RaginPlainsman

After seeing this I went into Concur to look at some dummy bookings and even on flights where alaskaair.com showed Saver space, Concur wasn't providing it as an option. Only showed the lowest main cabin fare available, plus Y and F. I'm really hoping that means my employer already made the decision to exclude X fares.

missamo80

I've already made several dummy bookings + real bookings with our corporate Concur portal and no saver fares are listed, as expected. They'd previously excluded BE fares from Delta etc.

Neil

VegasGambler

Hmm good point; I should look more closely at how the url is constructed.

I can't even figure out how to get Google flights to SHOW the booking code, never mind filter on it.

spgaston

I ran into this too. Kayak lets you filter out Saver fares.

Bretmd

VegasGambler

Ha! That's a great bug. I can practically see their source code.

jjmadison

Here are the URL codes I use when in Google Flights map view. The map UI settings don't let you filter down to a specific airline (only alliance). This lets you limit to AS so you can play with visual maps of all of the places you could fly Alaska for your date and $ ranges.

Tricks for Google Flights:

For AS only:
;a:AS*AS;

For nonstop:
;s:0;

For one stop:
;s:1;

For price under $500
;p:50000.2.USD;

For ticket class:
There seem to only be settings for First, Business, Premium, and Economy.

First
sc:f;

Business (same as first for AS)
sc:b

Premium
sc

Economy (which for AS, lists Basic Economy tickets as economy)
remove the sc code

VegasGambler

You can! It's just not easy. Select a destination. Then you can filter by airline. Then if you go back to the map page (NOT using the back button on your browser) the filter will still be there.

Your way is easier, though.

_fx

FYI, the Google Flights team is aware of this issue. In the meantime, notice that if you select a flight that is a saver fare, the "Book on Google with Alaska" option will not appear. This is so you are forced to go to Alaska.com to book, and you'll see the warning about the saver fare restrictions.

Quintious

Honestly, best thing you can do, unfortunately. I don't love DL by any stretch, but my travel experience has improved dramatically since mostly bailing from AS a couple of years back. I still hit G status each year just on the back of how frequently I travel to a spot DL doesn't service via a non-stop (just hit it last week, as a matter of fact), but literally all my other revenue goes the other way now, and it's honestly been easier (we all know hat a pain in the tail it is to have to get from someplace that's NOT SEA>PDX>SJC>LAX to somewhere else). As an interesting side effect, this saver fare has even messed up my biz travel to DEN (where DL, sadly, doesn't really play): I have to book through Concur. Historically, I book there and then call the Gold line and buy the F upgrade if I'm concerned I won't get the comp. Ever since Saver fares, though, my Concur portal books me in that bucket, and I end up having to threaten the damn agent on the other end of the phone to make an "exception" for me so I can buy up. I don't see myself even bothering with this in the coming year, it's too much negativity and hassle, and a clear sign AS doesn't value its FF's - even the ones that buy up - in any meaningful way.

rustykettel

Quintious

I'm a company exception (medical). It's never been a problem with any carrier previously until AS decided to start the process of becoming RyanAir. Whatever, it is what it is, I'll just take WN starting next year even though I dislike tourist carriers.

beckoa

Agree- most companies are blocking BE fares. If you need to change, those tickets are trash.

VegasGambler

Not quite sure what is going on here but right now for SFO-JFK in 2019, the R (main) fare is about $2 cheaper than the fare that books into X with underlying code R.

The bottom line is that there is lots of Main SFO-JFK for $127 (last year's prices!) while the X fares are $129. The main is R; the X is underlying R.

I'm guessing that this is a mistake on AS's part; buy em while you can.

xliioper

If you look closely at these flights, you will see that the 9:20AM departure and 11:30AM return flights do have Saver fares at $129 one-way and Main(R) fares are $157. The other 3 daily flights do not have any Saver fares and just have $127 Main(R) fares. This is undoubtedly due to B6 who is likely the fare setter on this route and does not yet have Basic Economy fares. There's no B6 flight around 9:20AM, so AS seems to feel they can charge a premium for that particular flight. There is an 11:10AM B6 JFK-SFO flight, but that time slot likely has sufficient demand that AS feels than can compete against B6 with pricier Main fares.