cmtlatitudes

It wouldn't surprise me if there's some truth in that. I've already used three this year and still have three left to use by December.

EXP100

Oil prices are soaring so of course fares are up. And if demand falls airlines are going to start to park planes. Their dirty secret is that they don't make money on flying so if flying becomes a heavy financial burden they will begin to cut routes, fire workers and park planes. I for one will be very happy to see the $59 fares gone for good-and everything that gets dragged in with them.

VegasGambler

Sure, and I'll pay a small premium for the convenience, but not 3x the price. Of course that was just a single data point. As I also pointed out, on my trip to CUN, the direct flight on AA was the cheapest option (though I did pick the only 2 days with cheap tickets -- as always, being flexible saves a lot of money). One nice bonus is that the cheapest days are usually the cheapest because of low loads, and therefore upgrades are easy! My return from CUN actually had an empty seat in F so I guess there were not many elites on that flight and they were all up front.

dls25

All of my summer travel is booked in other airlines for this reason. AA and DL fares have been ridiculous...UA has been a little better. By shopping around I have managed to spend 1/4 to 1/2 of what AA wanted, often with better schedules. I like my mileage and status perks but funds staying in my account is even better.

merlin90

I would never have ignored a big discount before but one thing the move to LPs/credit card spend has done is really freed me to think purely about cost and convenience when choosing flights, rather than defaulting to AA/AS in all but the most ludicrous of cases. My credit card spend is significantly outpacing the LPs I earn from flying, not least because I very rarely buy J/F tickets. My UA status gets me a free checked bag as well as UA's equivalent of MCE at check-in, and my ANA Platinum (*A Gold) status gets me lounge access when flying UA. My Amex Platinum gets me lounge access when flying DL. So it's not like I'm totally slumming it when I'm not traveling on AA, even if complimentary upgrades are either very unlikely or impossible. I know chasing status can be a bit of a false economy but it's nice to know that if I do end up choosing a different airline I'm not going regret leaving EQDs/EQMs on the table.

VegasGambler

FWIW, I'm just booking a flight from NYC to PHX, and AA was the cheapest option (AA and UA are both non stop). And AA is main cabin; no BE on that route/date. Even the ULCCs are more expensive (note that the JetBlue option is a codeshare operated by AA; JetBlue metal is more expensive)





So, again, I don't think that AA is out of line compared to other carriers. It seems to just depend on date and route

355F1

Might not be a fair argument because PHX-NYC has a lot of competition and is a very busy route all year.

dls25

...and AA is probably the weakest carrier with a non-stop.

ryan182

for some locations maybe but not all. I’m in Caribbean for the past month, my flight home was booked as O/W two months ago on UA as they were the only airline operating in the day I wanted to travel for ~$800 in J. This week I decided to stay a couple more weeks and on the new departure day AA was $1200 in J for the same city pairs, with far better connections/layovers. So while 1,200 > 800 it’s not 2-3x and it was much shorter notice.

unfrequentflyer

My neighbor just bought a ticket to Bangkok. The price is 50% higher than 2019

Tanic

There was a time that the volume of WN nonstops out of PHX kept the HP/US/AA fares in check. Now WN has their own record shattering fares.

ijgordon

I think this is a meaningful driver of AA's F fares. I haven't done the analysis recently, but I'm sure that AA's FC seats as a % of total seats across the narrowbody fleet is quite a bit lower than UA/DL (it's not just the 319s, their 320s have 25% fewer F seats than the competition too, and aren't the 321's only 16F (DL is 20)?
Also, FWIW, I suspect that $3k SFO-DAY fare is because of married segment availability that's only offering full J.

greekfreak

Seriously considering Airpass, I just spent $1300 to fly from RIC to Springfield, Missouri (Main Cabin). Last year that would've taken me to Australia. Only issue is the reduce fair costs are only good for a week in advance and I book flights typically 2-3 days before departure.

VegasGambler

Why does that make it not a fair comparison? Yes there is competition, but AA is the cheapest.

cmtlatitudes

Sorry, I probably wasn't clear.

The 2-3 reference was to double the cost now for a J ticket vice 2-3 months ago. Not that the difference between a UA and AA ticket were 2-3x. I'd just mentioned the non-stops on my routes from IAD on UA were frequently less now than the connecting AA flights.

It used to be fairly easy to find a one-way J ticket to the Caribbean on AA (from DCA) in the $400-$600 range, if you had some flexibility. Even usually the week of travel. It was rare in my experience for a J ticket to be over $800-$900 tops, unless a holiday peak period close in or the last seat on the plane.

Now, the J tickets seem to start in $900-$1000 range. Frequently up to $1200-$1300. Last week I saw some very full flights at $3000. (Which I would never, no not ever, pay to go to the Caribbean. Happy for AA to sell it to someone else or an EXP to grab the upgrade. LoL.) There was one for $795 that I wish I'd grabbed - it was as close to the good 'ol days as I'd seen in a month.