JonNYC

Probably most people here who have occasion to buy last-minute, one-way tickets to London know this, but it's kinda' a new one on me. Have to buy a last minute o/w ticket JFK-LHR to pick up a RTW ticket where I left off. Priced it on AA.com and it came to 'bout $715, fare basis H2. I've bought this fare before and used a VIP to upgrade it.

Since I'm saving my eSWU's now, I wanted to use miles. Knowing that a B fare would only require 10,000 miles to upgrade, I called AA to see how much a -B- fare would be. Answer, about $850ish.

So, it's 25,000 miles to upgrade the $715 H fare, but only 10,000 miles to upgrade the $850 B fare. Plus, the B fare yields 1.5 Q-points-per-mile.

Oh, and...

..after December 1st, it'll be $715 + 25,000 miles + $250 H-fare upgraded to business vs. $850 + 10,000 miles + no co-pay on the B-fare.

justageek

Wait, I thought the co-pay was to make up the fare difference on exactly this kind of routing?

Or was that only on JFK-LGB?!?

AA better find some better excuses...

Dave Noble

"Wait, I thought the co-pay was to make up the fare difference on exactly this kind of routing? "

Not really. $850 for a ONEWAY from new York to London is not exactly a cheap fare is it

Dave

JonNYC

Point well taken. If this points out one thing for sure-- at least in my mind-- it's that having the $250 fee apply universally to all fares except Y and B makes very little sense. That -H- fare I quote is (IIRC) much more expensive to other European markets (like $1500ish o/w to FCO, and other examples-- LHR is among the cheapest (I think)) Point is, the $250 is suitable, I suppose, to the very low rock-bottom fares buckets (not that I like it one bit) but they should have had the fee either be far less (or nothing) on fares that are not "deep" discount. They're just covering too wide a range of fares with this one fee, IMHO.

LAX21

Exactly my point. Their idea of applying the 250$ fee universally w/o distinguishing between deep discount and discount fares is almost as stupid as the fee itself.
The difference between H and B fares is ridiculously low in most instances. Aside from people on last minute mandatory trips (and you, Jon ), I am curious to know how many travellers actually shell out the $ for B or Y fares, when I fares are so close behind.
In my email to Gail Greene and Dan Garton, when I inquired about this same thing all I got from Gail was "We at AA carefully considered the impact on our members prior to announcing this change."
at least i managed to get a response...

Regards,

Chris

Dave Noble

I disagree. Conceptually it is no different to now. Currently someone on a B fare will use 10,000 points if they wish to upgrade whilst an H fare would have to spend as many points (25k) as someone on an N fare. It does give an incentive to pay for a higher fare if it is cheaper than the co-pay and I don't see anything wrong with that. Under the current scheme is it fair that somone paying $715 for an H fare should have to pay 25k to upgrade whilst the B fare payer at $850 pays only 10k?

Dave

jja34-1

I have been buying only B fares for travel to the US from LHR for the past year, ever since I discovered that the vast majority of the time B fares were not that much higher than the fares I was already paying. With the decreased mileage requirement for upgrade to C and the added Q-points for a B fare, I don't see any reason not to pay the increased fare.

My perception may be skewed, because I generally don't wait around for sales and have rarely ever paid less than four figures for a flight to the US from London. I also tend to travel to the US at busier times (holidays, summer vacation, etc.). However, I normally purchase my leisure tickets 2-3 months in advance and have generally found that the B fares are only slightly more expensive ($300-400 more) for the flights I want to take than the fares quoted to me on AA.com, regardless of the time of year. And that's not restricted to a difference between H and B fares. AA.com normally quotes me a V or N fare, which turns out to be (in my view) only slightly less expensive than a B fare. Given the added "benefits" of a B fare, I am happy to pay the increased price.

In my experience, about the only market this does not apply is LHR-JFK in the winter. I recently looked at B fares for travel in December and they were about 3 times the lowest available price on AA.com.

JonNYC

Yes, that is much more sensible than my example of what will be the case after Dec. 1st.

GadgetFreak

That is pretty interesting. It actually mirrors the situation on UA. I have a B fare coming up on them to LHR this weekend that was $300 more roundtrip than the next lower fare. The B takes the lower upgrade amount, gets 1.5x EQM plus is eligible for a 5000 mile bonus. It seems they are both, with different marketing plans, trying to push people to B and make it the price point. That makes sense to me, as much as I like the really cheap fares they can only fly so many of them. If they made fares like those B fares become essentially Y fares; refundable and the like I would probably buy nothing else for business and maybe even personal travel. Its those $2500 Y fares that make me wonder who is in charge. Those differentials between B and lower fares can change a lot from market to market however. NYC to London is really competitive.

JDiver

JonNYC, what do you want from us? To tell you AA has actually used logic on this issue? Go for the "B", of course... if you need the points or want to conserve the miles for other purposes.

The rules of the game has changed , but the players are figuring it AAll out!

JonNYC

BTW, it's worth pointing our that-- as best as I can tell-- AA.com will only offer the lower fare on this route (after Dec 1st requiring $250 each-way and 25,000 miles) You have to call to get the B-fare, which, essentially, will now cost much less-- both in terms of $$ and miles.

Would it have killed AA to put a bit more thought into this thing and had a more nominal "co-pay" on the higher fares?

It'll be great laughs when people with web-purchased H-fares start calling AA up (after Dec 1st) and asking for a 25,000 miles upgrade. Those poor, poor phone AAgents...

GadgetFreak

They have changed the rules, and while I think they do mirror those at UA they are different. While UA has taken steps to making buying the B fare more attractive, they have not made it virtually required to get an upgrade. So if you are in a market with a greater difference between B and lower fares or if you for whatever reason dont want the B fare, AA is as of now, not competitive with UA. That could change of course, UA could match this or liquidate which would make it an academic point. But as of now, AA isnt really competitive on international upgrades since they no longer provide the range of options that UA does. So when people figure this out, they may just figure out that AA isnt a great carrier for them if they do a lot of international upgrades.

studio76

[QUOTE=JonNYC]BTW, it's worth pointing our that-- as best as I can tell-- AA.com will only offer the lower fare on this route (after Dec 1st requiring $250 each-way and 25,000 miles) You have to call to get the B-fare, which, essentially, will now cost much less-- both in terms of $$ and miles.




This is really a big point in my mind. Maybe I'm missing something here, but the inability to booking by specific FARE CODE on the internet is become a huge issue. I recently ran into this same problem booking a flight on Cathay where I needed to make sure that I got AA miles but could not do this online. With all airlines trying to move towards everyone using the internet and the extra fees now associated with telephone reservations (do they waive these for elites?), how do you all book your "B" fares. I too have found that they are not much more $ and are certainly becoming more attractive. I just want to be able to book them myself online... Any advice?

FWAAA

I'm no AA apologist on the $250 co-pay issue, but AA had to draw the line somewhere, and AA chose Y and B as the two fare classes to which the co-pay will not apply.

Of course, with one-way H fares only $135 less than B, it appears for now that AA has misplaced that cut-off.

But by Dec 1, we might see AA correct that discrepancy: perhaps the difference between H and B might be closer to $250 (perhaps even greater than $250) by then.

Or maybe AA knows about this and is just planning to play "gotcha" with those who buy H fares.

Offering a substantial discount in both dollars and miles to B (and not H) is perhaps a conditioning mechanism to encourage us to book B and Y all the time and to stop booking all the other discount fares. AA would be in great shape if all we ever bought were Y, B and above.

mgm

The cynic in me believes this is exactly what will happen.