Were a load of posts deleted? If so, maybe somebody should explain why, even by way of a PM

I think they were moved to Trick It (where they quickly get swallowed up via interspersion and are hard to find*) per BiziBB in the post above yours.

* ETA: I'm not at all criticizing the decision; it was the right decision. I'm just explaining to Irelandflyer why he may have had trouble finding the posts if he clicked through to Trick It.

Thanks!

I think that AZ is monitoring the site more closely now...

If Alitalia is monitoring Flyertalk... they should keep those cheap fares off-season for airline geeks so frequent flyers can experience their product :)

I flew one of those dirty-cheap fares to Japan this year (in a half-empty plane otherwise) and it was quite a reasonable experience. It was my first with Alitalia, and I was quite freaked out about everything (bad) I had heard about them... yet it turned quite a good couple of flights comparable to your average Euro/US carrier... wouldn't mind to fly them again even if I would have to pay a typical fare :D

and thus the fares are disappearing... :(

Thus why I am keeping them to myself as I have seen people that seem to be trustworthy post the fares on blogs

Definitions:

frequent flyer = eurekaprice

airline geek = anyone who finds a fare before the frequent flyer gets there

:D


Seriously - I find the phoenix nature of these AZ fares odd. AZ clearly knows what's going on. Surely it could easily get rid of whatever gremlins make it so simple to manipulate itineraries to our advantage. Could it be the airline is happy to earn any contribution from otherwise unsellable seats, but prefers to do the selling off radar?

This might have something to do with it: http://webtrends.com/2012/10/alitali...-to-webtrends/

Interesting stuff, thanks! I particularly enjoyed reading:

“Webtrends Optimize team’s outstanding experience and consultancy approach allowed us to increase the number of online bookings of 7.09% in three months,” Arnese [director of e-commerce at AZ] concludes. :D

^ bloggers kill everything from vanilla reload cards at office depot to MR worthy and mistake fares. JFK-TLV disappeared from right under my keyboard :D

^^

Btw, last few days there has been a new "mistake" fare on their new service FCO-AUH that hasn't been reported here, about $200 ai return with several European different airports (open jaw).

I do think so.

Most of such mistake fares are in low-season in open jaws for remotely interesting destinations at that time of the year... the likes of a Barcelona-XXX-Beijing-XXX-Budapest in February. Many airline geeks (and even frequent flyers :) ) would just fly that for the excitement of the cheap fare... but a typical traveler? Tell your average tourist that you got him a ticket in February for $200 ai with that route to China... then he or she has to position to BCN and BUD from whenever they are (even in Europe), Beijing is too cold at that time of the year... and so on. Forget about it!

This is not the famous JFK-TLV fare on holiday... many people would do that flight otherwise for twice or three times the price... they just found it very cheap and everyone and their dog jumped on the wagon.

And even if it is cheap it is not "the" bargain (it is not a first class ticket to RGN let's say :p).

I booked one yesterday.