Why your airline tickets is so expensive today
This conversation inspired me to sit down and write this post. Since ticket prices is a complicated and obscure topic, I want to take some time to explain why your ticket so much goddamn costs and shares a few tips on how to still get cheap airline tickets.
Why Higher Prices?
Ticket prices are high today for a number of reasons. For starters, the industry has consolidated a lot in recent years. Less competition means less need for cheaper prices. Thanks bankruptcies and mergers, there are now only four major carriers in the United States (soon to be three, if Americans with US Airways merges). In Canada, there are two. In Europe, KLM and Air France are now one company, and Lufthansa has their hands in many smaller airlines. (While boarding to keep prices low in Europe as soon as you leave the continent, these 10 € Rates disappear!) As airlines have combined upward, merged or gone bankrupt, the incentive to provide low fares to win your business, has mostly disappeared.
Second, the price of airline fuel has increased enormously. In 1996, airline cost fuel 55 cents per gallon. Now it's $ 2.97 per gallon. Airlines can not absorb all of that increase, they expect some of the consumer, which can lead to higher tariffs.
In addition, airlines have increased taxes and security fees, add much to your base fare. Currently, the following charges will be added to the cost of your ticket:
- September 11th Security Fee of $ 2.50 (up to a maximum of $ 10 per round trip)
- passenger Facility charge $ 4.50 per segment (up to a maximum of $ 18 per round trip)
- US Federal Domestic segment fee of $ 3.70 per segment
- US Travel facilities tax of $ 8.20 per direction (only applies to flights to / from Alaska and Hawaii and the 48 contiguous US states or between Alaska and Hawaii)
- US Immigration User Fee $ 7
- US customs User Fee of $ 5.50
- US APHIS User Fee of 5 $
- US international transportation tax of $ 16.30 per arrival or departure
- Foreign State Security / tourism / airport / international transport taxes and fees of up to $ 20 (vary widely by destination and fluctuate with exchange rates)
This is a hell of a lot of fees! And it's not just the United States. Always fly in London? Half the ticket price is made up of taxes!
In addition, after 9/11 and the recession fell demand, and compensate for reduced airlines both the number of routes they offered and the frequency of their flights. They did this in order to save money and fly fuller planes. Fuller planes mean more passenger revenue and lower costs for the airlines. It is why, if you live far from a big city, you saw go fares and specifying the number of flights down. Planes fly close to full now and airlines are very happy.
can charge much more for tickets with fewer aircraft, less competition and higher capacity, airlines. There is nothing to stop them, and they do not need to cut prices. United CEO Jeff Smisek said that now only price are reasonable prices. If you have a CEO say something, it means prices down no longer walk -. Only to
According to Rick Seaney of Farecompare.com "in 08 before things in the favor of passengers. After the 09 crisis, the justice of the scale in the direction of the tilted airlines."
Why prices are wavering?
Prices go up and down for many reasons. No one can really predict when or whether a price change. The only know the airline that But there are four things that drive prices. Competition, supply, demand and oil prices. The first and last elements are the ones that really affect the prices the most.
Together, these four things all affect a beautiful thing, the load factor called. Airlines want to maximize their aircraft and profits to fill, and they do this through a plane of the load factor is calculated. Essentially, the proportion of seats sold on a flight. You want this number as high as possible to be.
Airlines tend to manage their workload by constantly changing the price of the ticket, to fill the plane and get maximum revenue. On US domestic flights, it could 10-15 different price ranges, be according to Rick Seaney.
If the load factor is low and the demand is low, is an airline, to increase the availability of cheap fares. If the load factor is high and the demand is high, the airline will raise prices
In the aviation industry there are two types of passengers. Business and leisure travelers. Business travelers are flexible (pays the boss) on the price, but not on dates. Tourists are not flexible on price (the cheaper the better), but are on dates. Airlines are constantly striving to find a balance between these two types, so that they can make a profit. Why full low fares flying an airplane, if you can get people to pay more?
Airlines know that a certain number of people will book well in advance, if they find a reasonable price. Airlines also know that they reserve a certain number of seats for business travelers who will at the last minute and to hold more, have to pay. Ticket prices jump up and down based on the demand for places in these two types of passengers.
When Scott Mayerowitz, airline reporter for the Associated Press, says: "to maximize their profits, airlines developed sophisticated computer systems to constantly compare to past sales history book Trends If tickets sell faster than in the past. so the price goes up. When a subscriber increased rates, the airline is likely to increase their. "
How to Get Cheap Rates?
I remember the days when I got excited above $ 500 fares to Europe. Now, with prices generally around $ 1,000 I get excited about rates $ 750 round trip. ( "Yay!" I forecast sarcastically.)
It is not impossible to find a cheap ticket. There are many, many ways to find cheap airfares, and while I go into incredible detail in this other post, here are some basic instructions:
In order to avoid being the person most of her ticket paid, you need to be flexible. Like I said, to balance the prices and try to leisure and business change constantly airlines; they will do their best to help customers pay the lowest price point must.
"About three months ago, airlines begin to manage these lower price points," says Rick. This means that airlines begin to look at historical trends and current seat sales, to find out if they will publish this really rock-bottom prices or keep prices high.
If you book in a month, you are playing into the hands of the airlines. As Rick pointed out to me, most tickets are sold within 30 days of departure. Booking that late is a bad idea. know at this point airlines that they have. If your dates are no longer flexible, you will pay what they charge
To quote again Scott :. "The days of routinely fly for 99 each way $ from New York to San Francisco, airlines are long gone. That is, there are occasional fare wars when airlines like Virgin America or spirit enter a new market. Is also deeply cheap flights when the traffic is low, such as winter flights to Europe the catch is:.. travelers need to be flexible when they fly ITA software airfare search provides a calendar of the lowest fares for certain routes, it is ideal to find the best deals. if you have some flexibility. "
(advice from Scott more, check with him my interview on airlines.)
and while there are many other tricks to reduce the cost of your ticket, the two most important are flexibility and fly when demand is low. This means that mid-week flying, take early morning flights or late evening, and avoiding flying on Monday, Friday or Sunday.
The days of cheap flights are long gone. You do not come back, and the prices that you see now are the new normal for air tickets. They will simply cost a lot more, especially if you do not find the sweet spot when prices at their lowest. But by understanding how tickets are priced, she may be to avoid, that pays the most.
Now that you know why flights are expensive, you will learn how you can get cheaper flights than the person sitting next to you:
- 10 ways Flights
- How to use airline credit Cards for Free Flights
- How do I search for flight tickets Get
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