mykel67

I’ve just booked a flight from YYZ to PUJ over Easter weekend on Air Canada in Premium Rouge (came up when using the “Business Class” filter on Google Flights). The fare was $1154, compared to $1074 for Economy Class. Is such a slight difference between these two fares common? Or is this some kind of glitch?

jfkeze

sometimes Economy is booked solid in the lower fare buckets so you end up with higher fares YBM for instance as only available fares, Premium Economy can still have lower fare buckets that could be a reason.
Also depends on the airline, some have a check to ensure Coach is always cheaper but you can still see plenty of examples where Business is less than coach...
this could definitely happen over Easter Weekend...

royal757

It happens. I just booked business on a YUL-LHR-YUL flight which was only 90$ more expensive than PY (2,595$ vs 2,500$). Just means lower fare business is available and PY is almost sold out hence only high fare buckets left

rankourabu

99% on this route are on a package with ACV and are not paying the posted price you see anyway
Not much leftover for individual sale but high buckets.

mykel67

That makes sense. But when I check ACV, the package rate for that flight and the resort I chose is almost $2000 more. Crazy…

rankourabu

I seriously doubt the all inclusive crowd ever checks if its cheaper to buy flight + hotel seperately....

Jagboi

You always have to check all the classes, as you never know. On BA I have booked First cheaper than business and have also booked business cheaper than economy.

I did a trip to LHR, booked it 2 weeks before Christmas for a trip between Christmas and New Years. Economy was rammed and was $2700 return. J was empty and was $2,000 return. Easy choice.

WildcatYXU

It depends on the resort/flight combination and the current post covid restriction situation. Packages currently cost a lot for departures in the spring. Otherwise the packages are often comparable to the price of a J ticket and packages with a flight in J cost about $300 more than in Y.
What surprises me though that currently you can't buy a package with departure in October with a flight in J from YYZ. We were looking up some resorts we want to try and I tried to do a mock booking. All I got was a trip through YUL with J on the way there and Y on the way back. It was priced about $500 more than a package with a flight in Y. It is surprising, because there is J availability for that time. But it looks like AC doesn't want to sell those seats to ACV customers.

SKYEG

Transcon busy business heavy routes like YYZ-YVR and even YYZ-YYC has flights that are cheaper in PY for widebody as a lot of companies have Y only policies 000 leaving PY cheaper once the Y buckets sell out.

Even when I used to take flights like YYC-YVR --- it would sometime be in cheaper in J and I'd tell my company that J is cheaper than Y to be able to book J lol. Would have to take screenshots when I was submitting expenses through the company CC