Low-fare revolution could topple major airlines

[LiveFreeorDie]

Re: Is This really a good thing?????????????

Low Cost Fares are great for consumers, but it comes at a price to all of us. Low cost airlines means low cost compensation to labor. Everyone winds up getting paid like bus drivers and working their butts-off. Service levels also continue to drop. Flying as a passenger is painful. It's not so bad if you go visit grandma once a year, but if you travel alot, it gets really old.

USNFDX - Where did you go to school? Your math doesn't add up. The 30 yr career pay of a SWA pilot is around 8 mil. So it isn't the whopping 18 mil. at UPS, so what? And I just flew SWA from OKC to LUV to get fingerprinted. Plane was on time. Free krispy cream donuts and coffee. Friendly flight attendents and pilots. Courteous gate agents. Comfy roomy leather seat. So I didn't get a microwave dinner with my flight? So what? I hope you keep your job with FedX if that is what you got. And for the love of God, don't get into the management side of things.


Cheers

 

[FearlessFreep]

Ok, Ok, Ok,

Ya'll just calm down! Set that glass down and step away from the Koolaid! (This was a line I heard from a WN management type during a tour of the training centre!)

It is a tumultuous time for the industry right now. It will probably not recover back to it's former glory for a while. While that is happening, time will tell.

As for the low fare airlines, more power to you guys. I just hope that you will not become the only game in town. To erase choice is not healthy and certainly isn't any fun. The idea of not even having the opportunity to choose different levels of service is disappointing. No choice of seats, no business class, no first class. Pretty dismal if you ask me. I think that all the airlines have a place. I mean after all if I am on a short flight do I need the aforementioned amenities or services? No. On a long flight I would at least like to have a choice of a seat.

WN is ok and they are effective and cheap. I will say that over the years though there has not been as much LUV dished out to the customers as their was in the past. Just from a passenger's point of view there can be some improvement. The seats are either entirely blown out or are unbelievably hard. The aircraft cabins are absolutely filthy. I can also tell you stories that I have heard from friends about human excrement (liquid & solid) on the seats and a cabin crew that doesn't know how to deal with it. I know that it is difficult to keep the aircraft clean with 20 minute turns but I feel like taking a shower immediately after I disembark. This whole open seating thing brings up the baser instincts of man, with constant pushing, shoving and jockying for position with all the other pax. With the flying I do I do not even have the option of getting to the gate early enough to get a good spot. EVERY TIME I fly I get "screened" at the gate (one way tickets) so that negates my rushing for a seat. The CSR's are getting more and more terse and short tempered, this is probably because of all the stress in flying, post 9/11. I have talked to other people and they voiced similar opinions. Otherwise WN is ok, it is cheap and on time and for the most part everyone works as a team, which is very commendable.

I have yet to fly on JB, I am interested in seeing how they work things.

Well that's my two cents! Nothing personal!

Good Luck All!

 

[typhoonpilot]

CCdisco:

"Change or die.

I have a question, how does international flying fit in with the LCC revolution?"

This is an excellent question and must be woven into the debate. The low fare carriers are fine for domestic service and possibly for short range international service, but how about LAX-NRT or JFK-LHR ? Passengers won't be willing to fly on a 737-700ER from Los Angeles to Tokyo with only a couple bags of pretzels and a coke for the 12 plus hour journey even if they could watch TV all the way across

The point to point network doesn't support them flying those routes either. Those flights almost all need to be fed traffic from different cities to be feasible. I think Delta is moving the way that the U.S. industry will go. An all widebody fleet flying International and long haul domestic, being fed by RJs from their affiliates. They are just buying time with the new 757 operation. The other majors are heading that way as well, as it will help them survive for another decade or two until someone figures out a good low cost international model.

Another part to the equation that has hurt the majors so much is the business traveller that has abandoned the domestic service in favor of corporate jets. Flex Jet, Net jets, Raytheon, et al are taking care of the businessman for domestic travelling at a reasonable price, but the businessman doesn't need the G-V ( G-450, whatever ) for those twice yearly jaunts to Tokyo. It is much more reasonable to get a Northwest World Business Class seat for that.

Typhoonpilot

 

[Publishers]

Last first

Have you ever heard of Virgin Airways, the what by definition on this board was an LCC across the Atlantic.

The fact is that majors have been headed towards SWA for some time with a shrinking base of business customers.

The difference between Delta and Ruth Crist is that no major has enough high paying passengers to sustain any route structure. They need through yield management to have them both on the same plane. In good times, they have been getting away with it. In bad, they do not. Meanwhile their service level has declined to where it is no better than Southwest or AirTran.

As to the pay at these being inferior, get a life. Most Americans would be happy to have that income. As many Eastern and Pan Am pilots found out along the way, they had it great and when they lost it, they found themselves scrapping for anything.

 

[typhoonpilot]

Publishers:

I would debate that Virgin is a low fare international carrier. They have economy, premium economy, and upper class service. The upper class includes chauffer driven limosine service.

Their fares may be lower than BA but they are a far cry from a low fare carrier.

Typhoonpilot

 

[Publishers]

check your info

Check your history.....

When Virgin came along, they were both inventive and low cost. Their coach class product was significantly less in price than BA at that time. While I have not checked lately, I have no reason to think that they are doing things differently today.


Their first class product was tremendous, check the price verus BA.

 

[Indapool]

Meanwhile their service level has declined to where it is no better than Southwest or AirTran

That has to be one of the most idiodic statements I have ever read on this board.

 

[Ty Webb]

That has to be one of the most idiodic statements I have ever read on this board.

Go sit in coach in Delta, AirTran, Jet Blue, NWA and UAL, and you tell me what the difference is. Make sure to try the center row seats in the B757 and 767. Also, make sure to sample the RJ product, since they are covering more and more of the routes.

Then go look in the mirror and tell us who the idiot is.

 

[dispatchguy]

I have to agree wit Ty. Go sit in a DAL B737, I'm 5-7, and my knees were bumping the seat in front of me, that airplane's seat pitch was the worst domestic seat pitch I've seen - even SWA is better pitchwise. At least I was in an aisle. I was jumpseating CVGORD trying like heck to get home one night and the flightdeck jumpseat in a 737 would've been more comfortable.

At least UAL has (had) the Premium Economy Zone - the front x rows in coach with the expanded legroom.

Plus, when it comes to service level, its all about perceptions to the self-loading freight. When they pay 250 bucks for a 30 minute flight on one of the "full-service" majors, they expect a certain service level - and on a 30 minute flight on a full-service major you wont get squat. On SWA, with their "mosh-pit" boarding, unassigned seating, somewhat lower fares, their perceived service expectation is lower, and when someone flies them, and gets whether its the snack box, cookies, peanuts, or whatever, even on a 30 minute flight, they are perceived to have met their service expectation.

 

[Publishers]

Service Level

I would prefer jetBlue to any carrier mentioned to travel on.

For years and years I was a dedicated Delta customer (100k a year). Other than assigned seating, as far as I am concerned, everything but jetblue has become pretty much the same. Frankly, I have not found SWA non assigned seating to be much of a problem.

 

[Indapool]

hehe..
Apparently too much cough syrup today..disregard

 

[Ty Webb]

Home suffering from a cold myself. If this medicine doesn't work soon, I may be forced to treat this thing with scotch . . . .

 

[Frac Daddy]

100k=100,000 miles flown a year.

 

[717pilot]

I have been at AIRTRAN almost 2 years. I really like it and enjoy flying the B-717. Having spent 12 years at Piedmont flying the Dash-8, this is the best move for me. If you dont care for or dont want to work for LCC thats ok. Wait a few years for majors to hire. Ill be a Captain making 6 figures. As will other pilots who saw that AIRTRAN is a fine place to be. Im sure if you ask the over 750 pilots at AIRTRAN, we have a nice contract with good work rules and a company making money and taking 717s each month!! I think Ill stay!!!

 

[DarnNearaJet]

"Airlines like People Express are the future of aviation."
-- Wall Street experts ca: 1983

"Airlines like Valujet are the darlings of Wall Street. In a few years all major airlines will have to adjust."
-- Wall Street experts ca: 1995

"In a few years there will only be three major airlines. The marketplace will see massive consolidation."
-- Wall Street experts ca: 1998

This is the most unpredictable of industries. To suggest that network carriers are obsolete is truly reckless.