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Northwest Airlines is very tricky when it comes to filing airfares which must drive other airlines revenue management departments crazy — that along with consumers who try to find the elusive days that seats are released for these airfares. Last night I got an alert from our system for a super low ball price from DFW-NYC. Northwest filed a $98 roundtrip airfare betwen Dallas to New York (see the screen shot below). Yes you read that right! This price is below the fuel surcharge on thousands of routes across the U.S. — but here is the catch … |
The airfare is good any day of the week for the rest of the year, but Northwest is only releasing seats early in the week Mon, Tue and sometimes Wed throughout the year. The out the door cost (connecting flight) has about $42 dollars in fees — where non-stops have $21 in fees (Sept. 11, Flight Segment, Passenger Facility Charges).
Additionally it doesn’t cover Newark which has more flight options, so overall only a very few people in the “know” can benefit from this deal, but it is a deal none the less and I decided to buy a ticket for as yet un-meetinged trip to NYC in August. The kicker for me was the flights were on a nicely sized Airbus instead of DC-9…
I have written about these “Crazy Ivan” airfares before and they continue to be sprinkled amongst the ridiculously high summer prices this year.
Rick, you’re a day late with this info.
Comment by Dan Wintz — May 7, 2008 @ 7:22 pm
dude, yahoo travel will alert you on your cell with a text message… no “sophisticated systems” requried. I saw this deal come through - only one caveat - buy from NWA directly not from Y! to avoid booking fees.
Roman/NYC
Comment by roman — May 7, 2008 @ 11:11 pm
I was searching for DFW - TYS (Knoxville), found $199 RT (GREAT for this pair). The available flights were dropping off as fast as I clicked “Buy”. This explains what was happening. Act fast people!
Comment by Chuck — May 7, 2008 @ 11:47 pm
Our real-time automated system sent out email alerts on this deal hours before it hit the reservation systems or any other alert system (to those signed up). We process the data in 5 minutes and everyone else does it hours later. In this case i received the alert Friday night at 9pm (loads at about 1am) and didn’t get around to checking up on it and buying it until 9am yesterday morning (when i took the screen shot).
Comment by Rick Seaney — May 8, 2008 @ 12:10 am
It’s 1am Thursday and I still see many Thursday-Tuesday trips DFW-LGA for $91.16 RT ($135.50 w/tax) in Aug/Sept/Oct. On the Northwest site, do their advance search for “Weekends in (Aug/Sept/Oct)”. Then, book on any site you want.
Comment by BKH — May 8, 2008 @ 2:36 am
Nice that you have it dated the 6th and I did not receive it from you until the 7th at 6:45 pm. I have noticed in the past, your info was a bit late but now it seems that your system must be a bit slow. I depend on this information since I do not live in a major hub and need all the breaks I can get on airfare. This is a real disappointment!
Comment by Debra Taylor — May 8, 2008 @ 8:12 am
I scored a sweet r/t ticket DFW-LA for $140.00 total thanks to your email alerts. Keep em coming.
Comment by G — May 8, 2008 @ 11:55 am
Debra - Do a little research on how email works. The alerts leave their server the moment they are sent. If there are delays in RECEIVING Internet email, it’s highly unlikely FareCompare could be blamed. Are YOU using an email service that we would know? (like one of the top 10 providers?). That may be your problem!
Comment by BKH — May 8, 2008 @ 4:16 pm
Debra - Consider yourself lucky that you received it on the 7th. I did not receive it until 12:10a.m. on the “15th”! I do have high-speed internet so I don’t get it!
Comment by Carol — May 15, 2008 @ 2:14 am