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More than half of all round-trip airfares between the top 50 domestic citys (about 1,200 city pairs) now have minimum-stay requirements. About 1/3 of these are of the less onerous type (1-night — same day trips) while most require a 2 or 3 day stay, or a Saturday or Sunday night stay. In other words, nearly half of the cheapest round-trip airfare on the most popular flights now require that you stay-over on a Satruday or Sunday night, or you need to stay over 2 or 3 nights. If you don’t do this (and this is something business travelers rarely do), you’ll pay a substantially higher price (the business rate) for your airline ticket. This is less of an issue with the low-cost airlines because they have a one-way airfare structure where minimum-stay rules are not applicable. We recently pulled the rules for over 40,000 round-trip airfares between the top 50 cities by traffic (about 1,200 city pairs) — why? — because airlines and analysts are now saying that “minimum-stay requirments” are making a comeback — so we decided to check it out. The data was used in an article this week in USA Today entitled “Minimum stay airfare rules irk fliers”. Which airlines are the worst offenders? More importantly — what can you do about this? Keep reading, and I’ll tell you… |
In the previous fewyears, such airfare requirements had largely disappeared — but they’re making a comeback — because it’s just one more way an airline can raise revenue in this era of out-of-control oil prices.
The worst offenders?
|
Airline |
Between Top 50 Cities Roundtrip Airfare With Min Stay Rule Filed Count |
Between Top 50 Cities Roundtrip Airfare Filed Count |
Between Top 50 Cities One-way Airfare Filed Count |
Betweeen Top 50 Cities Total Airfare Filed Count |
% of Roundtrip Airfares with Min Stay Rule |
|
Northwest |
8,445 |
21,082 |
7,294 |
28,376 |
40% |
|
Delta |
8,290 |
11,557 |
26,261 |
37,818 |
72% |
|
United |
7,416 |
9,647 |
21,953 |
31,600 |
77% |
|
Continental |
5,442 |
6,640 |
17,777 |
24,417 |
82% |
|
American |
5,441 |
12,281 |
18,353 |
30,634 |
44% |
|
US Air |
4,155 |
4,313 |
28,614 |
32,927 |
96% |
|
Midwest |
1,037 |
2,230 |
3,852 |
6,082 |
47% |
|
Alaska |
787 |
1,417 |
4,590 |
6,007 |
56% |
|
Mesa |
34 |
34 |
55 |
89 |
100% |
|
TOTAL |
41,047 |
72,361 |
159,953 |
232,314 |
57% |
|
|
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Now here’s a tip:
Airlines have frowned upon back-to-back ticketing and there is a debate on whether this is “legal” or not but many “Road Warriors” who don’t want to spend a Saturday night out of town but still want to save money have learned to buy 2-round trip tickets (with a required stay); what happens is, these business travelers only use half of each ticket, one with the arrival they want, and one with the departure they want. They know that very often, buying these 2 airfares with a minimum stay is very often cheaper than buying one airfare that doesn’t include the minimum stay.
Most low cost airlines don’t have a rountrip airfare strucuture so “minimum stay” does not apply — they will however look at the dates of your trip and decided which price point to release seats at so it is a form of at least checking your length of stay during the week.
What are the top 50 city pairs? Do you think this is reasonable given fuel as expensive as it is?
Comment by Joe Rinaldi's Big Brother — May 29, 2008 @ 2:07 am
Hi Joe, I updated the article with the full chart and clarified the city pairs (1,200) between the top 50 cities by traffic (a very large sample of over 223,000 roundtrip and one-way airfare). Is it reasonable? With fuel at its current price, I don’t blame airlines for trying to increase revenue, they are trying to survive — this particular “change” has many business travelers that have been savvy and shopping early (outside 14 days) up in arms, so I am just reporting what we found — If you ask one of the thousands that are paying 4-5 times what they were I am sure they will tell you that it is not reasonable …
Comment by Rick Seaney — May 29, 2008 @ 9:39 am