JETISFACTION

[jabird]

Not sure if they deserve a new thread, but they are a new operation to the UK, replacing AB's STN-FMO with SEN-FMO from 1st Nov.

Flights operated using Saab 340 (oops, I nearly said A340!), by Skytaxi.

So a virtual airline, who have managed to do something even MOL hasn't achieved - alienate half your potential customers by only accepting Mastercard for payment - never mind the fees, if you haven't got the right card, you ain't coming onboard.

Enough of a reason to avoid?

[virginblue]

If you go through the booking process, you can alternatively pay by a money transfer to a German Deutsche Bank Account (which, if I am not mistaken, must be the same price as a domestic money transfer if the recipient is within the EC). Nevertheless, very odd indeed.

[No RYR for me]

Enough of a reason to avoid?

Any one trying to sell you either a complete aircraft or a seat on a flight on one website should be avoided IMHO :rolleyes:

[jdcg]

The Mastercard payment issue is a particular quirk of Germany. In general they don't like MC and VISA anyway and often only take payment with EC cards (for heaven's sake!). But there are particular ATM machines (I think for the Volksbanks) that won't take VISA at all (allegedly because of the high fees involved) and where you can only withdraw money with MC or EC cards. Ludicrous, quite frankly.

[Phileas Fogg]

Well according to the well known, and lesser known, travel agency websites, during November 2011, there are no direct flights FMO/LON/FMO and most certainly no flights FMO/SEN/FMO.

So, by trying to save themselves a few percent that they would otherwise pay to travel agency(s) 'Jettison Action', or whatever they call themselves, are going to put themselves out of business because the majority of the travelling public won't be aware of the services they are offering.

[Aero Mad]

But how many people buy flights through travel agents?

[JSCL]

Well - their logo was on the stands for the press photos:

http://hphotos-sjc1.fbcdn.net/hphotos-snc6/194668_203663923032136_130834463648416_501822_944171517_o.jp g

So it must be getting somewhere...

[Phileas Fogg]

AeroMad,

In this day and age the vast majority of flight bookings are made online and, on TV and the web, we see all the time advertised these price comparison sites for all things from electricity, broadband, thru to flights, hotels, hire cars etc.

I had a discussion with a guy on the CWL thread that BMIBaby hadn't been advertising their services enough thus their CWL services failed ... BMIBaby's idea of advertising is by advertising on the Cardiff/Airport/Cardiff bus or, another example, on the rail link between BHX International and BHX Airport ... by the time people are already travelling to/from an airport they've already booked their flights for christ's sake!

So where are Jettison Action advertising ... At Munster and Southend airports per chance? ... Company executive needs to fly from A to B, he asks his secretary to organise, secretary calls corporate travel agent or whips debit card from drawer and goes online herself ... but the travel agent cannot book with Jettison Action and the secretary has never heard of them nor is likely to find them online ... and even if she did let's hope her card isn't Visa or Amex etc. :)

A new airline needs as much publicity and as many seats filled as is possible and, for flights, the agents take around a mere 5%. I'm going to be opening an accommodation resort, I'd prefer not to pay the agent(s) circa 10-20% but by placing just a proportion of the rooms with an agent(s), for which the room rate will be higher than booking direct, my accommodation resort will, because of that agent's heavy advertising, pay per Google click etc, be well up in the Google etc. search results.

Jettison Action could pay the agent's their small percentage and show up in all the flight search and Google etc. search results, a very small price to pay for getting one's brand recognised.

[jabird]

jdcg, I hd that problem trying to find a cash machine in BER to pay the taxi driver. He took me to about four, before letting me drop my bags at THF, and only then did we find one across the plaza from the terminal. Luckily he trusted me not to do a runner, I went through security, walked the 10 yards to the staris and the door went up.

[jabird]

Pf, the amount they would pay to an online website depends on the deal they have, but typically these are drawn up after the airline / route has been established quite a while. They might be on a fixed fee per booking, or %age of the flight value.

Either way, it makes sense for a new airline to have something in place so people know they exist, especially when they are using SEN, which is new to most people.

AB currently use a Q400 on this route, and for the dates I checked, it was about 2/3 full. Is there a reason why they are pulling off - part of their rationalisation?

So for the same frequency, Jettison Action (love your name btw, a classic if I may say) - need to sell just less than half as many seats (assuming 36 per S340 v 76 for Q400). This of course assumes the same yield per seat, and same costs - which is unlikely.

Looking as it currently stands - fly somewhere no-one knows about, when you don't have the marketing clout U2 do, take only one form of payment (we don't do that kind of transfer in the UK), and don't deal with OTAs or price comparison sites - yup, they might just achieve that target!

[Phileas Fogg]

jabird,

Well I can remember and I know how to spell 'Jettison Action', indeed I learned, and how to spell, such words as 'Easy', 'Air', 'German' etc. etc. etc. at school, I can easily remember how to spell Sabena by it standing for 'Such A Bl00dy Experience Never Again', I can remember how to spell SAS by it standing for 'Same As Sabena', indeed I can even recall how to spell Lufthansa by it standing for 'Let Us **** The Hostess And Not Say Anything', one word I have never learned how to spell is such a dumbass name as this cyber airline's ID and if I can't recall how to spell the name it isn't going to be as simple to enter it, followed by 'dot com', in to a browser bar nor indeed a search engine bar as all these other identities I've mentioned. :)

One can guesstimate how much the agents take just by going to one of these cashback sites, for my last travels I was getting up to 10% or so cashback on my hotel bookings yet my flight booking was only a 1.7% cashback, if you double these cashback figures then that's good for a ballpark figure of how much the agent are charging the airline.

And it needn't cost very much, one of my favoured airlines, one that sounds like they make army knives, they're all over the travel agent sites but these are their more expensive seats, I have never seen their 'Economy Saver' fares on any site except their own website.

[johnnychips]

If you just type j-e-t-i into google, jetisfaction appears in the options box below, though I wish PF could come up with a suitable mnemonic for it.:)

[hansdatdodishes]

Payment, advertising etc, all now irrelevant. Service to SEN now not happening "due to operational reasons".... Can't afford another plane ?

[Expressflight]

The "official" line is that the start of the service has been postponed.

FMO themselves seem pretty annoyed reading German newspaper reports and a statement on their own website. It seems they won't be holding their breath for Jetisfaction to restructure their operations, but are actively seeking a replacement operator.