8
josephcsible wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is that the extent of the group discount is absurd. E.g., the ORD-LEX one, $214 for a single ticket, and then only $1 more for a second one.

I’ve been pricing tickets for a family trip recently and I have not seen anything that extreme. That’s definitely a cherry picked example for the article, not the common scenario.

Yeah, typically groups pay more per ticket than individuals.

This is probably only on unpopular routes where they know they aren't going to fill the plane.

Re: Airlines are charging solo passengers higher fares than groups

#97

Post by paxys »

paulgb wrote: post #6

I think this is fair play, they can charge how they want (within reason) and it’s not too different than other bulk discounts. But someone should totally make a site for finding strangers to book the same flight with :)

Any amount of premium is worth not having a random stranger on your itinerary.

Re: Airlines are charging solo passengers higher fares than groups

#98

Post by mmcconnell1618 »

al_borland wrote: post #69
n8cpdx wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Traveling solo is already brutal because hotels and Airbnbs are priced on the assumption of two travelers. Traveling solo essentially costs double automatically because of lodging, and it kind of sucks there’s a double whammy with airfare where, unlike lodging, the penalty doesn’t actually make any sense. I guess as a family be grateful that all hotel rooms come with a 50% (or more) discount per traveler?

Cruises are especially bad for this. I’ve never gone, but I’ve looked at but after I had 3 independent people tell me to take one in the span of a few months. Most are priced assuming 2 people in the room and if you’re solo it seems like they expect you to buy 2 spots. I’ve seen a couple where they have a few solo cabins, but the amount of effort to surface this stuff turns me off to the whole thing. The only reason…

Some cruise lines, like Norwegian, have specific solo travel fares and cabins and even social events just for solo travelers

Re: Airlines are charging solo passengers higher fares than groups

#99

Post by hypeatei »

IshKebab wrote: post #63
darth_avocado wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We as a society already penalize people without families: 1. Higher taxes and fewer deductions 2. Higher workplace performance expectations 3. Higher costs in every aspect of life 4. Fewer options eat out, expensive solo tickets at events etc. This is just one more example in a long list of examples of how being by yourself is penalized in the society.

Yeah I used to think that until I had a family. In reality it's more like: 1. Taxes are more punishing because you're spending half your disposable income on children, and most of it probably comes from one earner. You can say "don't have children if you can't afford it" all you like, but you wouldn't be alive if nobody had children, so it's quite selfish of anyone to be anti-children. 2. For men performance expectat…

> you wouldn't be alive if nobody had children, so it's quite selfish of anyone to be anti-children.

It gets into philosophical territory, but the default "having a pulse = good" thinking is pretty shortsighted IMO. Life is inherently suffering and no one got a yes/no prompt before being born.

Re: Airlines are charging solo passengers higher fares than groups

#100

Post by brigade »

muppetman wrote: post #13

I love how the author thinks they've discovered something super secret, when they have in fact just learnt about "Group Discounts". Author will lose their mind when they buy 10+ of the same thing from AliExpress.

Airfare typically has group anti-discounts, where if you buy more tickets on a single reservation than tickets available at the lowest fare bucket, they’d sell you all the tickets at the higher fare instead of mixing fares
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