Delta To Cut Fares
 

Heads up all you Delta flyers. Just read an AP report that Delta, in order to win back flyers, is going to be doing fare reductions for Domestic flights (not International).

Might be good to keep any eye on the website if you have travel plans. ((*))

Thanks for the heads up.

Thanks. Will keep a check on it. ((r))

Sounds good--might have to plan a trip somewhere :-)

That's very kind of you. Thanks!

For you Atlanta folks, Delta is to add more flights and 7 more destinations from Atlanta.

They are changing the fee for rebooking tickets from $100.00 to $50.00

They are to eliminate the Saturday night stay.

All this for domestic flights, not international flights. ((*))

That's nice, but if they really want to win back customers, they might think about their customer service!

Too bad it doesn't affect international flights. I'm in the process of changing the dates of an international flight and they won't even consider charging less than $200 to change it!

so far,nothing is showing up in their schedules with any price reductions...
I am looking for a cheap tkt into and out of FLL in April-May..

Thanks LoveItaly. Didn't they just change the rebooking from $50 to $100 recently? Guess that didn't work out too well for Delta - glad to see them change it back to $50.

I just checked the Delta website for a ticket that I have been tracking daily for the past month hoping the fare would decrease. Now, the fare has gone up $50. I guess if they increase all the prices, then they can advertise an across the board decrease and return the to the original fares. Sheesh!

But DAL's coach seats are really awful.
M

Well personally after 2 flights on Delta I do not use them. Dirty planes etc. But for those that do use Delta it might be good to go to their website Delta.com to keep tabs on their flights and fares. Especially those that fly out of Atlanta.

Hope we all have better flights in 2005, but not holding my breath ((*))

I said this on another thread before I saw this one.

This is a PR move. Given how precarious Delta's financial position is (and the talk of them filing bankruptcy only subsided the last month or so) I can't imagine they can do an across the board revenue reduction without figuring out how to pay for it. They are still dealing with a bloated expense structure and fuel prices that are inflated - though less so then a few months ago.

This is a PR move. Some ticket prices will go down and maybe on those routes where people have a better feel for a "deal" they'll be more noticeable. I just don't see how you can reduce revenue without somehow figuring out how to pay for it.

Ryan (and anyone else) what do you think of the concept of making tickets transferrable? Think about it - this is the only product I can think of that can't be given away or resold...what a boon it would be if they'd make their tickets reusable. To avoid the terrorist panic, they could make a rule like no transfers within one week of flight. Now THAT would be newsworthy! And I think pax would be willing to pay more for this feature.

What a crock, sounds good, but the reality is, it's just a publicity stunt.

Look, let's face it, how many of us buy last minute tickets? In the literally hundreds of flights my family has taken, we have NEVER bought a last minute flight (other than for business travel, and we aren't paying for that anyway).

I've been tracking a normally very low-cost route (NYC-MCO) for months, and the rates are at least $75 higher than I have ever seen them.

Yeah, they're cutting fares, but those are fares the average consumer never touches anyway...big deal Delta, make your announcement when you've got some real news!

There is no benefit to the airline to make tickets transferable. If anything, I can see a big downside - namely some enterprising person scalping tickets on popular routes during peak times. Not sure about you, but I'm not ready for some guy at the airport saying "who needs two, I got two right here to Orlando. Who needs them. Anybody got an extra ticket, anbody, anybody..."

I'm with Patrick and think better customer service would be more effective.

Their customer service as far as I'm concerned is crap.

Delta refused to give me FF credit for a round trip flight I took shortly after my marriage in January 2000. Because I hyphenate my maiden name with my married name and my FF account was in my maiden name, they would not credit me. I spent a couple of weeks trying to straighten this out with no help from Delta.

The last straw was that Delta needed a certified copy of my wedding license before they would credit me. Huh?

I took my last flight with Delta in January of 2000 and donated every single FF mile I had with them to the effort to get military personel home.

As long as the flying public bases its purchase decisions solely on price airline service, amenities, seat comfort and cleanliness will suffer.

I live in a Delta hub city and their prices here have been horrible. Many people have, for years, been driving to neighboring cities to get cheaper fares. I have myself, and know many others who have as well, driven to Lexington, Louisville, Dayton to get a lower fare. Our local news has been reporting that the lower fares are specifically to combat this issue - customers driving to neighboring cities for lower fares.

Personally, I didn't have any problem transferring FF miles when I got married (just changed the name on my skymiles acct). Living in a hub city, my choices are pretty much Delta, Delta, or Delta. I hope the fares really do go down - it's annoying having to drive home from Louisville after a long trip when the Cincinnati airport is so much closer.

Ryan, assuming my example, there would be nobody scalping at the airport because no name change within one week of departure. And how about a maximum of one name change - that would curtail scalping, also number of tix per transaction restriction, or must have individual names assigned at time of purchase...as Nina said, most pax buy ahead of time anyway. The benefits to the airlines would be that they'd get to stay in business, by responding to what the public wants, thus creating demand for their product. Imagine if you had a trip booked, got sick and had to cancel at the last minute. "Honey take your sister - she can use my ticket"...I like it. Go for it, Delta!

Joan,
What you're suggesting is a bunch of new rules that the airlines now have to worry about enforcing. You suggest that you give a list of who you can transfer the ticket to. I'm not a computer expert but seems to me that there is a cost for the additional memory capacity that would result from 2 and 3 extra names per ticket. In addition, I can just imagine how many people will turn around and say "I didn't have them on my list but meant to." Which either leads to longer customer service calls on their 800 numbers or longer lines at the ticket counter while they fight it out.

In terms of people buying last minute tickets, plenty do. I traveled at least a dozen times on business last year and I don't think I purchased a ticket for any trip with more then 48 hours notice.

You might counter with, "well, leave it with spouses and children who are eligible" With a broader definition of families and spouses these days, you're opening up a Pandora's Box that will force an airline employee to spend time on a situation that earns them no additional revenue.

Bottom line, I think with all the real issues facing airline travelers today - this issue would seem to rank fairly low on the list of needed industry improvements.

You misunderstood me, Ryan...no list. That's not what I meant at all. I meant that to reduce scalping, at the time of purchase, each ticked must be booked with a unique name, which can only be changed (i.e. sold) one time. Simple. Do the same with the date. One set change fee, no matter whether it's the name or the date.

I still think this type of ticket flexibility would be a huge draw, business or pleasure.

I think these changes have been somewhat misrepresented by media headlines and misunderstood by the public. This will not result in lower fares for the infrequent leisure flyer who is already paying the lowest ticket prices. What it will do is result in lower ticket prices for travelers who need to purchase last minute walk up fares and it also eliminates the Saturday night stay requirement (all fitting the profile of business travelers). Those looking for cheap, cheap fares will most likely not see any difference at all. The reduction of the change fee from $100 to $50 is good news for everyone, but what hasn't been mentioned is that the change fee now also applies to date changes on award tickets which were previously free.

Joan,
I respect your view. But, I see no benefit for the airlines allowing transferable tickets. I just don't see that it would that big of a deal - unless the airlines figure out a way to tack on fees for a change and a premium for a transferrable ticket. Than, security issues notwithstanding, it'll be free money for them.

None of my current flights have changed at Delta. Guess you have to fly out of Scranton at Midnight and change planes twice to get the discounts!

Delta has Hawaii(HNL) special now, book by Jan 6 for travel thru March 15.
http://www.delta.com/travel/plan/spe...2204/index.jsp

eg JFK $522, BWI $522, BOS $440 r/t +taxes

After seeing the big "news" about the huge fare cuts at Delta on every morning show on TV, I ran to the computer to once again, check the fares from NY to Orlando in April.....guess what? The cheapest flight just went UP again, to $233 round-trip (I need 7 seats), and that's not even nonstop....Give me a break, I've never paid more than $150 for a non-stop for that route.....

Like I said, Delta is getting a lot of free advertising for what amounts to nothing for their customers BIG DEAL!!!!!

Wow - what a bunch of cynics.

One of our favorite flights went up around $150, but another one went down about the same. Luckily the more expensive flight is normally easy to get with FF miles, so we're pretty happy.

Tom42,
Cynic? Quite the contrary. I'm very optimistic that I'll be correct when I state that a company that has lost $3 Billion dollars in 9 months will be signing it's death certificate if it cuts revenue by 60% on a substantial portion of its business.

Delta is also cutting back its DFW operation severely..giving up 24 gates.

Have been reading all of the news, about the "fare cut", as well. While I know it mainly applied to full-fare coach, I certainly didn't expect leisure fares to be impacted . . . boy, was I wrong!!!

Have been checking fares for BWI-PSP for late May-early June. Yesterday, DL had a fare of $268 r/t -- pretty good. Today? It's $378! Some decrease! Hope this idea goes over like a lead balloon (except for the change in the change ticket fee).

I received the email announcement from DL this morning. Looks like they've reduced the number of fare classes on domestic flights to only 6 in coach and 2 in FC, thereby reducing the gap between the lowest and highest fares. This isn't an across the board fare cut but rather a change in the fare structure. In light of this, I now think that we'll see some increases in the lowest fare classes. They can't lower the top fares without raising some of the bottom fares.

An additional note... Delta has now joined the rest of the major 6 in charging an extra fee for tickets issued over the phone ($5) and at the airport counter ($10). This was included in the email annoucement.

It's good for some - my CLT-ATL flight which is normally $700 dropped to $135 today.

The Atlanta- LGA ticket that I have been pricing for the last couple of days has had at least two price reductions since yesterday. I just booked online for $167, which is about $100 less than it was yesterday.

You folks make me laugh. If you only took the time to read <b>Patty's</b> replies, you may understand what this is all about. She's the ONLY one that knows what she's talking about here.

This will NOT have very much impact on the leisure traveler, in most cases NONE!!!
This is a fare simplification, and most of the savings are aimed at the business traveler.

You all pretend to be or want to be travel agents and yet a thread like this shows your lack of understanding the basic concepts of air travel and fare structures.

Please read <b>Patty's</b> 1st reply above. She is the ONLY one here that knows and understands what Delta is trying to do.

For the casual, leisure traveler, this announcement has very little meaning. Don't expect that the $200 fare from ATL-LAX will become $140 fare from now on. IT WON'T!

The 60% is real and will happen. The big question is if the others will match? AA tried fare simplification in 92 or 93 and they were beaten back by the other majors. Within 6 months they had no choice but to go back to the old ways. This time it may be different, but the others will still put up a fierce fight, so it remains to be seen.