I noticed today that American Airlines is running some incredible fares from my home market of Austin. Austin – Los Angeles, thoughout the fall and winter, is pricing at $49 roundtrip (basic economy).
In fact it’s $48.20 and you basically have your choice of flights.
What makes this interesting is I’ve been told by more than one person that in an internal call United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby told managers that American Airlines is dumping capacity at low fares, and he says that United won’t follow.
Take a look at the same route, also served by United and Delta. United’s pricing is higher, $75 rather than $49 across the board.
And since taxes are the same on both, this is actually a bigger difference than it looks like. American is charging $14 base fares in each direction, while United is charging $27 each way (basically double). Delta’s pricing is even higher.
It’s not just that TSA checkpoint numbers are flat or down slightly, we’re not seeing passenger growth at this point, but everyone I talk to tells me that forward bookings have falled off a cliff. I told you this was happening two weeks ago.
American Airlines Senior Vice President of Planning Vasu Raja says that while fuel prices are low and government is picking up much of their payroll costs their break even load factor is around 9%, which explains some of the airline’s aggressiveness. They’re not selling $3 cross country flights like they were in march but they’ll sell basic economy fares very low.
The problem for the airline is that basic economy is really a tool to differentiate leisure passengers from business travelers, and there are almost exclusively leisure passengers right now. The basic economy fare is, for the most part, the prevailing fare right now. Most of the fare’s restrictions have even been lifted.
Airlines can give these seats away for free, and we’re still not flying; especially AA.
Since AA is going for Spirit airlines it makes sense.
I know this is beating a dead horse but I will soon return to flying(not as frequently as in the past)
American built its own grave when Parker and the folks that run the program took everyone of their customers and not only bled them dry but were regularly rude to loving family members,good friends and business colleagues etc Not offering the most basic expectations for cancelled flights missed connections due to their mechanical delays and such. Business relationships are a privilege not a birthright and require reasonable customer relationship management every day of the year
American thought by not allowing customers to speak to upper management and forcing them to email issues that it would be acceptable.So price becomes just one aspect of my personal business or leisure travel when it comes down to purchase behavior.I doubt they will ever get it right under the current leadership
Parker’s WSJ quotes might explain this…
Ill stick with Delta, Jetblue, and Southwest, thanks.
AA’s been taking great care of me since we moved from a DL hub to an AA hub city. Also, DL’s fares are always way higher so I fly with AA, have had good to great service from them and now that the work slowdown has stopped (DL/NWA fans to you remember that before and after the merger. . .I do) they have been an efficient machine.
Lower fares, good service and the best network in the Americas and with AK, J7 and OneWorld. . .hmmm who’s winning now DL?
Lol….given the fact that AA’s cash burn rate is still much higher than DL, I would say DL. AA has a lot of problems that are unique to AA, including high debt loads relative to its peers, higher priced labor as a result of poor negotiations during their BK process, and bad labor relations.
All of their recent alliances are bandaids to their underlying network issues. Therefore, while some cheer their recent partnership with JetBlue, my immediate response was why couldn’t AA make JFK work in the first place, and what makes them think the partnership will make them any more successful in the future.
AA should invest in riot gear for their gate staff. these fare drops will attract a very unsavory crowd.
Bag fees cost more…especially for those who check two bags.
@SunViking82 – you might one of the few AA pax who has received “good service” – especially since the pandemic started.
Based on my own poor experiences as a former ExPlat, I will never fly AA unless I have no other choice.
@David – if they do this, be prepared for protests that propose defunding gate agents.
This article means nothing. It references one route. Take a look at EWR-AUS or EWR-CLT. Or anything out of IAH. United is undercutting. By a lot. The fact of the matter is, they can while the government is paying salaries.
LOL even 15$ is too much for a middle seat on AA or UA. As it is I really pity anyone who flies Basic Economy
AA, the only major US airline that still expires FF miles, even for co brand credit card holders?
They would need to make their fares a lot more than $25 cheaper to get my business back.
Going to Europe in 2 weeks on AA and paying a fortune. Plus as BA has canceled my original flight ex LHR(bought from AA) I had to pay more (fare difference for new routing 2 weeks after original purchase price – adding $400) to get rerouted as they no longer protect pax on non oneworld carriers (and I am EP).
Then had to call twice to actually have my cc charged and the new ticket issued.
Will I fly again? Unless I absolutely have to – Not until the airlines have a firm grip on schedules and I can trust that they will fly what they are offering. The risk of cancelation and getting stuck or having to pay more last minute is just too high now as there are limited flights in general
Ha, ha, David, sad to say but you’re correct. The flights I was on early in the lockdown definitely had a “spirit” to them!
The rest of the comments are garbage. The flights right now are reasonably full, certainly better than April. The loads to Mexico this weekend are totally booked. You numbnuts are kidding yourselves if you think you’re making some bold statement by not traveling. There are plenty of people out there happy to take a well-priced flight and enjoy the lack of whiny karens on their flights and at their destinations.
@Joseph N. – Alaska Airlines never even paused mileage expiration during the pandemic
American & Delta have combined with the vast majority of all the airlines & offer special flights from different airports sometimes daily flights at the same time each day such as Envoy & Express which are just branches of with combination of AA & Delta – Same airlines, Same team just shorter flights w/ special rates daily……. Just as researching PSA airlines which is a branch of Delta just covers Portuguese /Sweden Flights…… Relevant or not yet just purchased a ticket with United and they are actually orbitz too!
Spirit is averaging $35 bucks round trip AUS LAX. Direct routing. So… buh buh, AA.
I’ve been following the cost of a one way ticket from Buenos Aires to NYC. International flights are to resume on Sept 1, after being banned since March. AA has been charging $545 for Main Cabin on its non-stop to JFK, which now appears to be completely sold out at least until October. There is still some one stop availability at $545. AA also ran an award special for 15,000 miles. UA and Delta are charging a minimum of $1032 for one-stop service and seem to have plenty of availability. On DL the lowest award I found was 76,000 miles. Aerolineas Argentinas has some flights for $620 on their own website or $1032 as a Delta codeshare for the same flight. Rock bottom is (or maybe was) Avianca at $345 with a stop in Bogota.
AA sucks. I have 2nd tier elite status with both Delta and AA. With both, I get 2 free bags. AA free bag is capped at 50lbs per bag, whereas Delta is capped at 70lbs per bag. As I travel with tools and enough clothes for a couoke of weeks, both bags are over 60lbs. AA charges me $100 per bag due to being over the 50lb limit, so that is $200 each way on a round trip ticket in additional fees. I have been flying as an essential worker through the pandemic and AA constantly flies at near 100% capacity, where Delta is capped at near 50% capacity.
Just got off a DL flight from sea to puj. Last week SLC to sea. This after ord To sea on ual and dfw to sea on aa. If you have to fly right now there is literally comparison between domestic Airlines. I would pay double to fly dl right now and I am a 1k ual and Alaska 75k. Literally no comparison (Altho as is close). You couldn’t pay me to fly aa again.
Does your hard on for Delta ever go down? Prolonged priapism is life threatening.
Which website lets you search like this?
@beth he is looking at ” matrix.itasoftware com/ ” you can look by single carrier etc – requires a little bit of work to understand it at first but can be a helpful search tool
@Suzanne what on earth are you talking about…