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The appeal of booking on an airline’s homepage isn’t the swank digs of the site itself. It’s typically the savings, and maybe a few bonus miles (though those bonuses are all but extinct). Now US Airways manages to eliminate its home field advantage by actually charging $5 more than some other agencies.

The Cranky Flier is all over this, and he has every reason to be cranky. Why buy from US Airways directly when you can book for $5 less from Priceline or Hotwire, which don’t charge booking fees? (I mean their “regular” bookings, not the “name your own price” opaque fares.)

The fee that US Airways is charging appears to be a fuel-related charge. It’s not a credit card fee or such, as is common outside the US. (Airlines seem to prefer debit transfers…) But don’t think that U.S. airlines aren’t thinking about renegotiating their merchant agreements with credit card networks, so they can introduce that sort of upcharge here. The first moves were made this summer. It’s coming, just wait. But I digress…

Bottom line: If US Airways is your choice, shop around before clicking “buy.” Don’t just buy your ticket directly from them. If you do, you’ll just reward bad behavior.

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Facing record fuel prices, United Airlines and others are considering flight cancellations and grounding large parts of their fleet. Apparently, it’s necessary to resort to threats like this when low-cost carriers make price hikes difficult.

United’s CFO Jack Brace offers this wisdom:

“Either the industry passes on the higher fuel prices or we’re going to have to lower capacity, but you have to make the equation work,” he said in comments to a Goldman Sachs conference in New York.

Brace said United has a little more than 100 aircraft unencumbered by debt, including 50 Boeing 737s, “that we could ground whenever we needed to if the demand environment were such that it didn’t make sense to fly those planes.”

But hold on: Airlines have already been raising prices, and the price hikes have been sticky. So grounding planes in an environment where prices are rising and planes are already packed to the gills is a curious move.

It strikes me as an effort to spur the industry to really sock it to consumers. I know it’s not a perfect analogy, but I’m reminded of Enron’s actions during the California energy crisis. Energy supply low? Turn off another power plant to drive prices up further! Bring on the gouging!

But is the threat to ground planes credible? It seems highly unlikely that any airline would unilaterally ground a fifth of its fleet, as United is suggesting (and others are supposedly considering, according to the linked article above). Competitors would fill the vacuum, step up with more flights — albeit at higher prices.

Bottom line: United can talk and talk about grounding flights. But will they do it? I doubt it.

Next thing to worry about in flight: Ozone
Like “sick building syndrome,” you can now start worrying about the plane’s air. But not because of the germs. It’s the ozone. Not holes in the ozone layer, either, but ozone levels in the cabin. Most interestingly, narrow-body flights are more prone than wide-body planes to higher ozone levels. Yet another reason to love the jumbos.

Korean Air shows off its Airbus A380 interiors
Singapore Airlines may be the first airline to fly the A380 mega-uber-hyper-super-jumbo-jet (and tickets are finally on sale for Sydney-Singapore flights, which start October 25, by the way), but you can get a photo tour of Korean Air’s A380. Lavender??! Who’s their interior designer? Yuck! (Thanks, Jeff!)

First class fare sale… if you’re traveling tomorrow
I know that airlines like to put out the e-fares and net-savers for weekend travel, but this offer from United struck me as odd. First class fares are on sale for travel on Saturday, September 15 only. Fly there in first, fly back in coach, savor the difference? Fares are less than regular paid first, but the bulk of fares are for really short flights where paying cash money for first class is bonkers.

Business class fare sales to Europe
All-business class L’Avion is flying Newark to Paris for $1398 roundtrip, pre-tax. Maxjet is doing London to New York or DC for $998, also roundtrip, also pre-tax. Both are through the end of 2007, but not every date may be available. (Thanks, Michelle!)

More dangerous shirts
I don’t know what to make of this. “Your liver is evil. It must be punished.” Har har har. But Continental Airlines wasn’t laughing when they kept Edna and Frank Taylor from getting onboard, because of that shirt. What’s with this “What Not to Wear” airline trend?

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Upgraded: US Airways elite status for non-elites
Downgraded: Existing US Airways elite member satisfaction
US Airways is letting those without status buy their way into the rank and file of the elite frequent flyer set, giving them access to the upgrade waiting list and a few bonus miles. Whoo. If I were a US Airways elite, I’d be peeved at their “Try Preferred Status on for size” promotion. Much like Tim Winship argues, it’s hard enough getting an upgrade; now the airline is willing to sell your loyalty down the river to make a quick buck, thereby making it even harder to snag that wider seat with the marginally better service. Classy.

Upgraded: Virgin America
Slow-going upstart Virgin America got its approvals all lined up, and they’re officially legal to sell tickets and fly around the USA. But they’re not selling tickets yet. Their website still promises the moon. What’s the holdup? Jeez, people! August, they say.

Downgraded: Airport scales
Surprise, surprise. The scales at airports are often wrong. How often? 90% of scales were off in a Phoenix television station’s investigative report. Problems limited to Phoenix? Probably not. Try to make sure your scale is at zero when you put down your bags, but that won’t necessary avoid trouble. (Via Consumerist)

Upgraded: The little guy
Jane Waun rocks. She took Spirit Airlines to small claims court for the additional expenses she incurred after Spirit summarily canceled her flight and left her high and dry. They refunded her money for the ticket (eventually) but didn’t cover her additional costs. So she sued. And she won, in part because Spirit never showed up to fight it. 90% of success is showing up, or something like that, right?
(Update: I see Chris Elliott picked up on this, too. And he goes a step further, suggesting that everyone take every travel company to small claims court. Sue them every time, and hope they don’t show, in order to force them to change their practices. Nice idea, but small claims cases still take time! That’s probably why Spirit blew the case off in the first place. But if you have the time, go for it.)

Upgraded: Price transparency in the European Union
The EU Parliament has passed a set of rules mandating that airlines have to quote full prices, not just base fares. (Take that, easyJet!) The law needs approval from member states before taking effect, but this is pro-consumer. Let’s hope the member states pass it.

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The other day, FareCompare.com CEO Rick Seaney sent over an analysis of AirTran’s recent fare sale. “When is a fare sale not really a fare sale?” The answer: When the airline hikes its fares, only to lower them with great fanfare a few days later. Hooray for the status quo?

Rick suggests that this is tantamount to those stores that once lined the streets of midtown Manhattan, declaring they were going out of business. That is, until you saw that the name of the store was “Going Out of Business, Inc.” or something like that.

So how did AirTran join such esteemed company as the all-things-must-go merchants of New York City? Within a one-month period, Air Tran raised their fares three times — twice for three days, once for five days — and then brought them back to the previous level. Each time, their return to normal pricing was heralded with breathless press releases and a marketing blitz, announcing a sale.

Rick is right: This is an at best questionable, at worst deceptive business practice. Think about it: If a department store jacked up its prices for a few days, then brought them back to normal, customers might be filing complaints with the Federal Trade Commission. Perhaps AirTran thinks that the fluctuating nature of air ticket prices makes them immune to such charges, but I think they’re walking on some very thin ice.

So now they’ve been called out on it. We’ll see if they’ll change their tune, of they’ll just keep right on doing it. If enough people catch on, the phrase “AirTran fare sale” might be like the boy crying wolf.

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Arthur G. writes in:

The Airbus 380 looks amazing. How much will tickets cost?

This is actually quite a common question received here at Upgrade: Travel Better HQ. People are clearly awed by the size of the A380 — I was awed, too, when I saw it back in March. Others are wary of getting on a plane that big, especially in case of an emergency. (See the evacuation test video for a best-case scenario.)

But your question about prices can’t be answered, Arthur. While an airline’s equipment certainly affects its cost structure (and the A380 isn’t cost-effective on every route), the price of a plane ticket isn’t solely linked to the model of aircraft.

You probably wouldn’t ask, “How much will a flight on Boeing 737 cost?” After all, you can fly a Boeing 737 on Aloha Airlines from Honolulu to Kona, or on Continental from San Francisco to Newark, or even from Houston to Zurich in an all-business class configuration on Privatair. The price could be anywhere from $39 to $8000. The model of plane isn’t determining the fare.

So if you want to fly on the Airbus A380, your fare will depend on the route, the airline, the class of service, how far in advance you buy the ticket… not to mention that old standby, supply and demand. Just like every other flight.

Singapore Airlines will receive the first four A380s to roll off the assembly line, with expected delivery date in the fall of this year. The initial route will be London-Singapore-Sydney. Qantas will bring the behemoth to American shores on flights to Australia in 2008. Lufthansa will bring the ‘bus to New York thereafter, if all goes according to plan.

But the price of those flights? That depends.

Related:
- Airbus A380 at Chicago O’Hare
- Video: Airbus A380 evacuation test
- Singapore Airlines (aff)

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Several innovative companies have been working to improve information about (and access to) low airfares in recent years. We’ve seen the widespread acceptance of aggregators like Kayak, SideStep (reviewed here last year), and the growth of fare watching/predicting services like FareCompare and FareCast.

So what’s next?

The tech world went ga-ga over Yapta (Your Amazing Personal Travel Assistant) recently. And if it’s the real deal, then it could be a great service.

Unlike existing fare alert tools, Yapta also tracks the fares on your trip after you’ve purchased, in order to take advantage of low-fare guarantees and fare-drop voucher policies. If your ticket’s fare drops after you’ve purchased, you get a refund in the form of a voucher. The site is in closed beta right now, and was supposed to open up for public beta this week.

The idea is a good one. One possible snag: Not every airline (or booking site) guarantees their fares in case of a fare drop. If more than 24 hours have passed since the time of purchase, getting a fare-drop voucher is increasingly rare. (For example, United still does it, but US Airways apparently abandoned their fare-drop policy after they merged with America West.)

Perhaps the best of all possible worlds would be 1) using Farecast to get a reading on whether the current fare is a good one, and whether to wait or buy now, then 2) using FareCompare to get e-mail alerts when fares drop (even hours before those fares even go on sale), and finally 3) using Yapta to track fares after you’ve pulled the trigger, so you can collect vouchers or refunds if fares drop further. Sounds like a great combination to me. (If these three companies merge, e-mail me for the address where you can send the finder’s fee for brokering the deal.)

I certainly appreciate all the effort, venture capital, and sheer computing power that goes into giving consumers better access to low airfares. It’s a big reason why airfares are as relatively low as they are today, despite recent fare hikes in light of high fuel costs.

But I’d love to see similar effort put into tracking hotel rates. I know, there’s more variation between hotels, and then more variation between rooms within each property, so it’s harder to make comparisons, but I’m sure there are some clever, entrepreneurial programmers who can figure out a way.

Yapta promises to introduce a hotel tracking feature in the future, and I’m looking forward to testing it. Fingers crossed.

Love is no longer in the air
An amorous couple that got busted for their inflight PDA will have to resort to conjugal visits soon. A jury convicted Carl William Persing of interfering with a flight crew last November. In the original complaint, he was accused of being overly amorous with his lady, and that he had his head in her lap in what was perceived to be a sexual manner. (His original defense was that he suffered from a medical condition that required him to rest his head. I guess they gave up that line of defense.) But a felony? And why did he take the fall, while she was let off the hook? It takes two to tango!

Fight terrorism! Shop!
Britain’s airports have been criticized for their long advance check-in times for a while now. Four hours before your international flight? Puh-leeze! Now the airlines themselves are getting into the criticism game. The leadership of British airline bmi has gone on record to claim that the British Airports Authority uses the terror threat to boost its revenue at airport stores.

Fight terrorism again! Assign seats!
No open seating for airlines in India: Assigned seats are now mandatory. Why? The Indian Directorate of Civil Aviation argues that “the move will ensure keeping the centre of gravity within limits at all times during flight,” and that “allocation of seats will also avoid confusion among passengers over seating arrangements and in cases of emergency, specific seat numbers given to certain passengers will be helpful for investigation purposes.” Okay… well, I like seat assignments, but is the center of gravity ever really an issue at Southwest? Seems like they really want to know where the baddies are sitting…

Europeans get better fares when they shop in the USA
European travelers looking to get a deal might consider booking their intra-European flights on US-based travel agency sites. The Times of London reports that fares are often lower on this side of the pond. But beware: Some sites don’t take credit cards that aren’t issued by US banks.

Deciphering pilot-speak
Patrick Smith provides a glossary of things you’ll hear on the PA system in flight. Some of it is niggling over the present tense, especially in variations that involve the word “do.” (As in “I do speak” vs. “I speak” or “I am speaking.”) Fight the good fight, Patrick!

This is the kind of experiment I wish I had thought of first: The guys at FareCompare decided to put various airline websites’ low-fare guarantees to the test. The results are mixed.

They did it by actually buying a ticket on every airline in their test. (They only included airlines that HAD a guarantee, naturally, so that meant American, Continental, Delta (sort of), Northwest, and United. US Airways, Southwest, AirTran, jetBlue, etc., weren’t included, since they don’t have a guarantee.)

Because FareCompare’s fare alerts — which I have strongly recommended in the past — give you several hours’ advance warning when a fare is about to drop, they knew exactly which tickets to buy. They bought the tickets before the fare drop went live. When the fare went down, they took a screenshot of a lower fare and filed for a refund and/or voucher with the airline.

What they found: Lots of variation. Each airline eventually came through, but the amount of effort required varied greatly. It wasn’t always easy: Some denied refund requests at first, or didn’t respond within 24 hours.

The airlines’ policies vary, too. Most required a $5 difference before considering a refund, but Continental required $10. Most give a cash refund, but United only gives vouchers. Most accept a lower fare published on any site, including their own, while American and Northwest bizarrely exclude lower fares that appear on their own sites. Delta doesn’t have a guarantee, per se, but they’ll refund your ticket within 24 hours.

It’s a great experiment. Go read the whole thing.

Note that FareCompare was testing the airlines’ sites only. Some online travel agencies have guarantees as well. For example, the folks at Peter Greenberg’s site recently had to step in to help a reader enforce Expedia’s guarantee.

In all these cases, it’s up to the customer to proactively search for a lower price within 24 hours. No one is going to volunteer the news that the price has dropped. But if you’re willing to spend the time and effort to check the prices again and wrestle with customer service, you could collect a few bucks.

Downgraded: Lavender
Update: The controversial and lame American Airlines website for women got a minor redesign, as Meg at the Consumerist noticed. See the before-and-after screenshots above. The criticism must have gotten to them. Gone is the lavender flight search box, though it’s still a dumbed-down version with fewer options than the main search page. Is this progress?

Upgraded: US Airways, Downgraded: Southwestern temperance
The booze is back in the Land of Enchantment! US Airways is once again serving alcoholic drinks on flights to and from New Mexico. Recall that they got busted for serving liquor without a license. Tipple with impunity.

Downgraded: Late night arrivals at Detroit; Upgraded: Odds of a PBOR
It happened again. Passengers were stuck on a plane for hours, bathrooms had no water, etc. A late-arriving Spirit Airlines flight from Cancun couldn’t be processed after landing (at 11 p.m.), because Homeland Security’s Customs/Immigration agents had gone home for the night. It took until 4 a.m. the next day for passengers to be let out. Update: Or the plane landed early! And Customs’ computers were down. And passengers left the plane at 12:30 a.m., if you believe Customs. Or later, depending on who’s telling the story.

Upgraded: Lufthansa first class seating
No preview images yet, but Lufthansa is upgrading their first class cabins, beginning with winter 2008. The new seats were meant to debut with the A380, but given the delivery delays, they’re just rolling them out anyway.

Upgraded, potentially: Baggage screening
Assuming the bill survives a veto threat from President Bush, airports across America could receive new equipment that supposedly screens baggage faster and more accurately than previous versions. Why the veto threat? The bill also contains a provision permitting TSA agents to unionize.

Downgraded: Flights from LAX
United Airlines and Los Angeles World Airports are having a spat about the rent. United says the rent hike is a violation of the lease agreement, but until the dust settles, they’re charging passengers who board a flight at LAX an extra $10 to cover the difference, even though the actual costs to the airline are allegedly a lot less. Now Delta and US Airways have followed suit and raised fares out of LAX by the same $10. Lovely.

Upgraded: Baltimore!
Layover at BWI? Grab a glass of wine at the newest branch of Vino Volo, the chain of in-airport wine bars. Other locations include Washington Dulles, Sacramento, and Seattle. (Via Jaunted)

Reader Raul S. asks:

You’ve mentioned paid upgrades at check in, but how much does that actually cost?

The price depends on a variety of factors, such as the route, how full the plane is, and possibly other, secret factors. It’s impossible to accurately predict an offer of a paid upgrade, but it can never hurt to ask. Not all airlines offer upgrades for sale at check-in, either; in fact, I’d say the number that DO sell them is in the minority.

U.S. carriers are far and away the most likely to try to squeeze out some extra revenue if business or first class seats remain available.

Alaska Airlines is the most explicit in describing their paid-upgrade policy, and they’re also the cheapest. As outlined in their chart, upgrades only cost $50 for every 1250 miles flown. US Airways charges a little more. United has lately been selling domestic upgrades at check-in at a rate of $65 for every 500 miles (or portion thereof) flown. I’ve seen higher, too, but $65/500 is the normal rate.

Internationally, it seems to vary more. On United, I recall being offered an upgrade from coach to business for $550 on the Washington-Amsterdam route — on award tickets — and $450 on paid tickets from Chicago to Frankfurt. $550 is a seemingly magic number that comes up a lot for trans-Pacific routes. American’s upgrades are similarly priced — and considering they charge a fee to use miles for upgrades, the all-cash upgrades are a decent deal. British Airways also occasionally offers upgrades for sale — even on board. I’ve heard of upgrades from regular economy to premium economy for about $250, but that was several years ago.

All these upgrades are one-way, of course. If it’s available on the return flight, you can expect to pay up again. And it may not be the same price. Crapshoot!

Note also that you don’t earn any class-of-service bonus miles for sitting in the bigger seats, even if you’re paying money for it. It’s still an upgrade from a lower booking class, not a purchase of a premium-class ticket.

Is it worth it? Depends on you. But at least you’ll be sitting up front.

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Update December 9, 2007:
The freetraveling.com site is dead. So the list of promotional codes for American Airlines and other carriers, linked below, is down. However, there IS a 5% discount codes for American Airlines, as well as a discount for US Airways Vacations, in the 2008 edition of the Entertainment book, which may be a worthwhile investment.

The text of the original post follows, as originally published.

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The folks at FreeTraveling.com have compiled a list of promo codes (Edit: link is deleted, as the site is dead) for several U.S. airlines.

Most of the discounts are for American Airlines, but I found codes for Continental and Northwest as well.

To find your code, you need to select your destination city from a pulldown menu first. At this point, there are about 40 cities with promo codes.

Discounts aren’t always available for every time frame, much less on every airline, but it’s worth taking a look before you buy.

To use the codes, you may need to select “advanced” fare search options on the airlines’ websites. They don’t always make it immediately apparent.

Alternate way to get a discount: Buy an Entertainment book. The price of the book varies according to the “home” location, but each book contains a 5% discount code for American Airlines.