Originally Posted by
icelandman2
This is what they're claiming to be doing, and if they were doing it I would be ok with that. However, the reality has been fairly different - a lot of us know exactly what each fare class is supposed to cost on a certain city pair (barring any unusual sales, etc). For example, I know that R-fare SFO-RDU roundtrips are "supposed" to be $190. If AS were to offer a lower fare on X to match the majors (even if Main were now slightly/incrementally higher), I would think very few would fault them. Instead, they're now showing $190 as the X fare (so no prices are lower and they're not, in fact, lowering to match the majors), while I'd now have to pay $220 for the same R fare.
I wouldn't fault AS at all for pricing your above example as 133 for X and 145 for Main - the problem is that they've instead gone out and made 140 X and now ask 170 for Main, which to me indicates it was never about matching a fare offered by any other carrier.
Well, that's what the email is explaining. AS is basically saying: "For the last approx. 1 year we've been pricing our R fares at prices to compete with BE and we're losing our shirt. So now, we've introduced a proper X fare to compete with BE." and when you read between the lines, you realize that means R fares are going up.
Thing is, when they announced Saver, we assumed it'd be a tier below R - not that it'd be supplanting R and pushing it up. Which is why they had to send this email, due to the backlash because it wasn't communicated properly in the first place.