Why pay for flights based on supply and demand, or the calendar, or the distance flown? Why not pay by the minute?

Seriously. Starting today, a newly-launched South African airline — Airtime Airlines — has started selling flights much like a prepaid cellular phone. You buy a given amount of “airtime,” and as you travel, your account gets deducted.

Flight times are fixed, so you’re not really paying by the minute you travel. (Between Johannesburg and Durban, for example, you are charged 85 minutes each way, Durban to Cape Town is 125 minutes each way, etc.) The rate to top up your “minutes” fluctuates, so fares will end varying. As I write this, an intro rate of 3 rand per minute is the starting price. The lower the rate per minute, the lower your fares.

At first, I thought this might be a hoax, much like Derrie-Air, the phony airline that “charged” by the pound. But Airtime is real.

The idea functions like a stripped-down version of a NetJets card: You buy a fixed amount of time, and as you travel, your balance is reduced. (Under the hood, the airline is using a twist on the “Pay as you Fly” concept that some airlines (e.g., Lufthansa, SAS) offer to their corporate customers, in which fares are negotiated in advance, but payment doesn’t occur until the passenger embarks.)

To add another unique twist, the minutes that you don’t use for travel within one year can be transferred to the mobile phone account of your choice, with MTN, Vodafone, or Cell C. So there’s a double meaning to “airtime.” But phone calls? That’s a harsh devaluation…

It’s an innovative (if not immediately intuitive) way to sell tickets, and if the company’s domestic South African routes work for you, it may be worth giving a shot. If you top up your account when rates are low, you can assure yourself of cheap travel at a future date. (Assuming, of course, that the company survives…)

How about an alternate way of linking flight times with costs: For every minute a flight is delayed, the airline would pay each passenger one dollar. Any takers?…

UPDATE: Airtime Airlines didn’t launch as planned. Their actually start date is not delayed for another few weeks:

Ticket sales for Airtime Airlines were due to open on January 4 with the first flight to take off on January 18. But the airline does not have the required legal documents.

Phindiwe Gwebu, a spokeswoman for the South African Civil Aviation Authority, said yesterday: “We have not received a formal application from the airline. We have therefore not issued them with their air operator certificate.”
[...]
Airtime Airlines is owned by Durban-based Blackbird Aviation, which does not have planes of its own. It had planned to lease three Boeing 737s from Lanseria-based aviation group Air Aquarius.

According to reports, the deal between Blackbird Aviation and Air Aquarius, which would have enabled Airtime to fly commercially under the latter’s licence and air operator certificate, has been scuppered.

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