Interesting... if seat selection is available for elites or when purchasing directly through AS then it might not be so bad using these fares for flights I know will not change & I dont care about getting upgraded.

Still want to know what the price difference is going to look like to pay for my benefits.

Just an FYI that my initial post (since been quoted a few times, including above) did contain some mis-information. Elites will be assigned a seat at check-in, not be able to select at booking, unfortunately. :(

Totally fair....its all about personal travel patterns....if WN went to eastern Canada (YOW/YYZ/YUL) that would be amazing

I wouldn't necessarily jump to that conclusion. Both the regular fare class and X need to be available for them to sell a Saver fare. Just because the system might be capable of offering unlimited X, doesn't mean that AS won't have X zero out well before Y does.

Whether it zeros out along with G or with B is anyone's guess at this point. But who knows, maybe they haven't learned any lessons from watching anyone else and it will be along with Y after all. Good thing my tickets to The (expletive deleted) Show come with assigned seating! ;)

The could easily make the middle seats in the back of the plane available for the "cheapskates" that buy the saver fares. Those would be the last to be chosen by anybody that actually has a choice anyway.

I should have taken a screen shot, but was trying to view seats for a few flights earlier today. Instead, got giant versions of the legend for the seat color squares, one of them being an S and labeled as "Saver fare." Compared to the blue with a star square for Premium Economy, for example.

Guessing that means that either you can choose those seats during the booking process. Or only those seats at online check-in. But they are definitely make a distinction in which seats Saver fares can choose. Sounds like it will be during the booking process which is good, at least for those who book in advance.

What route and dates? I have not seen this...

That bolded statement in regular English means you will most likely end up in a middle seat in the back. Though if the flight is full and we need to put you elsewhere that is also a possibility--just like all the other airlines which offer basic economy. You can guarantee an undesirable seat ahead of time or you play the lottery at the airport and may end up in a premium seat if that is all that is available.

It was clearly a glitch, since no seat map was ever shown after I clicked on the link to view seats. Just a huge version of the legend which included a new "S" saver seat, and it happened on every flight/route/dates I was trying to look at for a little while before going back to normal.

Oh, it's older than that. I was recently off the MVP Gold Advisory Board when it was introduced (and I left a decade ago, and recalled getting a call from an AS exec asking my opinion about potential names for that elite level). So while it's less than 10 years old, it's probably a few more than four.

But point taken. Plus, that we have no control over it, really.

Today's supposed to be the big day, right?

Anyone seeing Saver fares for sale?

I tried SEA-PHX, LAS, SAN, and ATL, didn't see any. I give up on random searching.

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...5e10556b11.png
https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...dd9d80ac44.png

Did the same from SFO. Random dates in Jan, April, and March show nothing in terms of Saver Fares for LAX, LAS, PDX, SAN, and LAX-LAS. I speculated one of the first targets would be SFO-LAS since Frontier has been throwing sale after sale. Maybe their testing out the implementation very selectively to work the bugs out?

can you just search with f bc=x in matrix?

I tried that for a few city pairs and the calendar view for dec and jan and didn't find anything though. I'm not sure if X is technically a booking code though so maybe this isn't right. Or maybe they just haven't been published yet. Or both.

Edit: tried with sea,pdx,sfo,las,lax as both source and dest and found nothing.

What city pairs? And what was price difference, out of curiosity?

None. This is just what shows when you click "compare fare types".

This solves both problems:

1. e.g., no whining if you get the middle seat with no recline just ahead of the rear lav.
2. no whining that you got a forward aisle on your last ticket and it was even cheaper.

The goal of these fares isn't to sell them, it's to draw people in because you have the cheapest fare on the GDS and then subtly make the case that the restrictions aren't worth the savings. Some people are quite happy and others not so.

Saver showing up with the app with no fares listed yet


https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...62289bb2a7.jpg

Yes and No. It all comes down to implementation. Like with AA, if you are not elite and pay extra to avoid basic fares and are not booking months in advance, most if not all of the seats are already blocked from selection unless you pay even more to select an aisle or window. In this case, unless I were prepared to pay both for the seat fee and the higher fare, I would never book on AA--unless with all those extra costs AA still provides the best value for that flight. I would start looking around at either B6/WN/JetSuiteX who don't yet have saver fares or would look at DL/UA to see what their seat options are. The people that are keeping themselves captive to one carrier may want to overpay for the same product. Everybody else has even more incentive to check out the competition to see which carrier provides the best value on any given itinerary.

I am a bit biased, but also an #avgeek . I think at the end of the day this will help bring more guests to AS who may not choose to fly AS because Brand XYZ was $X amount cheaper. AS can now compete with Brand XYZ.

How does it impact current guests? I think it helps current guests. Those guests purchasing Saver Fares will board last (as will their carry-ons). Most FT'ers do not fall into this group. Even those who do probably have Status. Status will allow you to board early.

It also allows AS to possibly compete in markets they may have been shut out of before. It makes AS a stronger company and hopefully, that helps their loyalty members (you).

That assumes that AS is going to use this to drop fares to compete with, say, NK on routes that they both serve. While that may be the case, what's been seen more frequently with the other carriers is that the Y- fare sits where regular economy used to be.

From some perspectives that’s ok. Fuel and labor costs are going up and if you can find a way to still offer some of the same fares that benefits consumers.

They are not going to offer NK type fares. That would only be shooting themselves in the head to fix a minor headache. They are using this to INCREASE revenue. Why would they market a bunch of seats at an even lower price than they have now when they would have to substantially increase all the rest of the tickets to make up for that plus charge more to get the expected revenue increases? AS does not have the ULCC model where they can make up the low fare by charging for carry ons, checking in at the airport, etc.

So basically people in BE could pay $25 getting into PE rather than pay $20 getting into normal Y? Or do they pay $20 + $25 to get the PE seat? If they only need to pay $25 I could see there probably will be no future for elite upgrading into PE

You will have to buy up to be able to pay extra for premium seat so possibly $50 + 119 or $20+ 25 depends on route and what the cost spread ends up being

https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...bf0ea9ae09.jpg
I am curious if the access to PC from Saver is based on paying the fare difference to Y or is limited via reduced inventory? This is from the PC FAQ's on the AS site.

It will be interesting to see how this upcharge to PE will play out. I remember, from the earlier discussion, that when BE was first presented they also included a comment about variable pricing for PE with their ancillary pricing strategy . Since I no longer have AS status, I always pay for PE when I fly in Y. When this thread started I decided that if I came across a BE fare it would be a wash for me - since I buy PE anyway, I always check a bag (with my AS Visa), always aim to board the plane last, and have yet to make a SDC.

So now it looks I might have to check 2 scenarios when booking and seeing a BE fare - first, I will need to check the cost of BE + PE and then, the cost of Y + PE.

With the above comment on limited access - I wonder if this means when booking BE and paying extra for PE you are stuck with only getting middle seats in PE...

My guess is that they'll be able to buy up to Premium at check-in in some cases. Possibly depending on how much inventory is open?

It seem like a simple and equitable fix would be to make PE $20-$30 more expensive for Saver fares (e.g., Saver + $20 + PE upcharge).

FYI - This notice was in a blue box at the top of the monthly Mileage Plan email statement I got today:

"Saver fares include the basic amenities that Alaska Airlines guests enjoy, but restrictions apply, even for elites."

Linked to here: https://www.alaskaair.com/content/tr...r#mileage-plan

Saver fares are live...
 

https://crankyflier.com/2018/11/15/a...three-markets/

The buy ups are currently $15/$25/$30 each way on short/medium/long haul.

Of course there's lots of weirdness on the website when you try to go book it, including misaligned and poorly formatted pop-ups. On the initial seat map it's not clear what seats are and aren't available for Saver. Then, when you can select seats, they are more clearly indicated but it won't let you buy up out of Saver to a regular coach seat. However it will sell you a Premium Class seat -- for $6 more than if you bought out of Saver and selected Premium -- AND you're still stuck un-changeable and un-upgradeable to F. :td:

I looked at a sample BWI-SAN. logged out of account as general member, Saver is $30 less and wants $89 for buy up to premium seat. Seats in the back are marked as saver and if you click on a normal seat it offers the ability go back and search for a new flight. The non saver fare has premium is $69 extra but the saver seats in back just appear as normal seats

https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...bc08da678f.jpg

Somehow I doubt the buy ups are set in stone at that rate :)
They're probably just testing the waters, and we'll probably see the gap get bigger.

Or maybe this will be just enough to get them to come up as a lower or more competitive fare on 3rd party flight search tools and d

I tested Saver + PC -- $49. Buy-up($15) + PC($29) -- $44, also they don't allow you to buy-up once you purchased Saver.