Family trip on basic economy
Jumped on a fantastic BE deal lately, I have learnt so much from this thread and I would like to share my experience for the folks who think about buying these fares for family trip.This trip has 4 segments, 2 domestic and 2 transatlantic. When I purchased the tickets, my biggest concern was somehow we would separate with my 2 kids (both under 12) or got terrible seats when checked in. So the question was whether I should purchase seats in advance which would cost ~$200 in total for all segments. It turned out just a day after my purchase, AA auto assigned seats for us. Three segments are not ideal but acceptable, only one is terrible (right next to the bathroom). Most important of all, we will sit on the same rows. So I simply went to aa.com and changed one segment which cost me only $45. The other disadvantages of BE fares are largely mitigated by my AA status. So the remaining downsides are 1) 50% of EQM (I care very little), 2) no chance to get MCE (unlikely to get 4 from my flights anyway) and 3) no change or cancel and low on re-accomodation.
Overall, I saved ~$500 compared to buying MC fare. That's 2 nights hotel for a rather expensive European city. I know folks here generally don't like BE. I have never purchased BE fare before and tried to avoid BE if possible. But this time it provided us great value that I can't resit. I will report back if the actual flying experience is any different.