Dominikkk

I'm going to have a rant.

I hate the AF MiNi fares. Not even because they mean AF is downgrading the service, but simply because they have turned a big "hey, careful - it's AF" sign in my head on every time I am considering booking a flight with them.

Look at KLM. They wanted to do basically the same thing, so they have simply got rid of free luggage and everybody pays (well, except the exempted). No messing with new fares that would block the regular fares, everything is easy-peasy and you're not stressed out while booking a KL-coded flight.

What really bothers me is the fact that the MiNi fare is a whole different fare and you cannot easily go for a full fare (classic) unless you are booking your ticket on the Air France website. I guess a way to deal with it would have been if afterwards you still had an option to upgrade yourself from MiNi to Classic in manage your trip or at the airport (1. pay attention to the fact I'm talking about upgrading to classic and not only buying the luggage allowance. 2. Another possible issue: would AF easily let you upgrade yourself online by paying that fee of €20 knowing that the booking was made through an agent and not on their website? I can be wrong but I don't think their website lets you play a lot with your booking if you made it through an agent...).

Goldorak

I'm not a big fan of the MiNi fares per se but travel agents ("real" ones or OTA) have to adapt to an offer (basic fare with no perks) that is now more and more common with airlines and their role is to inform correctly the customers. As you said, it is very clear on AF site when you book and some OTA also indicates clearly that it's a MiNi fare. So if some are able to do it...

Xandrios

The fact that it is so difficult to recognize a mini fare is the worst part about it indeed. Yes the AF site does let you choose but knows other limitations that make it not always the best channel to book through.

Other standard OTA's, including KLM, often do not warn about it being a mini fare. Some allow you to lookup the fare rules (not changeable for a fee = MiNI fare)...but most OTA's do not let you do that either. In which case it becomes a guessing game.

It would have been so much easier if they had used separate booking classes for MiNi fares. At least one would be able to recognize them through any booking channel. Personally I do not know any OTA that currently correctly identifies MiNi fares. Nor do I know any other airline that has such big differences in the fare terms under the same booking code.

Dominikkk

Sure but I'm not even on about that. I'm totally past the "why has nobody told me it's MiNi?" phase and assume everything is MiNi unless very clearly stated otherwise. What bothers me is that I just cannot book me fusslessly (is that even a word?) a ticket for flights not necessarily available on airfrance.com unless I want to have the AF-operated part of it as MiNi.

And as I am not interested in flying on a MiNi-fare, I'm simply booking a ticket without AF-operated flights. Congrats, AF, you've just lost a customer there.

NickB

I do not think the OP was talking about transparency but the question of whether you can easily book something else than a mini fare elsewhere than on the AF site.

On determining whether something booked at on OTA is a mini fare or not, the way to determine it is by the baggage allowance: all OTAs, AFAIK, indicate baggage allowance and a nil baggage allowance on AF is a sure sign of a mini fare.

orbitmic

I disagree. I think it is for AF to take into consideration what they know of the OTA market and that it would be wholly unrealistic to expect OTAs to adapt where AF shorthaul may, in some markets, represent well under 1% of their volume. If OTA only lists the cheapest available fare for the flight then I would not expect them to offer a second fare just for AF so that people can choose 'classic'.

That said I don't think its an AF specific problem- you have the same with BA hbo fares or the Lh-germanwings fares so while I sympathise with the rant and hate mini, I don't think singling out AF on the specific fare availability issue would be justified. Still I think it means lost revenue for AF and dissatisfied customers. Again.

Goldorak

Egencia (the corporate version of Expedia) does it very well. But Expedia doesn't...

Indeed. I agree.

Well, when you're the 1st and only one to propose a "new product" (please don't get me wrong here ), OK you can't expect all OTA to adapt. But when this kind of product is spreading in the industry, then it's the interest to OTA to adapt. To the list of airlines you can add DL who is introducing also those kind of "Y minus" fares and likely other US airlines will follow. If I can make another reference, when code-share agreements appeared and began to spread, some OTA (and airlines) were sued and condemned because they were not informing well the customer that the flight was operated by another airline. And so the booking tools had to be adapted.

But, again, I'm not saying that the overall situation with AF MiNi fares and booking tools is satisfactory. And we have clear examples in this thread (and others) that AF is loosing bookings because of the current booking tools. So they should definitely work on this.

johan rebel

No, it is not, but why not make it a new one? I rather like the way it sounds.

Johan

NickB

I think it is different, though: it would be an issue if the OTAs suggested that you earn miles, or get a free luggage allowance, etc... when you don't. AFAIK, that is not the case: they are saying anything which is factually wrong.

As the OP notes, the problem is not so much one of misleading. It is one of only offering the cheap, bare bones product (eg mini on AF) and not the slightly more elaborate one (eg: classic on AF).

In the same way as there is no duty in general on a retailer to stock the full range of products offered by a manufacturer, there is no duty on OTAs to offer the full range of fares available from a carrier. If the overwhelming majority of their customers will go for the bare bones product, it may make sense for them just to offer that, especially as trying to cater for other products whose characteristic are going to vary from one airline to another may introduce a high level of complexity which would not be worth their while.

orbitmic

Actually, that's the crux of the issue - I just don't think that it is. It used to be the case that airlines would offer travel agents commissions that were proportional to ticket prices. Most airlines including AF have now stopped doing that so OTAs charge their own booking fee which is usually fixed price.

In that sense, in most cases, they have absolutely no incentive to offer passengers to buy up on ticket prices that only go into the airline's pocket. They do, by contrast, have an incentive to see you insurance, transfers, hotels etc which give them additional commission. The only exception would be OTAs charging a credit card fee based on a % of the purchase amount but they are a small minority.

Moreover, comparators also compare the lowest price each OTA offers on each flight so again, the goal is to offer the cheapest one and not to allow more expensive inclusive fares on the same price/travel class.

And as mentioned by NickB, there is no misinformation - typically, the OTAs specify the conditions as they appear so there is no "negative incentive" either.

In short, having people buy "classic" is in the interest of the airline but not in the interest of the OTA and the airline does not choose to make it worth it for the OTA either. As a result, I just do not expect them to engage in expensive IT changes to adapt. Y minus or full Y makes no difference to OTA and if a passenger is unhappy with the lack of checked baggage or other restriction, the OTA offers plenty of other airlines which offer those services. In my sense, it is the AF's of this world which are shooting themselves in the foot and should not expect OTAs to correct things for free on their behalf...

Dominikkk

exactly. It should be AF's interet to make it possible to upgrade oneself to Classic online. Although, honestly speaking, let's give it a closer look - by booking mini you save 20€ and then can buy the luggage allowance for 15€ if you do that on the internet or 30€ if you do that at the airport.

Now an example straight from real life: the very closest partner of AF - KLM sells you a ticket with outbound operated by KL and inbound by AF. The AF leg(s) are MiNi, but how can you know about that if KLM sells AF MiNi fares while telling you you will get miles for those (and thus making it look like you actually are on a Classic)? So you're there happy that you're on a classic fare, arrive at the airport to go back home and guess what? Yes, surprise. You're flying MiNi, so... no, you cannot upgrade to Classic for 20€, you actually have to pay 30€ and no chance to get miles for that flight anyway. All in all, you're only loosing on that deal.

I think it is a real shame AF doesn't want to learn anything from KLM. They have at least managed to introduce a paid luggage without necessarily complicating their elite passengers' lives. Meanwhile, as much as I used to fly AF a lot, now I'm booking anything but them. I guess that was not what they were looking for while trying to fill up their aircraft in Europe...

AlicorporateUK

^

Slightly different scenario but same outcome here: on two recent bookings (LHR-CDG-WAW-AMS-BHX; LHR-LIN-WAW-CDG-BHX) made through Opodo, I only learned of the no-miles/qualifying segments when logging-in to my FB account a few days later. Needless to say, the KL & AZ operated flights earned me both miles+segments... Both tickets weren't that cheap either (just under £ 300), but next time I'll just avoid AF when booking via an on-line travel agent or even through klm.com - simple as that...

G

Xandrios

While I agree 100%, I do believe that this is more of a technical glitch than trickery. KLM introduced the ability to buy MiNi fares recently and has not yet updated their website to indicate this, and make sure the milage-indicator shows 0 miles.

Dominikkk

Technically speaking they should have thought about it before selling those fares. They managed to keep selling classic only for quite a bit of time so they definitely had time to think about adjustments to make before actually offering mini. To top it all, mini has been available on their website also for quite a while now and the website still says you're getting miles for flying MiNi fares. Correct me if I'm wrong but KLM is basically selling you a different product than the one you're actually getting.

Somebody that has accidentally bought a MiNi fare on klm should actually definitely ask KLM to a) give the miles they were advertising on their website for that flight and b) push them to fix it. I wonder what they'd say. Het spijt ons echt maar da's niet mogelijk?

PROACTIVE

Based on my experience, the issue on the KLM site is more complex.

You may be able to change from Mini fare to Classic (in KLM site the AF Classic fare is called "Semi-Flex") but at check out, the site is not able to price icorrectly the new fare and you end up again with a Mini fare in the booking.

Already called KLM call centre but they wanted only to sell me a Premium fare and did not bother to look how to go around the issue.


So really all this makes me wonder whether AF marketing people are trying to kill Flyingblue and customer loyalty with such complicated rules/fares.
On top I would add teh Transavia case where you may able to redeem but not to earn a single mile!

In general:
Thinking about the 3 main FFP in Europe I would say that BAEC and LH are trying (or as in LH already managed) to make a profit centre out of theit FFP thus trying to get customer happy and sticky to the program granting as low as 125miles/1 segments for cheapo flight, as in Germanwings case (even Vueling gives you avios!!).

For AF Flyingblue is still a cost centre to reduce. Therefore they not bother to create new fares that exclude earning miles/segments.