eggsbenedict

I don't think he's confused about how it works, he's just saying that it's nonsensical that the bonus is a fixed amount instead of a percentage, which makes it only really useful/rewarding on lower priced passes. I had the same thought when going over all the various bonuses and gifts and whatnot as the AC ecosystem is relatively new to me as well.

As an example using an Eastern Canada to Asia pass vs Ontario mining pass, both 8 credit LT passes:
8x YYZ-NRT gets you 63,912 SQM, the 50K bonus of 1250SQM amounts to a rounding error and isn't likely to affect anyone's decision as to whether to buy a nearly $20,000 pass
8x YYZ-YQT gets you 5,664 SQM, the 50K bonus amounts to a 22% bonus, which isn't bad at all and would be worth taking in to account when deciding whether to buy the pass or not.

Pretty much everywhere else in the program, percentage bonuses are used as they make way more sense. (At least to me and Aphrican!)

YYJ _SLF

Exactly.

It would be more of an incentive to offer a percentage bonus SQM for FP flights flown if Members choose bonus SQMs as a Select Benefit. Something like 6% for 25k, 8% for 35k, 10% for 50K, 12% for 75K and 14% for SE makes sense to me.

A 50K member, would get 6,391 bonus SQM on the expensive FP and 566 bonus SQM on the cheap FP rather than the current 1,250 bonus SQM on the more expensive FP and 2,500 (assuming that you buy 2 separate 4 leg passes to get to 8 legs) bonus SQM on the less expensive FP.

The ratio of bonus SQM to FP cost between passes under my hypothetical bonus SQM structure is much more closely aligned than under the current flat SQM bonus structure. It also creates on incentive to go further up the ticket type cost structure as the bonus SQMs are leveraged to different base SQMs.

With prime at 6.7%, a 6 month loan (let's pretend that we use our FPs evenly through the year and that AC can borrow at Prime) to AC on $20,000 is $670 of real money. Giving it up for 1,250 bonus SQM does not make that much sense to me at 54 cents per SQM.

From AC's perspective, it would help lock higher mileage members into AC long haul flights as they would now have a more powerful incentive to buy FPs in higher revenue seats. I don't remember the exact number, but airlines make a very large proportion of their profits from "premium" passengers. This is an area where they are being let down in my view.

Nitehawk

I don't like unlimited flight passes collect collect the same number of SQM per month, regardless of the region they cover. There are differences for fare classes (Flex 10,000 SQM per month, Latitude 15,000 per month, and business 20,000 per month).

Does anyone track the prices of unlimited flight passes? How much have they increased recently on say the western commuter?

vancouver25k

Need a cowtool for tracking all FP prices to make us feel bad.

thaddaeus

They used to have a, I believe, Halifax commuter FP that granted 10,000 SQM for ~$1,800 per month. It's gone now, but you could've bought FF status for 18 CPM which isn't too bad nowadays.

Snow Goose

The J version was $3200 per month on a 6 month option granting 20k SQM per month and instant SE 100k status. Alas it is no longer available.

i won’t be purchasing addition FP products until better deals come along. I have used them since AC first introduced this product. I expect FP sales are about to drop by a minimum of 50 percent, but I’m sure AC has already performed the analysis and knows what the impact will be.

YYJ _SLF

We live on Vancouver Island and have family that we visit at least 5 times a year in Winnipeg. The 10 leg FP in J that connects us costs $1,059.40 per leg. the average cost of a leg in August is $687. Either I have missed a FP that is a better fit or the pricing is nuts.

thaddaeus

The Western USA Plus LT FP. Comp upgrades to J or use eUps. $666.70 per leg.

Bohemian1

The price current price I see for this FP says 10 credits for $7,175.

King Chung Huang

Probably tax differences. It's $6667 for 10 credits with Alberta as the province of residence.

vancouver25k

Eep! That's probably the only FP I might think about buying now (well, the flex one, and I'm still not sure it's worthwhile). But I just checked and lat is still 6667 for 10 credits (using BC residency)?

YYJ _SLF

That is super helpful. Thanks. I am in the steep part of the learning curve for sure.

2023 is the year for both of us to go from zero to E75K organically based on the flights that we have already booked. One or both of us might reach SE including CC spend so this is a great strategy for 2024 once we have a pocketful of eUps.

To be honest, I never thought to look at a Western US Plus option for purely domestic travel but it is more cost efficient than the Western Canada Regional if you are willing to take the LT eUps risk compared to pure J.

Nitehawk

Buy it soon. That western USA plus pass will probably be going up in price by 50% shortly. Especially if we keep posting about it.

Adam Smith

Moderator note: thread re-opened after a number of general FP-related posts were moved to a general FP questions thread. Let's please try to keep this to the topic of FP price increases.

coleo

I've used the Southwestern pass for nearly a decade as well and loved it, great value esp for last minute flights.. I went to go buy one today and thought my math was bad on the latitude pass being ~ $800 / leg now! (I checked a few random dates and comfort fares, fully refundable, can range from $300-500 to LA from YVR). We used to use them for company travel, 5 people on a 10 pass and it was so helpful to keep costs down. Not even close to worth it any longer.

This is a shocking increase and will unlikely ever buy one again. Sad.