pansted00

Just finished checking prices for a return C class trip second week of January between CDG and BKK: TG is 3100 Euros, but AF is 5700 Euros ???
Are they nuts ?

irishguy28

Pricings on the websites of the flag carriers of Latin Europe can sometimes be a bit unusual!

As seen on http://www.iberia.nl -

danielonn

NO WAY you've got to be joking.

I was able to book a 6,450 mile trip from San Francisco to Sao Paulo Brazil for $474 o/w and a 2 week cruise to Barcelona for $900 per person. Plus an award ticket back to SFO for $85 in taxes. This is highway robbery.

I hope this is just a mistake.

Doc Savage

I don't think you understand what that phrase means.

danielonn

For 5,700 Euros not only are they NUTS this is extortion in my opinion.

danielonn

It means you are taking money from people who are naive and would pay the fare.

dlinsider

So what would you consider a really good business class fare??

delanotre

AF has nearly same price in class I than class J on TG but you have to reserve some day before flying...Did you never know that rule?

[IMG] [/IMG]

Goldorak

Several things to consider here :
- you are talking of an almost last minute trip during the high peak season of traveling to Thailand
- BKK is a heavy leisure-oriented market and AF serves BKK with a B77W with very high density Y cabin and only 14 J seats meaning that this cabin is rapidly sold and so, at the last minute (your case), only the highest fare buckets remain available (C, J). This is yield management.
- TG, as a foreign airline in France, is selling tickets at lower price than the dominant carrier in France (AF) to attract pax. Same in most countries (AF is less expensive than BA ex-UK while BA is less expensive than AF ex-France, etc etc). Add also that TG is serving CDG with their new A380 so with a lot of J seats to fill, explaining a more attractive fare available for more seats than for AF. In the past years, when AF was flying to BKK with B744 or A343, so with a larger J cabin, I flew several times there in J for 2000-2200€ (Z fare). Now, this fare is very difficult to book during the high season, because of the small number of J seats proposed every day. However, it's reasonably easy to have it on KL via AMS.

So no they're not nuts. It's yield management.

brunos

And BA is currently selling CDG-BKK at 1862 Euros for your dates.
Sure you have to transfer in LHR, but....

AA_EXP09

The �3400 price is close in price to EY F!
RJ also prices cheap in J on this route (though I am not going to check availability, especially without your specific dates.)

grahampros

As pointed out, this is standard revenue/yield management. Nothing unusual here. You'd find this on many carriers from their home market to peak destinations in peak season. If price is that important you take the other options.

carnarvon

If the C cabin sells that well, it means it is too small and they are losing revenue.

If 14 seats is not enough, shouldn't they use a leasure configuration rather than a COI one?

Yield management works if your capacity is more or less in line with the market. If you artificially reduce capacity and your competitors don't, then you simply turn high yield customers away, don't you?

So, they are nuts.@:-)

Goldorak

I didn't say that they are selling well or not well. I have no precise figure to say one or the other. But of course, it is easier to sell 14 seats than 40 or 60. And you can't judge if the cabin capacity is adapted or not just on one day of flight. It is well-known that BKK is highly leisure oriented and all EU carriers struggled or are still struggling to BKK due to "yields in the toilets" linked to the very attractive fares proposed by the ME3 (and to a lesser extent by TG). AF and LH even announced 2 years ago that they could shut down the route. At that time AF moved to the COI config which seems the right one for AF model and the route seems to do better as they are increasing the frequencies.

carnarvon

I was not aware that the ME3 airlines and TG did not offer a significant number of C class seats to BKK.

More seriously, they sell a lot of C class seats at a lower price than AF.

Only an airline as inwards oriented as AF can reduce the number of seats to 14, then make itself believe the load is so good that they can increase the prices to such ridiculous levels for the remaining seats.

On the plus side for friends and family, this will mean that there will be seats left for upgrades.

P.s. Leasure configuration is 35 seats, not 40 or 60.