Trying to book a ticket from NYC to LAS for July 13 and returning on a redeye on July 16/17. Started looking last week and noticed prices climbing from the cheapest airfare of $302 on CO to now the cheapest airfare being well over $400 almost $500. What is the deal with these insane airfares? What is a normally decent airfare between NYC and LAS this time of year? I thought $302 might have seemed high, but now kicking myself for not booking. Any impute or thoughts on how to proceed will be very much appreciated. By glance, the loads on these flights do not seem to be very high at the moment to justify the increase in fare.

The dates you are traveling on are usually higher priced then Wednesday, Saturday, and sometimes Tuesday. Try to be more flexible, and you should have booked the trip way before this, as fares increase towards your departure date, not increase. On ATA with a SW code share you are looking at $300, which isn't crazy. Also airlines can not be having all of these cheap fares, they are hurting from the ridicules price of few.

I guess we're in an age where a "almost $500" transcon fare is "insane". No wonder half the airlines are bankrupt!

I guess we're in an age where a "almost $500" transcon fare is "insane". No wonder half the airlines are bankrupt!
^

And you're judging price patterns after watching them for just one week? :confused:

You're two months away from your flight date for two very major cities. Why not wait another week or two to see if the prices come back down a bit? I'd be surprised not to see some sort of sale on this route by the end of the May.

Nonetheless, you're asking for some popular flights. I would think that the Sunday night redeyes from LAS-NYC would be pretty busy every weekend. There's always a crowd waiting to board a bunch of them when I land in LAS from ATL on Sunday nights. And lots of folks arrive in Vegas on Thursdays for a long weekend while LAS-based business travellers are trying to get home on the same flights.

New Orleans is pretty much closed to conventions and large meetings. Everything that was slated for New Orleans is going to either Vegas or Orlando, driving prices up.

Thanks for the feedback. I wish my dates were more flexible, but only have Friday off from work, so that means Thursday night departure from NYC and trying to get in Monday morning on the redeye. I'll keep checking things out. I'll report in on how everything goes.

And I know $500 is not unreasonable for a transcon flight... but unlike last minute business trips that take up the Y class seats, this is on my own dollar, so definitely searching for a bargain... especially when I don't have elite status on the majors and a comp upgrade is not in the picture... back when I was DL GM, I would buy the K fare at $400 plus for the chance to upgrade because it was worth it.

And I know $500 is not unreasonable for a transcon flight... but unlike last minute business trips that take up the Y class seats, this is on my own dollar, so definitely searching for a bargain...
Priceline, perhaps?

I must gently inform you that $500 for a RT flight NYC-LAS is a bargain. Something tells me that this summer there won't be any $199 roundtrips coast to near-coast.

GoCanes,

You're not the only with a bit of sticker shock this summer. Pricing the last few years sort of reconditioned my thinking about what's "reasonable" for transit to Vegas. Since 2002 (post-911), I could get coach RT nonstop ATL-LAS on DL for the low-to-mid $200s (two to three months out) at premium departure times. (This, of course, may explain why they are in Chapter 11.) I was ticked if we had to pay in the high $200s! Today, the same flights 2-3 months out are running $400-$600. It may be perfectly justified, but it's still sticker shock. Frankly, I don't think waiting will help either. The airlines have taken a lot of capacity out of the system.

Sirecca

and dont forget that in addition to the usual vegas conferences etc july is the world series of poker so most savy players probably booked all the cheap seats a long long time ago for july....

At these prices isn't it a decent idea to start looking at reward tickets? I personally value my miles at 1.5 per for a domestic trip and 2.0 on an international trip. At 500 bucks I'd rather use miles at a price point of about 400 RT. You can always book a reward ticket and if ticket prices drop, you can always buy a ticket and refund the miles. Just my .02 (or one international mile)

At these prices isn't it a decent idea to start looking at reward tickets? I personally value my miles at 1.5 per for a domestic trip and 2.0 on an international trip. At 500 bucks I'd rather use miles at a price point of about 400 RT. You can always book a reward ticket and if ticket prices drop, you can always buy a ticket and refund the miles. Just my .02 (or one international mile)

Thanks. I will have to look into that. Have some UAL miles to burn, but did not see much availability on their site.

It's become very hard to find cheap fares NYC-LAS. I don't think the $200 RT exists anymore, and at this point I'm pretty happy if I can find a fare in the $250-300 range. On the weekends (out Fri, back Sun) under $300 is very difficult to find. Even JetBlue's baseline fare (which is also almost impossible to find on weekends) seems to be up to $179 one-way. It sucks, but the airlines have been successful in getting the price up.

At these prices isn't it a decent idea to start looking at reward tickets? I personally value my miles at 1.5 per for a domestic trip and 2.0 on an international trip. At 500 bucks I'd rather use miles at a price point of about 400 RT. You can always book a reward ticket and if ticket prices drop, you can always buy a ticket and refund the miles. Just my .02 (or one international mile)
If the fares are running $400-500 there's a very high likelihood that there won't be any reward availability. Generally the only time you can use miles to avoid an expensive ticket is when the flight load is light (and lots of fare bucket availability) but you missed the advance purchase requirements of the cheap fares. However, these days the airlines will likely charge you an expedite fee for the close-in reward booking, so they get you anyway. :td: (Not to mention there's usually a fee to redeposit miles from a cancelled award, as you suggest).
In mid-July the cheapest published fare right now for NYC-LAS is ~$360 r/t on CO or HP (Q class for both). Not sure about JetBlue though. If actual itineraries are pricing meaningfully higher, it probably means the flights are filling up and the cheap fare classes are sold out. They can always be released as departure approaches if seats aren't selling well, and it's up to you whether to gamble that this will be the case (hey, you are going to Vegas, why not get a head start!). But the convention market there is hot right now, partially due to New Orleans, and depending on the schedule, flights can fill up quickly!

I guess we're in an age where a "almost $500" transcon fare is "insane". No wonder half the airlines are bankrupt!notwithstanding your sarcasm, i do think that $500 for an advance purchase (21 days +) domestic fare is insane, particularly between cities with so many direct (not to mention indirect) routings. i can understand paying that to fly from CLE to ALB, for example, where COex is the only carrier.

notwithstanding your sarcasm, i do think that $500 for an advance purchase (21 days +) domestic fare is insane, particularly between cities with so many direct (not to mention indirect) routings. i can understand paying that to fly from CLE to ALB, for example, where COex is the only carrier.
I pay that almost every week from CVG to wherever.

When in doubt go Southwest

When in doubt go Southwest

...where rates for those dates from Islip essentially match CO from EWR.

I have a ticket in June for RDU-LAS and it has basically been in the $390-$420 range for the days I have to travel (work convention) for the past several months. I've been watching pretty regularly and haven't seen anything below $350 since February. It must be a combination of popularity and moving convention traffic. (It doesn't help that the days I have to travel for the work conference are busier and not the days I would pick on my own for leisure travel.)

Oh, and Southwest has consistently been 20% more expensive than the other options out there (commonly approaching $500) -- I've been checking them too, just in case.

It must be a combination of popularity and moving convention traffic. (It doesn't help that the days I have to travel for the work conference are busier and not the days I would pick on my own for leisure travel.)ALso throw into the mix the reduced total number of seats out there - some airlines are parking planes or returning to lessors, others are substituting smaller aircraft in orderto use bigger planes on more lucrative routes.

Also, here are some of the conventions being held on your dates:

Locksmiths - 4500 delegates
Herbalife - 10000 delegates
Nutritional Foods - 8000 Delegates
Cosmetologists - 30000 Delegates

No blockbusters on the order of CSE or NAB, but added to the regular weekend volume, it looks to be a fairly busy sumer weekend.

A follow-up to my search. I got two tickets on CO from EWR-LAS on the dates and times I wanted for $291.00 each. All in all, not too bad. Thanks for all the feedback. Guess waiting it out was all I had to do.