American Airlines to let passengers pay for boarding perks

[The Goose]

How about this novel idea....?

Price tickets realistically and NOT charge passengers for anything.
They have adapted to all this nickel and dime nonsense...they would certainly adapt to paying more for a tickets all inclusively.

How about simply reregulating the industry and reintroducing other forms of mass transit like trains?? It's really evident airlines aren't capable of policing their own actions.

Other countries do this and are rather sucessful at it. Telling the big oil lobby where to get off is basically all that's needed.

China executes its crooked businesspeople - we should also.

 

[BoeingBoy]

How about simply reregulating the industry

Won't happen. There are a lot more people that like the lower fares than there are that work for network (legacy, hub & spoke, whatever you want to call'em) carriers. Now if you want to regulate fares at low cost carrier levels, that would stand a chance of passing.

and reintroducing other forms of mass transit like trains??

Population density is too low in too much of the U.S. for trains to be sustainable without subsidy - just look at AMTRAK outside the NE corridor. So how much do you want to pay in extra taxes to have true nationwide passenger train service?

Jim

 

[BonTemps]

How about this novel idea....?

Price tickets realistically and NOT charge passengers for anything.
They have adapted to all this nickel and dime nonsense...they would certainly adapt to paying more for a tickets all inclusively.

Doubtful..tickets are the same price for some routes as they were in 1988. I remember my family going from DFW-SJU for around 400.00 per person..in 1988. It's still 400.00 per person...

Ma and Pa Clampett and their 2 kids and 46 carryons will fly whoever saves them 5 bucks. But they pull up in a 40K SUV and stay in a 175.00 a night resort..and pay 7.00 for a soda and 5.00 for an order of fries...but complain about the price of air fare to get there.

 

[Hopeful]

Doubtful..tickets are the same price for some routes as they were in 1988. I remember my family going from DFW-SJU for around 400.00 per person..in 1988. It's still 400.00 per person...

That's my point.... Ticket prices SHOULD NOT be as they were 22 years ago.

Is the price of the same model car the same it was in 1988?
Same pair of Levis' jeans?
Gasoline?
Gallon of milk?
Cab fare?
Bus fare?
Subway fare?
Income taxes?
My property taxes are most likely NOT the same as they were in 1988...

The new airline management rule of thumb is to keep wages relative to airfares.
1988 AIRFARE = 1988 WAGES....

 

[JFK Fleet Service]

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but isn't the newest version of the executive compensation/incentive scheme dependent on revenue? If so, the $20 bucks for this "Perk" is why.

 

[Hopeful]

How about simply reregulating the industry and reintroducing other forms of mass transit like trains?? It's really evident airlines aren't capable of policing their own actions.

Other countries do this and are rather sucessful at it. Telling the big oil lobby where to get off is basically all that's needed.

China executes its crooked businesspeople - we should also.

Speaking of the devil......Push to re-regulate airline industry on the move...

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_UNITED_CONTINENTAL?SITE=KMOV&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

(be patient, this link takes a couple of seconds to load.)

 

[FWAAA]

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but isn't the newest version of the executive compensation/incentive scheme dependent on revenue? If so, the $20 bucks for this "Perk" is why.

Nope, it still depends, as it has every year, on the relative performance of AA's stock compared to the various other airlines in the peer group. Higher revenue is great (every dollar of revenue means a greater chance of profit) but revenue alone has nothing to do with the variable compensation scheme that enriches executives.

AA's inability to cover all of its costs thru base ticket prices (same problem faced by most other airlines as well) has driven the assortment of ala carte fees.

Re-regulation? If anything, regulation today would cap the maximum prices airlines could charge, not set minimum floor prices, as mentioned by BoeingBoy.

Too many passengers choose their airline for each trip based on the fare. Charging $10 or $20 more (and including a decent meal in coach) would simply mean that other airlines would get the passengers until they were out of seats, at which point AA would finally sell a few tickets. That $10 or $20 would cost AA hundreds of millions of dollars, if not billions. THAT's why airlines tend to match each others' fares on the low side.

 

[Hopeful]

es, as mentioned by BoeingBoy.

Too many passengers choose their airline for each trip based on the fare. Charging $10 or $20 more (and including a decent meal in coach) would simply mean that other airlines would get the passengers until they were out of seats, at which point AA would finally sell a few tickets. That $10 or $20 would cost AA hundreds of millions of dollars, if not billions. THAT's why airlines tend to match each others' fares on the low side.

I wonder if no one buys a Cadillac until they lower the price to $10,000.00, maybe we can get the auto companies to do the same as airlines?

 

[BoeingBoy]

I wonder if no one buys a Cadillac until they lower the price to $10,000.00, maybe we can get the auto companies to do the same as airlines?

Car manufacturers differentiate their various products. If Cadillac was selling the equivalent of a Kia for $50,000 while Kia was selling it's model for $10,000, very few people would buy Cadillacs. Conversely, no one would pay $50,000 for a Kia but rather buy a Cadillac (or Mercedes, etc)

With the airlines, one's coach seat is equivalent to another's - no differentiation. So if airline A and airline B serve the route but charge different bottom prices, guess which will sell more tickets and which will sell less.

Jim

 

[jimntx]

BTW, no offense, but the Dallas and Fort Worth distinction is only important to people who live in Fort Worth. Most people around the world know Dallas and not Fort Worth. When flight attendants go to training or do a flight through DFW we say Dallas. The only FAs who say Dallas Fort Worth are the ones who are originally from the Fort Worth side or who are based there and got tired of getting schooled by the locals.

Oh, you "senior" flight attendants who never read your HI6s. Tsk. Tsk. We were told some time ago (over a year) to quit saying "Welcome to Dallas" on landing. We are supposed to say "Welcome to Dallas-Ft. Worth." Actually, I say "welcome to DFW (or Dallas-Ft. Worth) International Airport" because only a small portion of the airport is in either city. Part of the airport is in Grapevine, part in Irving. I think at least one of the HEB cities has a sliver. Well, you can kiss your PFA award goodbye. 🙁

 

[jimntx]

Too many passengers choose their airline for each trip based on the fare. Charging $10 or $20 more (and including a decent meal in coach) would simply mean that other airlines would get the passengers until they were out of seats, at which point AA would finally sell a few tickets. That $10 or $20 would cost AA hundreds of millions of dollars, if not billions. THAT's why airlines tend to match each others' fares on the low side.

Bingo! I saw a guy spend over $60 last week in a food court at DFW for food to take on the plane for his family of 4 (I was behind him in line at Au Bon Pain). I would bet that same guy would not have been willing to pay $10/pp extra on the tickets for a meal/snack provided on-board.

 

[eolesen]

I wonder if no one buys a Cadillac until they lower the price to $10,000.00, maybe we can get the auto companies to do the same as airlines?

Unlike airplane seats, which are worthless after departure time, the Cadillac still has a value when the dealership closes for the night, even if it sits there for a couple weeks or months.


There is something interesting with this new product. It's only available via the AA website. It won't be available for travel agencies to sell unless they use "direct connect" to bypass the GDS's. Makes me wonder what else they're ready to sell direct to consumers and deliberately bypass the agencies and/or GDS's.

 

[PHL]

On the topic of bringing back regulated fares (which, by the way, is a step back to 1978), wouldn't that just allow the "low cost" carriers to thrive even more?

They are making a profit (ok, well...mainly Southwest) charing the same or a competitive price as AA on the same city pairs. So, why should the government step in??!! Why shouldn't an airline like AA take a hard look at the costs it has, but WN doesn't such as.....

No FF alliance
No lounges
No First Class
Higher crew costs and longer flights
No advance boarding process

My point being...legacy carriers can continue to operate as they have been, or they can continually adapt by adding alla carte services to bring pu that bottom line.

But government regulation is *NOT* the answer to these problems.

 

[Skymess]

Oh, you "senior" flight attendants who never read your HI6s. Tsk. Tsk. We were told some time ago (over a year) to quit saying "Welcome to Dallas" on landing. We are supposed to say "Welcome to Dallas-Ft. Worth." Actually, I say "welcome to DFW (or Dallas-Ft. Worth) International Airport" because only a small portion of the airport is in either city. Part of the airport is in Grapevine, part in Irving. I think at least one of the HEB cities has a sliver. Well, you can kiss your PFA award goodbye. 🙁

That memo/hi6 must've only hit STL because it didn't make the rounds in NY. Maybe they should circulate it through management in NY first because they refer to DFW as Dallas too. 😉

 

[frontline]

PHL- you realize that AAdvantage is a profit center for AMR, not a cost, right? It's one of the only parts of the company that makes money. 😀