I fly these two routes for leisure fairly often. I'd like to fly US into one of their new western hub cities....but WN is pretty much always the better price. $30-40 cheaper, more flights, and no change fees.

Once in a while when I'm booking pretty short into the future and my plans are definite, I go with US, but most of my money goes WN's way.

$30-$40 is worth it for miles, status, and for the protection on other carriers in case of problems.

I sat around for 4 hours in Baltimore on 'standby' for a Southwest flight when there was a mechanical cancellation. They would not put me on another airline's flights.

Conversely, US will put you on Delta or Northwest or whatever if there is availability and your flight is cancelled/seriously delayed.

I agree with Heinrich, and I would also suspect that for some business travelers SW is not really an option they consider. I just never even think about booking SW as an option to HP.

And remember, that LAX to PHX is also a feeder route... people then connect via PHX to other cities... so even if the non-stop is priced higher, it is also part of different fares to differnt cities, (ie LAX-FLL, LAX-MCO, LAX-ICT, etc)

WN is actually a lot better between PHX and LAS/LAX. Frequency is greater on WN and WN's execution (on time record) between those cities is much better than HP. In terms of FF miles, WN has no capacity control on usage until 70% of the plane is booked, and no earlier than 21 days before departure date. Although upgrades on HP PHX-LAX are highly likely, PHX-LAS upgrades are now highly unlikely. If you are going to be stuck in coach, WN is world's better and they don't charge $5 for snack boxes...they are free.

WN is a lot better than it was 2 years ago with advance "A" boarding passes. Those who don't like it tend to not have flown it for quite some time.

What you get from HP/US is not worth $10 more, let alone $40 more on those routings. Flight time is 50 minutes.

WN is actually a lot better between PHX and LAS/LAX. Frequency is greater on WN and WN's execution (on time record) between those cities is much better than HP.
According to the DOT, (http://www.transtats.bts.gov/OT_Delay/OT_DelayCause1.asp?pn=1) US has significantly better on-time performance at both LAX and PHX. Can you provide a link that proves WN is on-time more frequently on this route?

WN is actually a lot better between PHX and LAS/LAX. Frequency is greater on WN and WN's execution (on time record) between those cities is much better than HP. In terms of FF miles, WN has no capacity control on usage until 70% of the plane is booked, and no earlier than 21 days before departure date. Although upgrades on HP PHX-LAX are highly likely, PHX-LAS upgrades are now highly unlikely. If you are going to be stuck in coach, WN is world's better and they don't charge $5 for snack boxes...they are free.

WN is a lot better than it was 2 years ago with advance "A" boarding passes. Those who don't like it tend to not have flown it for quite some time.

What you get from HP/US is not worth $10 more, let alone $40 more on those routings. Flight time is 50 minutes.

Even with an "A" boarding pass, one often still need to wait in line along with others who have "A" boarding passes prior to boarding. With elite status, one would get priority boarding on US. Plus, more importantly, an assigned seat. For some, that might be worth $40. In addition, a few lucky elite FFers might even get complementary upgrades to F, which is not available on WN at all. In cases like that, one might say it's definitely worth at least, if not more than $40.

LAX

WN is actually a lot better between PHX and LAS/LAX. Frequency is greater on WN and WN's execution (on time record) between those cities is much better than HP. In terms of FF miles, WN has no capacity control on usage until 70% of the plane is booked, and no earlier than 21 days before departure date. Although upgrades on HP PHX-LAX are highly likely, PHX-LAS upgrades are now highly unlikely. If you are going to be stuck in coach, WN is world's better and they don't charge $5 for snack boxes...they are free.

WN is a lot better than it was 2 years ago with advance "A" boarding passes. Those who don't like it tend to not have flown it for quite some time.

What you get from HP/US is not worth $10 more, let alone $40 more on those routings. Flight time is 50 minutes.

Your agenda is really old and you need to heed the advice I offer in my username.

The frequencies are roughly equal. I have flown between southern California (SAN, LAX, BUR) and LAS probably twice as many times on WN than HP (maybe 40 WN - 15 HP) and the service is much, much better on HP. You would never, and I repeat, never get a snack box from WN on a LAX-LAS/PHX segement. Nor would you be offered buy on board by HP. Like you said, it is a 50 minute flight. WN only offers snack boxes on medium haul or long haul routes (and only during meal times on medium hauls). HP is worth the extra money because they DO have a good on-time performance, just as much frequency, a possibility of being upgraded, assigned seating, no sitting in an A, B, or C line for an hour to make sure you don't get stuck in the middle or can sit with your companion, and the value of the miles and segments is so much greater on HP.

I know you hate US Airways/HP, but at least post something that is legitimate and can be substantiated instead of this worthless and waste of time BS. :rolleyes:

I fly these two routes for leisure fairly often. I'd like to fly US into one of their new western hub cities....but WN is pretty much always the better price. $30-40 cheaper, more flights, and no change fees.

Once in a while when I'm booking pretty short into the future and my plans are definite, I go with US, but most of my money goes WN's way.

I frequently fly both US/HP and Southwest on this route, and there are plusses and minuses to both, but on the whole US is better. I generally fly last minute and the fares are usually comparable ($109 one way). Although overall I default to US, I tend to go with Southwest when I am doing a last second walk-up (they will accomodate you very close to flight time and do a great job making sure you get on the flight) or when I need to fly stand-by on a busy travel day or the flexibility of changing my flight time or day. The flight is so short, that the middle seat is not really a big deal (and I have never really gotten many with OLCI and an "A" or "B" BP.

When I have some advance notice and don't need flexibility then US wins hands down. TED has worked for me as well on certain occasions

The frequencies are roughly equal. I have flown between southern California (SAN, LAX, BUR) and LAS probably twice as many times on WN than HP (maybe 40 WN - 15 HP) and the service is much, much better on HP.

it all depends on what one means by "frequency". for frequency of departure times, WN definitely wins. For number of overall flight departures, yes it's a tossup. HP/US uses the double-plane simultaneous departure method on LAX-PHX, no doubt to maximize the number of seats having avaiable short but makeable connections at PHX. Hence, the lack of "competing" is deliberate-- why offer the exact same product mix as WN?

Your agenda is really old and you need to heed the advice I offer in my username.

The frequencies are roughly equal. I have flown between southern California (SAN, LAX, BUR) and LAS probably twice as many times on WN than HP (maybe 40 WN - 15 HP) and the service is much, much better on HP. You would never, and I repeat, never get a snack box from WN on a LAX-LAS/PHX segement. Nor would you be offered buy on board by HP. Like you said, it is a 50 minute flight. WN only offers snack boxes on medium haul or long haul routes (and only during meal times on medium hauls). HP is worth the extra money because they DO have a good on-time performance, just as much frequency, a possibility of being upgraded, assigned seating, no sitting in an A, B, or C line for an hour to make sure you don't get stuck in the middle or can sit with your companion, and the value of the miles and segments is so much greater on HP.

I know you hate US Airways/HP, but at least post something that is legitimate and can be substantiated instead of this worthless and waste of time BS. :rolleyes:

I will apologize in advance for not taking the advice included in your board name, with 2 posts. You should read the responses to your only other post by other board members. I don't hate US/HP at all. I was raised on US. I and many others on this board just want it to survive. There have been too many USA airline failures during the last 15 years and most failures were at least partially manifested within what is going wrong at US right now. Too many people work there and too many people fly them to get the short end of the stick through failure of the carrier. Even if it just stays in its current operationally mode referred to by many as, "failure on the installment plan" instead of "outright failure", it is still failure because it is not success in the eyes of its customers and markets.

Misleading customers on nearly all counts except actual purchase fares, is a massive error on Doug's part and I am sure you know that as well.

I also want US to survive. I think the advantage with US is you have the Assigned seats, the possibility of First Class, and the miles.
I have also flown Southwest, and some of the advantages (esp from other LA-area airports) is the later departures (esp to PHX). I know if I wanted to leave ONT-PHX after 8pm it is possible on Southwest, on US/HP it is 6:35pm (last out of ONT), 7:55pm (CRJ, last out of SNA), and then the late flight is 9:35pm out of LAX.

So WN, does have some advantages if you are commuting and want to fly late to stay home later...

I also want US to survive. I think the advantage with US is you have the Assigned seats, the possibility of First Class, and the miles.
I have also flown Southwest, and some of the advantages (esp from other LA-area airports) is the later departures (esp to PHX). I know if I wanted to leave ONT-PHX after 8pm it is possible on Southwest, on US/HP it is 6:35pm (last out of ONT), 7:55pm (CRJ, last out of SNA), and then the late flight is 9:35pm out of LAX.

So WN, does have some advantages if you are commuting and want to fly late to stay home later...

Agreed. IMHO there is nothing that makes one measurably better than the other. I think those who "don't like" WN tend to be thinking back to a time (4 or more years ago) when it was ABSOLUTELY worse than US/HP.

But now, every single airline has lines. Every single airline has loads within about 4 percentage points of 87%. No airline provides food. Almost every airline has nearly every passenger stuck in coach, despite veiled assurances of upgrades that tend to not occur, etc. Bottom line: unbenownst to US and most other airlines, WN is now equal to them...sometimes a little better or a little worse...but statistically equal in terms of schedule, seating, load, dependability (in questionbable weather I will fly WN before any other USA airline), food, and lines.

But now, every single airline has lines. Every single airline has loads within about 4 percentage points of 87%.
Really? I would love see the documentation of that. Can you post a link please?

Really?
l4pi,

I think we both know that WN is the exception when it comes to load factors. They seem to run 9-10% lower on average than the legacies by design.

Of course, that gives them something of a "comfort" advantage when it comes to the dreaded middle seat in coach (probably not as big a deal to those in this forum).

For example, a US 737-300 at 84% LF (probably what we'll see averaged this summer) has 21 empty seats - just over 1 per row (19 = 1 per row in coach). WN, with a 75% LF, has 34 empty seats - just over 1.5 per row (24 = 1 per row). There's a better chance that the middle seat will be empty on WN.

While I'm on the subject, I did some digging in the BTS databases for on-time performance in the PHX/LAS - LAX markets. This is for Jan-Mar of this year, DOT standard rules (over 15 minutes late arriving), and keep in mind that this does not include any Mesa operated Express flights for US (they report to the BTS separately):

PHX-LAX:
US - 84%, 87%, 82% (Jan,Feb,Mar)
WN - 83%, 68%, 71%

LAX-PHX:
US - 92%, 94%, 92%
WN - 79%, 79%, 74%

LAS-LAX:
US - 89%, 86%, 85%
WN - 75%, 73%, 69%

LAX - LAS:
US - 89%, 89%, 89%
WN - 75%, 66%, 67%

Since someone said that the frequency in these markets is about equal, and WN operated about 50% more flights in each of these months than US mainline (HP), I presume that there are also a number of Mesa operated Express flights on the US side. I didn't try to capture those, so the US on-time percentages for US could definitely be higher than it would be if the Mesa flights were included.

Jim

According to the DOT, (http://www.transtats.bts.gov/OT_Delay/OT_DelayCause1.asp?pn=1) US has significantly better on-time performance at both LAX and PHX. Can you provide a link that proves WN is on-time more frequently on this route?


Thanks for Murph you saved me the time to look up another outright made up statistic by PHX Flyer, in fact I bet all his are made up!

In response to the original post.
US has higher loads and higher revenue in both PHX-LAX, PHX-LAS markets (and better on time performance)than LUV does, so maybe the question is why does LUV bother to compete?

Jim

I do believe the quote I referenced was referring to all flight on all airlines, or the over all load factors in as much as it was referring to standing in lines.

If you have those numbers I would love to see em.

l4pi

If you have those numbers I would love to see em.
They'd be in both the quarterly reports (for the quarter) and the monthly traffic press releases (for the month).

The problem with the quarterly reports is that different airlines report LF differently. Some report consolidated (DL comes to mind), some mainline only (US, at least in the past), and some mainline & express separately but not combined (AA). Of course, WN doesn't have express so everything they report is straight-forward.

For April, here's what various carriers reported:

US - 82% (that's for Group, so presumably includes Express)
AA - 81.7% (mainline, Eagle was 74.4% and Connection wasn't reported)
CO - 82.5 (consolidated)
UA - 82.8%
DL - Apparently they haven't reported April yet
WN - 76.7%

Jim

ps - I put the on-time info in because of a much earlier post about relative on-time performance in those specific markets, not to address anything you said - Jim

l4pi,

I think we both know that WN is the exception when it comes to load factors. They seem to run 9-10% lower on average than the legacies by design.

Of course, that gives them something of a "comfort" advantage when it comes to the dreaded middle seat in coach (probably not as big a deal to those in this forum).

For example, a US 737-300 at 84% LF (probably what we'll see averaged this summer) has 21 empty seats - just over 1 per row (19 = 1 per row in coach). WN, with a 75% LF, has 34 empty seats - just over 1.5 per row (24 = 1 per row). There's a better chance that the middle seat will be empty on WN.

While I'm on the subject, I did some digging in the BTS databases for on-time performance in the PHX/LAS - LAX markets. This is for Jan-Mar of this year, DOT standard rules (over 15 minutes late arriving), and keep in mind that this does not include any Mesa operated Express flights for US (they report to the BTS separately):

PHX-LAX:
US - 84%, 87%, 82% (Jan,Feb,Mar)
WN - 83%, 68%, 71%

LAX-PHX:
US - 92%, 94%, 92%
WN - 79%, 79%, 74%

LAS-LAX:
US - 89%, 86%, 85%
WN - 75%, 73%, 69%

LAX - LAS:
US - 89%, 89%, 89%
WN - 75%, 66%, 67%

Since someone said that the frequency in these markets is about equal, and WN operated about 50% more flights in each of these months than US mainline (HP), I presume that there are also a number of Mesa operated Express flights on the US side. I didn't try to capture those, so the US on-time percentages for US could definitely be higher than it would be if the Mesa flights were included.

Jim

Jim-

Those are refreshing stats. I only go to LAS for business. About 8 months ago there were 2 occasions in 3 weeks for me that US was so delayed that I rebooked PHX-LAS on WN right in terminal 4. On both occasions, WN left exactly on time. There are a lot of people in PHX who refer to HP as "the world's largest unscheduled airline" in terms of PHX-LAS.

The reason I don't spend too much time chasing those DOT stats is because there really is little difference between arriving 14 minutes late and arriving 16 minutes late. But, 16 gets reported and 14 does not. I wish there were a statistic for "average lateness", in minutes for each carrier. My gut tells me that all would be within 1 to 3 minutes of each other based on all of the airlines I fly. I have only had one late flight, domestic and international during the last 2 months. And, it was 2.5 hours. So I guess I am on a lucky streak.

. . . There are a lot of people in PHX who refer to HP as "the world's largest unscheduled airline" in terms of PHX-LAS.

What? "A lot of people." :confused:

I fly PHX-LAS all the time. I'd bet I've been delayed no more than twice in the past three years.

I wish there were a statistic for "average lateness", in minutes for each carrier.

You make a valid point (that I left out of the above) - 14 or 16 minutes isn't much of a difference except that one counts as "late" and the other doesn't.

The data is available, if one wishes to dig far enough into the BTS databases, which are quite large. To extract the data I presented, I only downloaded 4 of about 40 fields - airline, origin city, destination city, and on-time "marker" (DOT definition) - from the on-time database for each month. The result was almost 20 meg of data for a single month - that specific data for all reported domestic flights for that month since there's no way to just download data for specific carriers or routes.

The same BTS database contains much more information, including scheduled departure/arrival times, actual departure/arrival times, and minutes late/early, if one wants to download it, but the files just get too big for me to work with.

Besides, when the DOT puts out their monthly report they use that criteria, so using the same puts the numbers in context with what the DOT reports.

Jim

They'd be in both the quarterly reports (for the quarter) and the monthly traffic press releases (for the month).


Thanks for the information. None were 87%. I rest my case........