flyerCO

It can also show weird if your searching using a multiple city code. Ie WAS, CHI, NYC, etc.

SamuelS

I've been seeing a lot of fares recently in my markets where the Main Cabin fares are actually lower than the Basic Economy fares. No big conspiracy theory, just thought it was a bit strange of a pricing strategy. Maybe they are reducing Main Cabin fares to match competitor(s) fares in the same markets?

Mr. Tickets

Already discussed

Basic Economy more expensive than Regular Coach?

GrayAnderson

Basically, it might not be a strategy. In some respects, I don't think BE has been fully integrated into the sorts of faring restrictions which usually (for example) tie First fares to MC fares (so that if a "cheap" MC fare vanishes, it can knock out a low F fare as well). Though there's often a connection, BE and MC don't seem to have nearly as close of a tie to one another as MC/F.

xliioper

In a number of cases (but not all), the cheaper main cabin fares involve a connection (with a broken fare) in one direction while the BE fares are non-stop. This is because most BE fares do not permit end-on-end fare combinations while there can be cheaper main cabin fare combinations that do allow it. When pricing these out, you need to look at both outbound and return flights to see if this the case. Simply looking at RT pricing based on outbound flights while not looking at the return options can paint an incomplete picture (as the outbound flights may be indentical, but the cheaper MC option requires a connection on the return). In other cases, the cheaper main cabin fares appear to be limited duration competitive fare filings. For example, DL matches B6 fares in some markets with main cabin fares as B6 does not yet have a BE fare offering.

CO-PLAT

PS or D1 on an 11 hour flight?

MSPeconomist

That's an amazing Z fare if it's really D1 suites in both directions, although I'm confused that the top of the page says one way since AFAIK Z fares tend to require RT purchase. OTOH a Z RT for about $4400 is what I would expect, nothing special, and even high around Thanksgiving.

apodo77

Quote the dilemma. Food’s been looking pretty good in PS on the dining thread.

MSPeconomist

Isn't PS food just a subset of the D1 offerings with different wines? AFAIK PS dinner main courses are either chicken or vegetarian pasta from the D1 menu, with no beef or fish possibility.

ijgordon

It's a great one-way fare ex-US. There are no hard and fast rules about certain fare classes requiring round-trip purchase. It's quite possible a r/t would cost even less than 2-x the one way as there are likely multiple fares that book into Z.
And while I agree $4400 r/t isn't particularly great, this close to departure it is (assuming it's available on a reasonable return flight).

But I'm not really sure I see the dilemma here.

flyerCO

It going the "wrong" direction for Thanksgiving week travel. I would guess the J cabin is fairly empty.

photojojo

I don't even know if we're allowed to fly to the EU at the moment but I was sniffing around with wishful thinking that maybe I could take a trip this fall and I noticed this.

It's not a cheap fair by any standard, but I've never seen First/One priced under the main cabin.

MSPeconomist

Did you by chance click the box for refundable/changeable fares? Also, are you searching for a OW or RT?

Also, do you have any idea whether the flight is full on this particular day? Have you looked at seat maps? Any special events?

BenA

Both of these flights are wide open in all classes of service (ATL-MUC is J9 C9 D9 I9 Z9 W9 S0 Y9 B9 M9 H9 Q9 K9 L9 U9 T9 X9 V9 E9 on that day, with practically no seats assigned in any cabin). We'd need to know what OP's return dates and cities are to evaluate the whole itinerary, although as far as I can tell, nothing's sold out in coach for a return on a 3-10 day trip.

photojojo

Straight up RT returning back to CVG on Nov 13th.

I don't even know if we can travel on a US passport to the EU yet, so part of me was wondering if they were for some reason priced this way for EU citizens on their return trip.. Sort of like how we can upgrade very cheaply with cash TO the EU but not while returning home. I don't know. Struggling to figure out what the logic is here and that's the only theory I could come up with.

Personally (all things considered) I'm shocked that the prices are this high.