bag charge for full-fare tickets
 

Does YX waive the bag fees for full-fare tickets like F9 does? I can't find any indication on their website that they do.

It's pretty convenient having you around here, at least we have someone to listen to our complaints for once.

Are you talking about something like a Frontier Classic Plus or Classic ticket or something else?

Maybe a close-in booking at the full non-refundable fare. What about if you purchase a signature seat at the time of booking? AirTran gives 2 checked bags free for anyone who buys a biz class seat in advance, or even if you upgrade to it at the counter.

The only people that I found that are allowed free checked bags, according to our policies, are Midwest Miles Executives and Military.

From what we've found there are no free checked bags for anyone that purchases a signature/stretch seat or fully-refundable fare. Also, there are no free checked bags for Aspire members.

Please don't kill the messenger. :)

Then AirTran's biz class upgrades and elite program really are superior. If you purchase a biz class seat on airtran, your baggage fees are waived. If you're checking two bags on a short-haul flight, the net cost of the biz class seat is much lower than a signature seat on midwest.

I apologize for sending us down the Aspire road. I'm almost certain that the original item on the YX page mentioned the free bags...the only real difference between what the Aspire and Executive pages listed then was the 25% versus 50% mile bonus, and I remember being a little surprised that the Aspire benefits were pretty much identical to Executive other than the 25% versus 50% bonus. The current page of Aspire benefits is clearly shorter than the Executive benefits.

As for free bags included when upgrading to Signature, that would be problematic because the Signature upgrade is so much lower.

Two checked bags is $40 on AirTran, and the upgrade to Business Class on AirTran is $49-$129 per segment. So if a customer buys and upgrade and checks two bags for free, AirTran is still netting between $9 and $89 per segment for upgrading the passenger.

Two checked bags is $50 on Midwest, but the current upgrade fees to Signature are $20, $35, or $50 per segment. For a customer checking two bags to Denver, Midwest would be paying them $15 to upgrade to Signature (pay $35 upgrade fee to save $50 in baggage fees).

The alternative would be to raise Signature upgrade fees enough to cover the lost baggage revenue, but that means everybody pays roughly double the upgrade fee for Signature no mater how many bags you check or if your bag fees even apply. This way it's more a la carte in pricing, and more affordable.

Finally, regarding the free checked bags for full-coach on Frontier, I don't think it's quite that way. Let's say these are the fare buckets in a particular city pair:

Fare buckets for AAA - BBB
Y $310
B $265
K $190
V $150
Q $120
W $90
X $75

It's not Y, B and K fare buckets get free bags and others don't. Rather from whatever fare level is the cheapest you can buy three versions of that fare..."economy" is the cheapest fare, "Classic" is that very same fare plus an upcharge, and "Classic Plus" is that very same fare plus a bigger upcharge.

The upcharge to Classic or Classic Plus buys you a bundled set of amenities depening on which one you choose...things like a free assigned seat, priority boarding, free checked bags, bonus miles, etc. So if X class is available, you can buy a seat for $75 or you can choose pay the X class fare plus the upcharge to get Classic Plus. If K is the best fare class available, you can buy a seat for $190 or can choose to pay $190 plus the upcharge to get Classic Plus.

I've seen cases where the "Economy" and the "Classic" (not Classic Plus) fares are the same, usually in a walk-up fare situation on a full flight. But the free bags come from buying a "Classic" or "Classic Plus" ticket, and most of the time that's the lowest available fare plus an upcharge.

There's speculation on if Midwest will move to a similar pricing strategy, and perhaps they will. What concerns me most about this, however, is that this bundled delivery method is currently only available if you by at Frontier's web site. If you buy via another means...including the corporate travel tools or travel departments that many business flyers are required to use...there's no way to buy Classic or Classic Plus. You can only buy Economy. Where that is crummy is that Economy doesn't allow you a seat assignment. And Frontier's web site doesn't allow you to come back to your reservation and separately pay for a seat assignment on your own. On Midwest you have the option of coming back to your reservation on their web site and paying for a Signature upgrade, and on AirTran you have the option of coming back to your reservation and paying for a seat assignment. On Frontier, if you buy Economy, that's it until check in.

Hopefully if they do go to the multi-tier bundled pricing on Midwest this can be fixed. Midwest and Sabre put a great deal of effort into making the upcharge-for-Signature option available through delivery channels other than their web site. Hopefully they don't take a step backwards if they adopt the Frontier bundled pricing.

But that's only if you're checking two bags. I look at it from the other direction where the upgrade fee on AirTran has the bag fees built in, and so I have to pay it no matter if I check bags or not.

MKE-FLL is a $50 upgrade on Midwest and a $99 upgrade on AirTran.

The effective cost to upgrade on MKE-FLL:

$50 on Midwest no matter how many bags are checked
$99 on AirTran if no bags are checked
$84 on AirTran if one bag is checked (save $15 on bag fees)
$59 on AirTran if two bags are checked (save $40 on bag fees)

Business class on AirTran includes a few extras like free drinks, so it's not a perfect apples-to-apples comparison. But the BASE upgrade fees are close to double on FL over YX.

One final note on the upgrade costs...checked bag fees are fully acceptable on an expense report. Upgrade fees are not. If I pay the AirTran upgrade fee out of my own pocket, the amount I'm saving in bag fees doesn't wind up in my pocket...it saves my client a negligible amount of his total bill from my company. Saving money on a waived baggage fees does me zero good. If I pay the Midwest upgrade fee out of my own pocket, the bag fees are still expensed to the client just like any other normal travel cost. So it's a no brainer in that regard depending on how the expense reports work.

It's very similar to having a bad experience at a hotel, complaining, and having them deduct the cost of one night. If you're traveling on an expense report, the benefit to you the traveler is zippo. Saving bag fees by paying for an upgrade is similarly a losing game for people on an expense report.

A side note about Signature. With four additional E190's coming into YX-branded flying by early February, 11 of Midwest's 24 "mainline" markets will have all or some flights with the 2x1 cabin. That increases to 16 of 24 city pairs with a premium section if you include Frontier's "stretch". The MKE-east coast markets will still be mostly E170 in February, but from what I've heard those will see upgrades as we get further into spring and more E190's arrive.