Three months ago United Airlines started selling highly restrictive ‘basic economy fares’ on a test bases on routes between Minneapolis St. Paul and the airline’s hubs.
These fares don’t allow advance seat assignments, ticket changes, or a full sized carry on bag. Elites don’t get upgrades or economy plus seats on these fares, and customers don’t earn credit towards status either.
Elite frequent flyers and co-brand credit card members do still get their priority boarding benefit, and since the carry on ban is handled by boarding group this allows them to bring a carry on in addition to a personal item as well.
While United claimed these new fares were a benefit for customers, they were in a very real sense lying because Basic Economy fares were (as American Airlines candidly put it describing their own Basic Economy offering) merely ‘new attributes’ for the lowest fares, and not new lower fares at all.
In other words, Basic Economy fares give you fewer benefits at the same price you used to pay. The goal is to make these fares unpleasant enough that you’ll spend more to avoid them. The risk is that you’ll spend more with someone else like Delta (which allows full sized carry ons on their Basic Economy fares) or Southwest (which still offers free checked bags and doesn’t charge ticket change fees).
And Basic Economy fares have now spread like a cancer throughout United’s system. They showed up on more routes a month ago, but now they’re being sold even on connecting flights. In fact, The Flight Deal points out:
Pretty much every cheap domestic United fare is now Basic Economy now that it includes even connecting fares like this one: pic.twitter.com/4ieDgCRYxb
— The Flight Deal (@TheFlightDeal) May 29, 2017
Beware and if you’d consider traveling on one of these fares at least be sure to check:
- Pricing on Delta, since you can still bring a carry on bag even in their basic economy markets
- Pricing on Southwest, Alaska Airlines, and JetBlue which don’t have Basic Economy restrictions
- Pricing on any other airline because a connecting flight on American isn’t going to offer basic economy at this point even though some of their non-stop routes do.
This just points out again that we need regulation, as the airline industry is a race to the bottom. Doesn’t matter what airline, they all want to compete for that leisure customer. With the administration removing even the truth in travel advertising rules, you will see MORE of this, not less.
Is all about opacity, and reducing the consumer’s ability to compare A to B, right? Make the flight appear cheap on the search engines, then profit on the extras like baggage, reserved seats, etc.
Meh. Don’t like em? Don’t buy em.
All the manufactured outrage over these fares is pretty darn tiresome.
There’s going to come a time when the airlines will once again court us. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to check my crystal ball to see when the next recession is coming.
With a few exceptions, airlines are trying to beat cable TV companies for the title of Most Detested by customers. I can’t imagine how this will end well for shareholders.
I have voted with my wallet and elsewhere
I wish them luck
If you buy a ticket from these carriers u support them and encourage them to continue their bad business nrhior
Really confusing when booked on Google Flights which says Basic Economy in small print and doesn’t provide a simple means of filtering that option away. Expedia only shows basic economy on initial search and then provides options to upgrade, like a slimy bait and switch tactic.
Yes I was looking at a reservation ticketed today by one of my independent contractors – RDU-SNA-RDU for 3 weeks from now (own an agency) – it’s $715 AND
“NONREF/NOCHGS/NOCBBG/NOASR”
nuttin’ allowed lol.
wow. I am gonna show her the next fare at $50 more that isn’t BE. Insanity.
The weird thing is that you’d think the airlines would WANT Google Flights and OTAs to make it easy to filter out Basic Economy fares, since presumably they want us to spend more to avoid Basic Economy. These are the fares they don’t actually want us to buy! So why do they come up as the default search option, and why is it so hard to screen them out?
We don’t need more regulation. The government needs to remove the regulation that prohibits foreigners to own US-based airlines. That way foreigners, like Richard Branson, can start a US-based airline and create more competition in the airline industry. Also, if the regulations are dropped that prohibit foreign carriers (like Cathay Pacific) from operating US domestic flights, that will increase competition. We don’t need more regulations, we need more competition. If there are more regulations, it will actually cause the big airlines to get away with more garbage through their lobbying and will prevent competition. I believe competition is what will force airlines to improve.
Joe C, why not both more regulation and less? There’s potential for regulation to do good and bad just as there potential for unregulated markets to do both good and bad. The logical fallacy you’re demonstrating is called a false dilemma.
I’m not a big fan of these fares. Even with getting a better “basic” experience because I have a United MileagePlus CC, I decided to pay the extra $15 for the regular economy fare. I just wanted to be able to pick my seat and not be stuck in a middle seat for a 3 hour flight. Even with the extra money, the fare was still less than Southwest on a similar route.
Now I did book a Basic Economy on a upcoming Delta flight, The planes on the route weren’t that bad and the flights are shorter so I figured I’d take a chance and see what happens. At least I can bring my roll-aboard carry on bag.
This is all about limiting opacity. As with any unregulated (or underregulated) consumer market, savvy marketers will position things to appear better than they are.
Advertising an airline ticket at a price that doesn’t include checking in, picking a seat, or having a bag is no different than advertising health insurance that doesn’t cover many common medical procedures…it exists only to goad consumers into making a poor decision.
I know this because I’ve spent 25 years encouraging people to make bad decisions and I’m known in my business as being one of the best of the best. Heck, I successfully quintupled sales (and octupled the profit) of shitty coffee by creating a totally fake brand once. I’ll say, I both want this stopped and I tip my hat to the people who thought this up.
This really stinks. I fly out of a regional airport so my flights add $300 RT to the already high fares out of DEN. On a $600 flight to LGA I would expect to get seating assignment etc. it’s a total rip and I’ve moved some of my spend to AA and Delta because they don’t screw with my head.
@Robert – the issue is two-fold so check before criticizing. First, some companies require cheapest fare. Second, if buying from an OTA, what you don’t get isn’t clearly stated.
@Bob – problem is with these you can simply “buy up” so they additional revenue model we see now (to some degree) isn’t present in this, making it tougher for the customer (maybe limiting the airline profit, but I think it monetizes the other people better to some degree.)
United sucks. With all the problems they have been having and the bad press, looks as if they would try to get better rather than worse. What are they thinking? Soon people will prefer driving to flying and be treated as an animal. American is bad also. If ever I fly again, which I once did regularly, I will take the small carriers so I will know what I am getting before I board.
@dlnevins — The airlines don’t want you to use the OTA’s. If the OTA is completely opaque, and the customer is dissatisfied with his/her (irrevocable) choice, the airline can point their finger of blame at the OTA, and, in effect, say, “We disclosed, don’t blame us.”
I called it a virus but you’re calling it a cancer. I think you are right. This is just revolting.
United is terrible.
Everyone is completely missing the point about these fares. UA does NOT want to sell them. They have no real interest in this business model. They are selling “basic economy” in order to compete with Frontier and Spirit who offer this service at these prices. Before they offered these fares, UA had to give you more than “you paid for” if they wanted to match Spirit’s fares — because if they didn’t match them, consumers would just buy Spirit’s lower cost option.
So these fares seem very bad for Frontier and Spirit, and bad for customers who were previously able to take advantage of low ball major airline fares (including me!) that were matches of the ULLC fares. But for everyone else? Show me the real damage. I doubt it’s prevalent.
@iahphx, Do you see any evidence these fares really compete with Spirit/Frontier? I think they are offering bare bones service but at far higher prices. Forget United.
Delta, United, and American have been explicit that these fares are not tools to compete with Spirit and Frontier, that was their original genesis at Delta a few years ago but simply no longer how they are deployed
Well I just booked with AA for $10 than UA more because of this. Screw you UA. I’ll take my biz elsewhere.
Just looked into a SEA-CMH trip. UA comes out the cheapest – it’s a connection and it’s Basic Economy. Hell no.
Enough with the handwringing and phony outrage. Don’t like it? Pay up or fly someone else. Simple.
The market is demanding this – way too many are willing to be treated like cattle in exchange for “saving” a few dollars. It is how Walmart dominated – give cheap products for low prices and horrific customer service. Look how Spirit is growing. Worst service ever and yet people flock to them because it’s “cheap”.
Thanks for reminding me why I took my former United elite status to become a Southwest A-List member. I am treated well, the fares are more than reasonable and I don’t have to put up with this nonsense. I guess I’ll just have to continue to use credit card-earned miles to fly to Europe or Asia in premium seating, since Southwest won’t have that.