Originally Posted by
david4455
Trying to book SEA-FCO and finding the NW/KLM J fares to be close to $9000.... when AF is $3200 and BA is $5300.
Clearly my choice will be AF but I was hoping to avoid LHR and CDG for my connection.....
Why are NW/KLM fares so high? There appears to be no competition here at all.
"close to $9000" is a full-fare (J class) business seat SEA-AMS-FCO-AMS-SEA. (technically your AMS-FCO-AMS is in KLM Europe Select, which is not
even as good as Domestic First on NW.
If you're seeing that price, it means that on the dates you've searched, only full-fare J is available, because the cheaper discounted business fare classes, C and Z, are sold out.
A C fare for that routing is probably $6000 or so, and a Z fare is more like $3250.
There's only one direct flight per day each direction between SEA and AMS, and it's a pretty popular route, nice plane, good IFE, etc. So you may actually spot cheaper fares connecting through MSP or DTW, but then your domestic segment from SEA to MSP or DTW is in domestic F, not WBC.
Just some data points.