Cheaper to fly further.

[higheden]

This may well have been covered on the forum here or in another thread but each time it happens I say I'm going to write about it - and never do until today

Last year we did something like 50 flights, many of them long haul. We usually fly business, occasionally PE and for short hauls we go economy. However, it doesn't seem to matter which class we book - if we are wanting to fly long haul, say Auckland to LAX, which was the route I was booking yesterday - I get cheaper fares by booking AIR NZ from Australia. Now I understand that for some this might be an issue but we live between four countries so for us its a bit of a 'shrug'.

But what gives - Brisbane (with a short stop-over in AKL) LAX on Air NZ was (yesterday) a $1000.00 cheaper than if I had booked us direct AKL/LAX.

This happens a lot and we have learnt to source our flights from different countries - which isn't a biggie if you're travelling in Europe either. It's just as easy to get to Milan as it is to get to Frankfurt or Geneva. Last year when flying back from Europe - it was cheaper to book our flights from Milan via Frankfurt to Brisbane, than it was to book Frankfurt/Brisbane.

Is it because airlines are trying to promote routes? are Air NZ and QANTAS is such tight competition that they will fly across the ditch for such a low cost so as not to lose pax to each other?

I appreciate the savings, as I said the extra flight doesn't worry us as we can just as easily be in Brisbane as in Auckland, but I've learnt to research and look around.

 

[theblank]

Yes it happens a lot, plenty of info online why it happens.
Airlines sell seats on planes, not charge by km's flown.

 

[higheden]

Yes it happens a lot, plenty of info online why it happens.
Airlines sell seats on planes, not charge by km's flown.

Thank you.

I've never had time to research it but it didn't dawn on me that it could have been a 'bums in seats' reason.

 

[Denali]

We flew SYD-LAX-ATL-SCL return for less than a SYD-LAX return price. Booked with Delta, flew SYD-LAX-SYD with VA (which is what I wanted) and the rest with Delta. It was like they threw in the SYD-LAX sector for free.

 

[drron]

Happens even on shorter routes.If flying LAX-MCO it is usually cheaper to fly LAX-MIA-MCO.

 

[theblank]

I remember when Air Canada first started from Brisbane it was about $900 or even less to fly BNE-LAX via Vancouver, but BNE- Vancouver was around $1400.

why? obviously they have to compete with Virgin/Qantas et all who all do BNE>LAX for under $1000, otherwise, who would !

 

[Mattg]

As theblank has alluded to, Air New Zealand almost has a monopoly on NZ-USA flights. But in the (larger) Australia-USA market, Air NZ has to compete with many airlines that all offer non-stop flights. To make Air NZ attractive to Australians - who have to have an extra stop in Auckland - they compete on price in the Australian market. They don't really have to compete on price in the NZ market.

It often works the other way too - QF/VA can be cheaper from AKL to LAX via SYD/BNE than flying direct SYD/BNE-LAX.

 

[JohnK]

Happens with most airlines on every continent.

 

[Stevo.1702]

One of the most notable ones domestically in Australia that I keep discovering is the Perth - East coast route. PER - BNE is often quite more expensive that PER - BNE - AKL.

 

[dajop]

You get some interesting ones. QR just advertised some specials ex-SIN, via Doha. Advertised "sale" price in economy for Kilimanjaro (JRO) was 3x sale price of Los Angeles, but less than half the distance flown Competition and convenience are the factors that affect it (lots of competition to LAX, but none to JRO, and plenty of inconvenience fly via DOH to LAX vs flying non-stop or via NE Asia).

General rules:
-The longer you have to take to fly from A to B, the less you want to pay for the inconvenience of not going direct [unless the airline in question doesn't need to discount to fill planes]. Or people pay a premium for shorter/more direct flights.
- Flights to/from a hub will often be more than flights via a hub (A-B-C will cost less than A-B or B-C)
- Flights from an airline's home country will tend to be more than from other countries