Disappointed in Black Friday Sale
#16
Original Poster
Join Date: Mar 2016
Location: Plymouth, UK
Programs: BAEC Gold
Posts: 1,159
I try to avoid TAs as the contract is then with the TA and it can be difficult to get hold of them or to get adequate rerouting/compensation in the case of IROPS.
#17
Moderator, Iberia Airlines, Airport Lounges, and Ambassador, British Airways Executive Club
Join Date: Feb 2010
Programs: BA Lifetime Gold; Flying Blue Life Platinum; LH Sen.; Hilton Diamond; Kemal Kebabs Prized Customer
Posts: 63,475
I've had a quick scan through the other airlines where I am a frequent flyer/trainer in their relevant schemes.
- Air France - their marketing partly impresses me since they make it NCL specific But as ever, all their bargains seems to be on unusual routes such as to Fortaleza and Wuhan. Their headline rate was 259 return in economy to Kuwait.
- Lufthansa - 25 off voucher but a fairly open use of it, base fare just needs to be over 25 to get all 25 off. This was a "Cyberday" promotion. Headline offer: Buenos Aires 446 in economy. Otherwise reassuringly boring (which I actually quite appreciate!).
- KLM - the previous weekend they had some special cut-rate mileage related deals, which were more impressive, so MME (Yarm International)-SFO for 34,000 miles. They don't seem to have a Black Friday or Cyberweek special that I can see, but they are touting MME-HKG for 433.
- Vueling - a few euros off their lowest fares, so fares which are typically 25€ may be 22€ now
- Eurostar - train + hotel deals but no specific headline figures.
- Iberia - just a listing of fares they want to highlight, including Montevideo on 535 economy, and LHR-MAD for 68 return. Reference to a 20% reduction on Iberia Holidays but no other details.
- Ryanair - they always succeed it coming up with some amazing headline figure, this time it is L'viv in Ukraine for 9.80 return! Huge amount of flight for that fare. Or Olsztyn/Allenstein for 5.14 return. More usefully for me, NCL-DUB for 19 return but that's only slightly cheaper than their usual low fare.
- easyJet - they forgot to email me, but online there is some suggestion of 90 off their easyJet Holidays (flight + hotels). Probably the lowest key of "my" airlines.
Now set against the above, in my view BA's deals put themselves apart by
- being premium fares focused (and such is the USP on BA)
- BOGOF
- 100 of 2,500 BA Holidays
- shorthaul CE (including LHR-NCL at 161 return, which is near TP Run territory, Hamburg and Billund are also in this space)
- being well highlighted in email and on their website
- Air France - their marketing partly impresses me since they make it NCL specific But as ever, all their bargains seems to be on unusual routes such as to Fortaleza and Wuhan. Their headline rate was 259 return in economy to Kuwait.
- Lufthansa - 25 off voucher but a fairly open use of it, base fare just needs to be over 25 to get all 25 off. This was a "Cyberday" promotion. Headline offer: Buenos Aires 446 in economy. Otherwise reassuringly boring (which I actually quite appreciate!).
- KLM - the previous weekend they had some special cut-rate mileage related deals, which were more impressive, so MME (Yarm International)-SFO for 34,000 miles. They don't seem to have a Black Friday or Cyberweek special that I can see, but they are touting MME-HKG for 433.
- Vueling - a few euros off their lowest fares, so fares which are typically 25€ may be 22€ now
- Eurostar - train + hotel deals but no specific headline figures.
- Iberia - just a listing of fares they want to highlight, including Montevideo on 535 economy, and LHR-MAD for 68 return. Reference to a 20% reduction on Iberia Holidays but no other details.
- Ryanair - they always succeed it coming up with some amazing headline figure, this time it is L'viv in Ukraine for 9.80 return! Huge amount of flight for that fare. Or Olsztyn/Allenstein for 5.14 return. More usefully for me, NCL-DUB for 19 return but that's only slightly cheaper than their usual low fare.
- easyJet - they forgot to email me, but online there is some suggestion of 90 off their easyJet Holidays (flight + hotels). Probably the lowest key of "my" airlines.
Now set against the above, in my view BA's deals put themselves apart by
- being premium fares focused (and such is the USP on BA)
- BOGOF
- 100 of 2,500 BA Holidays
- shorthaul CE (including LHR-NCL at 161 return, which is near TP Run territory, Hamburg and Billund are also in this space)
- being well highlighted in email and on their website
#18
Community Director
Join Date: Jan 2009
Location: Norwich, UK
Programs: A3*G, BA Gold, BD Gold (in memoriam), IHG Diamond Ambassador
Posts: 8,448
The post you've linked to doesn't really support your claim that you "have had several flight bookings actively blocked by telephone sales staff" on the grounds that you were flying only to gain status. Rather, it seems you were unlucky in getting a sales agent who didn't know how to book a complex, indirect itinerary.
Itineraries such as OTP-PHX are very easy to book directly on the AA website, at the price quoted by Matrix; you don't even need to use BookWithMatrix (which rarely works satisfactorily for me).
Itineraries such as OTP-PHX are very easy to book directly on the AA website, at the price quoted by Matrix; you don't even need to use BookWithMatrix (which rarely works satisfactorily for me).
The restriction you encountered with not booking onto an AA flight number with BA metal is down to BA policy and nothing to do with your routing - it would have been exactly the same if youd been trying to book OTP-LHR-PHX direct on AA codes.
If AA doesnt work a TA could certainly book it. I had what I thought was quite a simple itinerary on SK recently which involved an open jaw of ARN-CPH-SFO-CPH-LHR. The saving doing it that way was considerable compared to just going back to ARN, and I gained a protected connection back to the UK. The SK website couldnt cope with it, and so I used a TA (Propeller as it happens) who achieved what I needed in minutes.
I dont therefore think theres any conspiracy with any airline in trying to deny us cost savings/miles/TPs by creative routings - its just that we are in such a minority its (a) not worth investing in the IT to offer more functionality and (b) most certainly not worth the effort of actively stopping us.
#20
Join Date: Oct 2015
Location: London, UK
Programs: BAEC GGL/GFl, HH Diamond, BW Diamond, Virgin Voyages Deep Blue Extra, Blue Peter Badge Holder
Posts: 3,933
I think the other thing we have to remember, as with all sales, it is a marketing tool. With a crowded airline sector, competition is already fierce and profit margins tight; this means that to have great bargains then you would perhaps need to inflate prices at other times which would make BA uncompetitive.
Alternatively you use it as BA have, look for where there are gaps in your inventory and when these dates are, then use marketing to drop those prices, albeit restrictely on dates, to draw people to your site, some of these may be loss leaders, but other flights may be booked as a result which are not.
Those who have been waiting out for specific flights may be lottery winners, but the majority not and will end up buying the flight they would have anyone which they would have purchased before had they not been waiting out for Cyber Friday.
Alternatively you use it as BA have, look for where there are gaps in your inventory and when these dates are, then use marketing to drop those prices, albeit restrictely on dates, to draw people to your site, some of these may be loss leaders, but other flights may be booked as a result which are not.
Those who have been waiting out for specific flights may be lottery winners, but the majority not and will end up buying the flight they would have anyone which they would have purchased before had they not been waiting out for Cyber Friday.
#22
Join Date: Apr 2017
Posts: 516
As someone who works in digital marketing/eccomerce, I think its clear this year that most retailers/people who sell a product online (including flights), have been much more clever about Black Friday than in years past.
One of any online sellers main aims is to protect RRP, for various reasons (if I were BA, it would be to preserve the remains of my brand equity and stop people expecting lower prices more than anything else) and therefore more retailers this year have avoided straight discounting. Ive noticed lots of BF deals incentivising consumers to trade up, join loyalty schemes/subscribe and save or trial new products, which means that the seller gets a longer term reward out of it as well.
Therefore from what Ive seen of BAs Black Friday (not that I had time to have a proper look yesterday), it is no surprise to see them incentivising higher cabins, booking for two people and bolting on car hire etc. There would be very little value in just discounting economy tickets that people would probably buy anyway, when all you would be doing is training people to expect lower fares and not exposing them to any of the better cabins or extra services.
Looking to the future, I would certainly expect to more online sellers to be moving away from straight discounting to being much more savvy about Black Friday,
One of any online sellers main aims is to protect RRP, for various reasons (if I were BA, it would be to preserve the remains of my brand equity and stop people expecting lower prices more than anything else) and therefore more retailers this year have avoided straight discounting. Ive noticed lots of BF deals incentivising consumers to trade up, join loyalty schemes/subscribe and save or trial new products, which means that the seller gets a longer term reward out of it as well.
Therefore from what Ive seen of BAs Black Friday (not that I had time to have a proper look yesterday), it is no surprise to see them incentivising higher cabins, booking for two people and bolting on car hire etc. There would be very little value in just discounting economy tickets that people would probably buy anyway, when all you would be doing is training people to expect lower fares and not exposing them to any of the better cabins or extra services.
Looking to the future, I would certainly expect to more online sellers to be moving away from straight discounting to being much more savvy about Black Friday,
#23
Join Date: Jun 2015
Location: LHR, LGW
Programs: BAEC
Posts: 3,357
My disappointment is in the execution on their site/platform. The implementation has been awful. I too received the email late last night at 20.52 GMT. The banner/offers went live at 2pm on Friday. The friday was 90% done! The fares were not properly loaded on some routes from what could make out.
There arent excuses for this sort of implementation when its only lasts 4 days and you want to maximise the window of opportunity for revenue.
Luckily there is FT
There arent excuses for this sort of implementation when its only lasts 4 days and you want to maximise the window of opportunity for revenue.
Luckily there is FT
#24
Join Date: Mar 2008
Location: New Orleans
Programs: AA EXP
Posts: 655
#25
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jul 2002
Location: SE1, London
Posts: 23,360
Very true. Many sellers have been burned by the margin loss and brand damage from traditional discounting and are working much harder to attract but then retain customers through BF promotions, rather than straight forward sales chasing.
#26
Join Date: Sep 2010
Location: Wolverhampton
Programs: BA Silver, Hilton Diamond, Marriot Gold, Radisson Gold, Amex Platinum
Posts: 1,600
I have been disappointed on most of the Black Friday sales in the last five years and the one I wasn't, I couldn't use (2014 I think). This year they listed links which clearly were not loaded (Jamaica), and they limited returns so it was Christmas to just before New Year and no variation, such as 28th to 4th.
Previous years they've limited it to Brazil and Vancouver, and I'm not even sure it was a 2 for 1 last year either.
Scratch that, continental club doesn't even mention a sale around November last year, so I have to assume it wasn't much cop. I don't remember even considering one around that time...
Previous years they've limited it to Brazil and Vancouver, and I'm not even sure it was a 2 for 1 last year either.
Scratch that, continental club doesn't even mention a sale around November last year, so I have to assume it wasn't much cop. I don't remember even considering one around that time...
#27
Join Date: Oct 2015
Location: Vale of Glamorgan
Programs: BAEC Gold
Posts: 2,963
I find the AA website to be a lot easier to use, and less prone to errors, than BA's.
#29
Join Date: May 2013
Posts: 6,349
#30
FlyerTalk Evangelist
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