US Airways Dividend Miles (Pre-FlightFund Merger) - The US Fare Game, or Crazy Siegel, his prices are INSANE

So I thought it might be useful when explaining to others, media, US execs, etc to be able to give useful examples of just how out of wack the proposed changes are with respect to the US price structure. To that end I propose a "Find the insane fare" contest, to enter just post a route, fare code and price in one of the following categories.

Non-refundable, No Standby, Internet only, No Status Miles (under '03 rules), Raw Price.

Sub categories for Coach,Biz,FC as well as Domestic and Int are also allowed.

I will start the bidding with


No Refund (no standby): JRS65E LAS-LGW $7228

Refund, no standby : FRGB MAN-LAX $12202
12 THOUSAND DOLLARS AND NO STANDBY????

Internet Only : ME10WN BOS-SFO $1605

No Status Miles 03 : HHWAN21 LAS-CDG $1542

Raw Price : F LAX-LGW $14440

Except Crazy Eddie's prices were insanely low, not high.....

ALthough I seem to remember Crazy Eddie Antar's company went bankrupt and he and his brother were extradited from Israel to do jail time as he was cooking the books.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by gardener:
[B]Except Crazy Eddie's prices were insanely low, not high.....
[B]</font>

And isnt that what they are claiming? That only low fare paying leisure pax will have to put up with these restrictions while high fare paying pax will not? You pay 12K and you are a cheap airline ruining cockroach who doesn't need to be able to standby????

RDU-TPA

$98 VE141QN3 No refund, no standby (understandable)

$220 KR28 Refundable, no restrictions ???

$418 ME7NN No refund

$934 B8US No restrictions

$1338 F8 You are master of all you survey and the bosom buddy of Baldanza.

Now how is it possible for a $220 fare to be totally unrestricted and a $418 coach not? Is this the elite status premium? You pay us $198 more and you get the status miles?

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by biggs:
RDU-TPA

$98 VE141QN3 No refund, no standby (understandable)

$220 KR28 Refundable, no restrictions ???

$418 ME7NN No refund

$934 B8US No restrictions

$1338 F8 You are master of all you survey and the bosom buddy of Baldanza.

Now how is it possible for a $220 fare to be totally unrestricted and a $418 coach not? Is this the elite status premium? You pay us $198 more and you get the status miles?
</font>

Southwest at work ... notice that's a 28 day advance purchase!

As for elite miles, the website says that you only don't earn miles on non-refundable fares, so the obvious conclusion would be any fare should earn miles if it's refundable ... hopefully we'll never find out if that really the case since they should be rescinding it any day now ...

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Beckles:
Southwest at work ... notice that's a 28 day advance purchase!
</font>


The KR28 has no advance purchase, the numbers are used for tracking purposes only.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by BWI2MCO97:

The KR28 has no advance purchase, the numbers are used for tracking purposes only.

</font>

Well, that makes more sense. Still, you can bet that's matching a Southwest fare ...

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Beckles:
As for elite miles, the website says that you only don't earn miles on non-refundable fares...</font>

That's not what it says. There is no link between refundable/non-refundable, preferred miles or discountness.

The preferred miles thing is solely by fare class -- regardless of (non)refundability, discount or dollars paid.

The obvious conclusion is that they haven't a clue.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by TomBascom:
That's not what it says. There is no link between refundable/non-refundable, preferred miles or discountness.

The preferred miles thing is solely by fare class -- regardless of (non)refundability, discount or dollars paid.</font>

From the website:

Effective January 1, 2003, Dividend Miles members will not receive miles or segment credit toward Preferred status for tickets purchased in H, K, V, Q and L nonrefundable fare classes.

http://www.usairways.com/dividendmiles/preferredlevels/silvergoldguidelines.htm

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Beckles:
From the website:

Effective January 1, 2003, Dividend Miles members will not receive miles or segment credit toward Preferred status for tickets purchased in H, K, V, Q and L nonrefundable fare classes.

http://www.usairways.com/dividendmiles/preferredlevels/silvergoldguidelines.htm
</font>

The key thing isn't the word "nonrefundable" it's the list of fare classes. Everything in those fare classes can be safely assumed to be non-refundable. If it turns out to be refundable (as apparently happens on rare occassions) then you get a "bonus". But the converse is not true -- things in other fare classes cannot be assumed to be refundable -- they often are not.

Optimists are hanging on this wording to mean that they are planning a serious revision of the fare structure and just forgot to announce it.

I don't think so -- a serious revision would eliminate 3/4 of the fare classes.

They should reduce the number of fare classes they offer to:

First
Envoy (where available)
Refundable (Full Coach)
Non Refundable (discount coach)
Special Non Refundable (for sale fares)

That would make life easier.

But somehow I don't think that making life easier is their goal. At least making OUR lives easier.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by BWI2MCO97:

The KR28 has no advance purchase, the numbers are used for tracking purposes only.

</font>

Beckles:

I think you have IDed the WN effect because the one-way full fare is $110 to TPA. Checked RDU-BWI and KR28 is $150 RT and totally unrestricted.

I wonder what other cities US is matching WN. Since these are tracked (I assume to see how it fares against WN), I wonder if you are considered to be a "loyal non-cockroach traveler" or is this low enough that it would be considered to be taking advantage of leisure fares since we all know that WN is only carrying Ma & Pa Kettle. A loop hole on status miles for those lucky enough to be in a WN city. Too bad I haven't had business in TPA in 2 years.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by TomBascom:
Everything in those fare classes can be safely assumed to be non-refundable. </font>

There are plenty of refundable H and K fares ... especially in markets served by discount carriers. There a refundable K quoted previously in this thread, as one example ...

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Beckles:
There are plenty of refundable H and K fares ... especially in markets served by discount carriers. There a refundable K quoted previously in this thread, as one example ...</font>

I'll have to recheck that (later, I'm working right now...) but I didn't see many last week and I was looking in just those sorts of markets.

If true though it just adds to the confusion.

My interpretation of the "you're a cockroach, we don't care about you" policy is that, in order for a fare to qualify for elite status, it has to be booked in F, Y, B or M (ie., anything other than H, K, Q, or V). If that is the case that K fare you found, won't qualify for status.

At any rate, I don't care as I won't be giving this airline my business any more, given that they don't want it.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Beckles:
There are plenty of refundable H and K fares ... especially in markets served by discount carriers. There a refundable K quoted previously in this thread, as one example ...</font>

"Plenty" is apparently in the eye of the beholder http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif I see 17 fares between RDU & BWI. 7 seem to be refundable and they're are indeed spread around from K thru F (1 each in K, H & M) The B fare I can't figure out if it is or isn't. And it's cute how some of the refundable's are cheaper than the non-refundables in the same fare class.

If this is a vision of the future then I like it except:

1) The high end is still way to high -- a spread of 10x between low ($96) and high ($808) is way too much.

2) There's no sense that I can see in pricing the refundables (I hate that term) lower than the non-refundables. It just reinforces that there's no point in having the distinction.

Checking some of my other favorite routes was less encouraging. MHT -&gt; MCO (SWA effect should apply) is $168 on the low end, $1,712 at the high end. Very few non-refundables, all clumped at the top.

MHT -&gt; IND is similar. $198 at the bottom, $1,726 at the top. Although the cheapest refundable is $358 (but it's an H so no preferred miles) -- that's pretty close to my range if it were adequately differentiated (just being refundable isn't adequate and no preferred miles knoocks it out of the running too). I don't think that was there last week. They'd stand a better chance of selling these if there were some way to easily identify them and even ask for them.

MHT -&gt; DEN is horrible (no SWA). $334 at the low end which doesn't sound so bad but it's about 18 fares later that you get to a $1,786 refundable. Top fare is $2,780. This is where I found my discount non-refundable F poster child in last weeks review of crazy fares (I found others in places like SFO so it wasn't a fluke...) It's not there now though.

The "F" button on the web page seems to have been changed -- it now pulls up all of the unrestricted fares. I don't think that it did that last week but my brain cells might be misfiring. In any event it reinforces my thought that they ought to eliminate the F fare class.

[This message has been edited by TomBascom (edited 09-05-2002).]

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Beckles:
There are plenty of refundable H and K fares ... especially in markets served by discount carriers. There a refundable K quoted previously in this thread, as one example ...</font>

I fly PVD-LAS quite a bit, and this is what I found. 37 different fare/fare code levels (Including same fare/different fare code & same code/different fare).

The lowest: $198 RT - V Code (Non Ref/Non Elite)

The highest: $2,936 RT - F Code

Lowest Refundable: $598 RT - H Code (Ref/Non Elite) - I beleive this fare matches the Southwest $299 Walk up One-way.

$1198 RT was the lowest I saw that was both refundable and qualified for Elite Status (M Code fare)

Just thought I should show this as well. My 2nd favorite pairing is BDL-LAS.

$158 RT - Lowest non/ref non-elite

$3,334 RT - Highest F Fare

$1,954 RT - Lowest fare that is refundable and elite earning.
This fare is also the lowest fare listed that allows stand-by's.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">
$1198 RT was the lowest I saw that was both refundable and qualified for Elite Status (M Code fare) [/B]</font>

I must apologize for posting incorrect information.

$693 RT - BE7NN Fare Code (While still non/ref and no standby, "B" was not listed in the codes that would no longer qualify for elite status)

Still paying $500 more RT seems a heavy price to pay.

I'm here trying to figure out how the one USAirways computer guy is going to solve the problem of identifying which fares count for preferred status.

Depending on how you read the rule (which yes, we all hope will be rescinded), the K, V, etc fares could be refundable - and thus count towards status.

How would they ever figure all this out? Its bad enough that the gate agents have to type in the first letter to make it go through, but will they also have to read the fare rules and enter an N or R?

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by TomBascom:
"Plenty" is apparently in the eye of the beholder http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif I see 17 fares between RDU & BWI. 7 seem to be refundable and they're are indeed spread around from K thru F (1 each in K, H & M) The B fare I can't figure out if it is or isn't. And it's cute how some of the refundable's are cheaper than the non-refundables in the same fare class.</font>

Tom, that's just one market though ... when you consider all the other route-pairs US serves, there are "plenty" of refundable K and H fares that would make it very dangerous to assume that all K and H fares are nonrefundable as you suggested ... that's all I'm saying.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Ekollios:
Lowest Refundable: $598 RT - H Code (Ref/Non Elite) - I beleive this fare matches the Southwest $299 Walk up One-way.

$1198 RT was the lowest I saw that was both refundable and qualified for Elite Status (M Code fare) </font>

Again, from the US website:

From the website:

Effective January 1, 2003, Dividend Miles members will not receive miles or segment credit toward Preferred status for tickets purchased in H, K, V, Q and L nonrefundable fare classes.

http://www.usairways.com/dividendmiles/preferredlevels/silvergoldguidelines.htm

According to everything US has said, all refundable tickets earn miles and segments that count towards elite status. They've made other statements worded differently than above that say the same thing.

As I was typing my reply, I found out my reply was moot. Mr. B as decided to back off from the H,K,V....Whatever restriction.

I for one am very happy to hear that. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif