pedro colizzle

Considering getting this card b/c I need to book a pair of peak-period domestic tix. Unfortunately, thankyoucompanion.com won't let me check prices without first having an account. If there is a huge markup, it's not worth opening a new CC...

Anyone with an account want to help a brother out and let me know what the lowest prices are for BOS-DEN nonstop Feb 22-26 (1 person + companion)?

Or better yet, does anyone know Spirit Incentives' fare class rules, so that one can look up companion prices using public booking engines?


Many thanks -- Peter

sepulvedaj3

Cheapest I found was
2/22 Bos --> Den United 6:31A Flight #721

2/26 Den --> ORD United 6:03A flight #603
ORD --> BOS United Flight # 896

1 person - 383 AI
w/ companion 558.20 AI

That was the cheapest I found on Thankyoucompanion

Edit: Compared to 434.40 or one and 869.80 for 2 on same flights using ITA

pedro colizzle

Awesome - that bodes well. Pulled the trigger. Thanks!

travelinfoo

Is it possible to book a ticket and the free companion ticket then upgrade the 2 tickets via the airline w/FF miles?

mia

In part the answer will vary by carrier. Do you have a specific airline in mind?

pedro colizzle

I've spent the last 2 hours trying to book a Thankyou Premier companion ticket (using their portal thankyoucompanion.com run by Spirit Incentives.) The assessment: it's hit or miss, usually miss, and borders on being a scam.


Problem #1: The inventory of tickets is *extremely* limited. Here's how it works: you type in a route, and the engine only shows you the lowest 1-15 itineraries for that route. So for example, if you want the nonstop route and that is more expensive, you are out of luck. If you want a flight that is not a redeye and a redeye flight dominates the list of cheapest itineraries, you are out of luck (this is what I am facing right now.)

Sometimes the cheapest routes are completely unreasonable. I searched Aspen to Boston, and the only route listed had 3 layovers and took 20 hours, overnight. Are you kidding me?

The cheapest itineraries change over time, which adds another odd element of randomness. For example, in my case Jetblue cut the price of its redeye, and then all the United Flights dropped off Spirit Incentives' list, even though the price of those flights didn't change.

If the cheapest route is one that is acceptable, then you are in luck. But it's a roulette game, with bad odds.


Problem #2: They mark all prices up by 30%, compared to say, Orbitz.com. Still not a bad deal if you can find a decent itinerary. I don't think the extra 30% comes from a requirement to purchase a certain fare class -- it looks like a pure markup.


All around, pretty scammy, and definitely not a "free" domestic ticket, as advertised.

The funny thing is that I doubt the scamminess is intentional. It is probably just incompetence on the part of Spirit Incentives (and the Citi biz dev team that agreed to the deal.) Citi wanted to offer a companion program, but wanted to limit its average per-ticket outlay. One way to do this is to only list the cheapest X tickets for a given route. But adding basic search functionality (e.g. preferred departure times) to Spirit's wrapper and *then* listing only the cheapest X flights for each search surely wouldn't cost CITI that much more. And it would actually lead to a good enough offering that could generate buzz and attract many more cardholders. Even a cap on the companion ticket at, say $500 or $750 would be much more useful, and certainly more transparent to consumers.

But as it stands, I'm short this whole position

(I posted this on the blog creditcardforum.com, but figured I would share here too.)

travelinfoo

United.
Found a decent NS flight on United for the companion ticket deal. It looks like both tickets will get FF miles which makes it sound like they both would be upgradeable. If that is the case, that would be a fantastic deal (bout $510 for 2 FC tickets + miles).

budblab

I did not find this to be true. The flights that I wanted were the same price as on all other sites, and one of the lowest priced itin's for my plans, so for me, the companion ticket saved about $250. I did have to pay the taxes and fees on the companion ticket. Could that account for the 30% that you describe?

jk2

I'd like to share my thoughts about companion fare, since I bought 2 of them (one on my wife's card and another on my card).

1. companion ticket TPA-ORD. I've paid $223 + $100 in taxes for both tickets on Delta. When I've looked to the ticket on DL website I see that my ticket costs $223 + ~$50 in taxes that corresponds to the price I've paid on thankyoucompanion.com for the one ticket.

2. companion ticket to BOS on DL. I've paid $510 (base fare) + $150 taxes for both tickets. So, I would assume that my ticket costs $510+$75 in taxes. What came by surprise when I've looked on DL website for my ticket (they show how much "I've paid" for it). It actually costs $430 + ~$80 = $510. Why is there a difference? Spirit claims that $510 was the base fare, on DL website $510 is the total fare. Why did Spirit charge more? I thought that I only pay taxes for companion fare. Is it legitimate?

pedro colizzle

Well, yes. But the "taxes and fees" charged by Spirit exceed the taxes and fees you would pay if you booked directly from the airline. In other words, a markup. And based on jk2's comments, it looks like Spirit is also marking up the base. A few more datapoints corroborate:


NYC-DEN (Jetblue nonstop)

Orbitz, 1 ticket: $228 + $21 taxes & fees = $249
Thankyou Companion, 2 tickets: $251 base, taxes and fees for all paying passengers = $75.02 = $325.29 total

Effective markup: 30%


BOS-DEN (Jetblue nonstop)

Orbitz, 1 ticket: $293 + $21 taxes & fees = $314
Thankyou Companion, 2 tickets: $321.62 base, taxes and fees for all paying passengers = $84.08, total = $405.70 USD

Effective markup: 29%


NYC-LAX (Virgin nonstop)

Orbitz, 1 ticket: $277 + $22 taxes & fees = $299
Thankyou Companion: $306 base, taxes and fees for all paying passengers are $82.00, total = $387.15

Effective markup 29%



Extrapolating from these three examples, there is a 10% markup of the base fare, and a roughly 100% markup on "taxes and fees." Then you have to pay the higher taxes and fees again for the companion ticket. At least for tickets in the $300 range, this translates to a roughly 30% effective markup, or put differently, a 70% effective discount on the companion ticket.

budblab

Rather than a mark-up on the part of Spirit Incentives, I believe it has to do with how the taxes are reported (or not reported) on the other sites. Sometimes they appear to be bundled into what is quoted as the base price of the ticket. Spirit Incentives requires the customer to pay these on the companion ticket. The most costly is usually the 7.5% excise tax. Most sites include this tax within the quoted base price, but it is a tax.

Taxes And Fees
The following taxes and fees that may apply to your air travel:
7.5% U.S. excise tax
September 11th Security Fee: A September 11th Security Fee of $2.50 applies per enplanement originating at a U.S. airport up to $10 per roundtrip.
Domestic Segment Tax: A segment tax of $3.80 per U.S. domestic flight segment (a flight segment is defined as one takeoff and landing).
Passenger Facility Charges (PFC): Up to $18 per round trip per customer in local airport charges.

mia

Correct, USA based carriers are required to include the excise tax in their advertised base fares. See here:

http://www.smartertravel.com/travel-...html?id=317465

pedro colizzle

Interesting about the excise tax. That does change things, but there still seems to be a Spirit markup. Jetblue reports:


Quoted "Air Fare" includes base fare and, in the case of domestic transportation, a U.S. excise tax of 7.5%


This suggests that the only tax baked into the quoted fare is the 7.5% excise tax. Assuming the 7.5% tax is indeed it, rerunning the NYC-DEN Jetblue route numbers yields:

$228 base fare ($212.10 + $15.90 excise tax) + $21 taxes & fees = $249 total (as per Jetblue's site).

If the companion ticket's price were determined by simply doubling all taxes and fees -- including the excise tax -- the new price should be 212.10 + 2(15.90+21)=$285.90. However, Spirit lists $325. Furthermore, these doubled taxes match the "taxes and fees for all passengers" that Spirit lists, which suggests our assumption that the excise tax is the only tax baked into Jetblue's quoted base fare was correct. But there is still an unexplained difference in the fares.

My conclusion is that Spirit is marking up the base fare (in this case from $212.10 to $251.00). I'd be happy to be proved wrong.

mia

Jet Blue publishes many fares. Using arbitrary dates in early February I see these roundtrip fares NYC-DEN:

• $188 = S
• $198 = S
• $238 = U
• $248 = O
• $258 = O
• $268 = O
• $270 = O
• $310
• $328
• $398
• $458
• $518
• $598
• $688
• $818
• $926
• $928
• $1138
• $1338
• $1346
• $1668
• $1846
• $1848
• $3420

None of these fare exactly matches the one you saw on the Jet Blue website, perhaps because the dates are different, but rather than assume that Spirit Incentives is adding a hidden markup it seem probable that they are simply booking into a different fare bucket ("O" versus "U"). Airlines do not make the same seat inventory available to every agency.

As consumers it does not matter why the fares are different, a dollar is dollar, but I don't think it's reasonable to generalize from a few examples that Spirit's fare are 30% higher.

pedro colizzle

Quite a spirited defense you are making. Note that all you have to do is jump over to the 15% discounted tickets portion of the site to find that lower base fares are available to Spirit. But I concede that it is possible that the companion tickets only apply to higher buckets. No reference to this anywhere on the website (that I could find), and it still seems unsavory.


Edit: Relevant FAQs from thankyoucompanion.com:

Is there a minimum fare requirement?
No, there is no minimum or qualifying fare requirement with this benefit. You will be offered you [sic] choice of airline and the lowest available fares in the market. You can select the itinerary available that best fits your schedule.

What if I want a specific airline and flight which I found available online?
Spirit Incentives uses the largest global distribution system (GDS) available to provide you airline and schedule options. Other online venues may at times have specific arrangements with airlines or resellers that Spirit Incentives is not participating in. In the unlikely event [!] that you would find an airfare option not offered you should contact our Reservations Center at 866-428-4078... [note: in which case they won't be able to offer you anything beyond the results on the website]

Is there a service fee associated with my companion airfare benefit?
There is no other associated service or processing fees. All taxes and fees are charged directly by the airlines and the global distribution system (GDS). You are responsible for those associated taxes and fees for both tickets.

I'll give it a rest and leave it to someone else to reverse engineer the pricing.