Low Cost-Eh?
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Join Date: Jan 2005
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Low Cost-Eh?
Booking a month in advance, with one check in bag and checking in at airport.
Glasgow to London 20th March 2008 (chosen at random):
Ryanair: £43.23 STD 1015z (Fare £9.99 Tax £18.33 Baggage £9.00 Ins £5.91)
Easyjet: £33. 98 STD 0915z (Fare £9.00 Tax 15.00 Baggage £3.99 Ins £5.00)
BA: £41.60 STD 1030z (Fare £11.00 Tax £30.60 Ins inc)
The prices are all getting rather similar....I know who I'd rather fly with.
With the Deutsche Bank suggesting thats Ryanair is facing a possible business model failure, is the bubble beginning to burst for the low cost carriers?
Glasgow to London 20th March 2008 (chosen at random):
Ryanair: £43.23 STD 1015z (Fare £9.99 Tax £18.33 Baggage £9.00 Ins £5.91)
Easyjet: £33. 98 STD 0915z (Fare £9.00 Tax 15.00 Baggage £3.99 Ins £5.00)
BA: £41.60 STD 1030z (Fare £11.00 Tax £30.60 Ins inc)
The prices are all getting rather similar....I know who I'd rather fly with.
With the Deutsche Bank suggesting thats Ryanair is facing a possible business model failure, is the bubble beginning to burst for the low cost carriers?
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If the lo costs have had the effect to reduce fares for comparable routes/flights then all well and good (...excusing comments about green issues...) but the comparison is a bit disingenious - Ryanair fly from several light years distance outside Glasgow at Prestwick, and I suggest the real comparisons are with those carriers operating the same routes, not those that purport to offer the same.
The extra time and cost to get into Glasgow, say for any onward travel, negates the cheaper fare they might have available compared to say BA, but at least you're bang on with raising the point that if you do elect to go BA, you arrive at the destination you expect and at the fare you expect too. (I note Glasgow is just an example but the same could alsmost be said for arrival in London - or do you mean Luton, or somewhere in Essex...?)
There's far too much extra fees added to the lo costs too e.g with Ryanair - £6 for credit card booking (only apparent once booking is made online, not decribed prior to confirming); if you can't check in online you pay £3 per ticket for checking at the desks; also other carriers have come up with bag fees of you don't travel with only a g-string to change into - fine if its a day trip but not so hot for the holiday maker; included insurances - need to be removed or you pay for this cost on the ticket and so on. A £10 fare rapidly works out at £40. Just see the gripes on airlinequality.com
Be interesting to see the final costs of the £0.01p fares Ryanair are offering including all fees and taxes....once you accept the terms online.
Nothing wrong with making a profit, but a lack of transparancy in costing travel at the outset just is not acceptable - and the shameful noises from carriers bleating that they don't want to show the full costs including fees and taxes....
Open Skies might well have an upside for ex LHR travel to the US, but it might also have a downside of pushing some carriers out of business, a la Maxjet, if the fares can not stand up, and cheaper carriers can not offer the same number of flights - to suit the traveller, not the airline - as some of the larger airlines can do at the moment.
I gather its about a £100 per person minimum cost for the airlines per pax to carry each one across the Atlantic, and that can only go up if fuels increase in costs anyway, so bargain bucket fares for that route are unlikely except as promotions - remember the Electrolux ticket? - and I wonder if the knock on would be to bunp the short haul up to pay the way for the new long haul routes for those carriers interested in this as an option?
The extra time and cost to get into Glasgow, say for any onward travel, negates the cheaper fare they might have available compared to say BA, but at least you're bang on with raising the point that if you do elect to go BA, you arrive at the destination you expect and at the fare you expect too. (I note Glasgow is just an example but the same could alsmost be said for arrival in London - or do you mean Luton, or somewhere in Essex...?)
There's far too much extra fees added to the lo costs too e.g with Ryanair - £6 for credit card booking (only apparent once booking is made online, not decribed prior to confirming); if you can't check in online you pay £3 per ticket for checking at the desks; also other carriers have come up with bag fees of you don't travel with only a g-string to change into - fine if its a day trip but not so hot for the holiday maker; included insurances - need to be removed or you pay for this cost on the ticket and so on. A £10 fare rapidly works out at £40. Just see the gripes on airlinequality.com
Be interesting to see the final costs of the £0.01p fares Ryanair are offering including all fees and taxes....once you accept the terms online.
Nothing wrong with making a profit, but a lack of transparancy in costing travel at the outset just is not acceptable - and the shameful noises from carriers bleating that they don't want to show the full costs including fees and taxes....
Open Skies might well have an upside for ex LHR travel to the US, but it might also have a downside of pushing some carriers out of business, a la Maxjet, if the fares can not stand up, and cheaper carriers can not offer the same number of flights - to suit the traveller, not the airline - as some of the larger airlines can do at the moment.
I gather its about a £100 per person minimum cost for the airlines per pax to carry each one across the Atlantic, and that can only go up if fuels increase in costs anyway, so bargain bucket fares for that route are unlikely except as promotions - remember the Electrolux ticket? - and I wonder if the knock on would be to bunp the short haul up to pay the way for the new long haul routes for those carriers interested in this as an option?
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Be interesting to see the final costs of the £0.01p fares Ryanair are offering including all fees and taxes....once you accept the terms online.
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I don't think many people are going voluntarily fly BA to anywhere especially out of Heathrow. Interminable check in and security, fly to Australia with no hold luggage, pilot strike pending, catering and baggage handling strikes in the past. I'll take my chances with MO'L and the others. They seem to run a strike free, and frills free, service.
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Sorry drifting slightly off the topic but the final costs of any of Ryanair's previous 1p offers have been 1p once you accept the terms online!
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We were caught up in the liquids in baggage panic a couple of years ago when we came to Scotland for a family holiday. We had flown BA via Gatwick instead of FR direct to PIK, as the prices were very similar. On our return, all flights into Gatwick were cancelled- cue chaos at the check-ins!
BA got us back home dia Dublin and London City, on 3 different carriers, arriving at much the same time we were scheduled to. Normally we fly FR, but this occasion brought home the difference in service you can expect when things go wrong.
BA got us back home dia Dublin and London City, on 3 different carriers, arriving at much the same time we were scheduled to. Normally we fly FR, but this occasion brought home the difference in service you can expect when things go wrong.
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Low Cost refers to the lean, mean business model and has no relation at all to the fares charged! I still can't believe how few people seem to have grasped the concept that, apart from the few lucky ones who grab the early booking cheap fares, you can actually pay a heck of a lot more with EZY and RYR than with the "heritage" airlines! ..........and if they don't actually charge a higher fare, they will claw back the differential and more in other ways.
Bear in mind, the "heritage" carriers already had low fares for early bookers (remember APEX and SuperPex etc?) - okay, maybe not the daft 1p gimmicks that swamp RYR's web-site and cause a systems failure, but BA and British Midland both used to have £13 return fares on our UK Domestic services to let Grandma come down to see the kids once in a while! The low fares weren't advertised, we just discreetly got on with the job of always charging the lowest fare applicable for the journey type, as per corporate policy!
My next door neighbour, a contracted aircraft engineer, had to fly to Madrid in a tearing hurry. He had the choice of being "waitlisted" as a Club Europe passenger with British Airways at £572 (giving Lounge Access, Full Catering etc) or confirmed with EZY at £680 (a fare of £108 higher than the highest " Full Service" fare.)
Because the job was so urgent, he reluctantly took the EZY option who then proceeded to sting him for excess baggage charges!
Bear in mind, the "heritage" carriers already had low fares for early bookers (remember APEX and SuperPex etc?) - okay, maybe not the daft 1p gimmicks that swamp RYR's web-site and cause a systems failure, but BA and British Midland both used to have £13 return fares on our UK Domestic services to let Grandma come down to see the kids once in a while! The low fares weren't advertised, we just discreetly got on with the job of always charging the lowest fare applicable for the journey type, as per corporate policy!
My next door neighbour, a contracted aircraft engineer, had to fly to Madrid in a tearing hurry. He had the choice of being "waitlisted" as a Club Europe passenger with British Airways at £572 (giving Lounge Access, Full Catering etc) or confirmed with EZY at £680 (a fare of £108 higher than the highest " Full Service" fare.)
Because the job was so urgent, he reluctantly took the EZY option who then proceeded to sting him for excess baggage charges!
