Posted on 06/24/2014 8:18:59 AM PDT by SoFloFreeper
Airline ticket prices are soaring this summer. Prices are up 12 percent since 2009, even after adjusting for inflation.
When customers of Spirit Airlines book their flights, they can see exactly what they’re paying for. Spirit provides a breakdown of individual factors that make up the total cost of an airline ticket, including the base fare, fuel prices, and taxes/fees (aka the government’s cut).
(Excerpt) Read more at dailysignal.com ...
Fewer flyers, more money to ride.
The reason airline tickets are increasing faster than the rate of inflation is because demand is up and the airlines removed a lot of seats from inventory. Wish I had bought airline stocks a year ago.
How much of the increase is for insurance on pilots who hijack their own planes and fly them into the deep ocean???
any place I have to go that is less than 6 hours drive, I prefer to drive.
I can leave when I want, i have my car, and by the time you book a flight and get to the airport an hour early and wait around you waste 6 hours anyway
Up 12 percent since 2009. Why that is low, low. Try anything else: food, healthcare insurance, college, taxes, regulation.
There is plenty of upside left of airline prices. Gotta feed all those hardworking TSA agents don’t you know.
The higher the fare the better. Drive the noisy, self-centered, pajama-wearing, smelly uncivilized brutes back to taking buses. . .
I remember when flying anywhere was fun. Not so much anymore. I just got back from a flight to see relatives. From LAX to XNA, with a bus to LA from my city, is an 8 hour day. Hurry up and wait......for everything. I hate it.
Same here, and if the trip will require 2 planes, then I will look at driving anything 9 hours or less, before flying.
Plus, there is a huge advantage to packing for a car trip, rather than planes.
If there ever was a role model for an industry adapting to massive fuel cost increases, wages hikes, employee turmoil and government regulation ...it is the airlines. I moved out to the left coast over 20 years ago and paid almost the same price for tickets just a couple of weeks ago.
My mantra was how can these people afford these houses and how can the airlines stay in business with the cost of tickets staying so low.
I am airline retired and can fly at a much reduced rate. Even so, I have not seen fit to even go near an airport for the last dozen years. Its a friggin' disgrace between the pawing, the rotten food,and overcrowded smelly aircraft a car makes much more sense.
yeah- you can pack more, not have to lug it around an airport, you have your car when you arrive, and you can leave whenever you want.
Maybe it’s a distance to cost thing. I don’t fly that much, but I just booked a flight from Seattle to Orlando and back. Hard to find a longer domestic flight than that. Under $600 round trip. 6000 mile round trip with a car would cost you $800 in fuel alone, IF your car got 30 MPG, not to mention all the other costs involved, like lodging along the way, food, general car upkeep costs and the like. It’s still hard to beat the airlines for long distance.
Great idea. ( except that airline suspended a scheduled flight we had reservation for — and didn’t even tell us. By the time we accidentally discovered there wouldn’t be any flight, it was near our travel date and the replacement ticket on another airline was expensive. We received nothing at all for the loss. Needless to say, we never flew on the first outfit again ).
Air fares are up far more than 12%. The cost of flying has skyrocketed, no pun intended. The rash of airline mergers has become a gold mine for the remaining airlines, and the flying public is paying the bill.
Not only do we have a $25 charge for checking one bag, we now have seat charges. To begin with, the basic fares are quite a bit higher. Then when one goes to select seats for their flights, one discovers that most of the seats have premium charges. Of course one can wait until one arrives at the airport and be assigned a seat, but be aware, it likely will be a middle seat in the back of the plane because these flights are at or near 100% occupancy.
On a flight from California to Connecticut with a plane change in Dallas, my wife and I had to pay a total of nearly $340 in order to get seat assignments on the two planes going and the two planes coming home. Then, we had to pay a total of $100 just to check our two bags going and coming.
I made the original reservation on Expedia.com. At the time of purchase, the Expedia website next showed seat selections available, all at no additional charge. I selected seats for both of us for all 4 flights. Three weeks later, I learned that we did not have seat assignments.
When I called Expedia, the rep advised that we really did not have seat assignments. At that point, we were able to select seat assignments, and she confirmed them. However, she advised that I phone American Airlines to confirm them with AA. When I did, American advised that I DID NOT have those seats as they already were assigned to other parties. She then offered me seats but there would be an additional charge for each. She also advised that since I had not made the original reservations directly with American Airlines there would be an additional $50 charge for speaking with a live AA rep. At that point, I ended the conversation, went on line to the AA website, selected those same seats, paid the outrageous seat charges but “saved” the $50 fee for dealing with a live AA rep.
What used to be a $300 dollar flight became a $450 flight about 3 years ago, and this time cost around $850 per person. Happy Flying.
Someone I know in the industry said the reason for these “fees” is so they don’t have to pay the new and improved (required)taxes on the air fare. So they break up fares and fees. You used to get assigned seating and baggage for “free”.
I just use points to buy airfares.
Now there’s a point.
Why are you keeping it a secret which airline it was that screwed you?
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