American and United Add $10 Surcharge For Peak Holiday Travel

American, Fares, United

It looks like United and American have decided that you don’t pay enough to travel on the peak holiday travel days, so they’ve added a $10 surcharge. Is this a new fee? Nah, I think it’s just the lazy man’s fare increase.

You’re always used to paying more to travel on the holidays, right? Usually, this happens because airlines use inventory controls to make you pay a higher fare. So that $99 one way fare just won’t be available (well, ok, maybe on Virgin America). But now American has decided that still aren’t paying enough on certain days, and United has followed. On the Sunday after Thanksgiving and both the Saturday and Sunday after New Year’s, they’ve added a $10 surcharge to nearly all fares.

I’ve already seen some people wondering if this is a new fee that the airlines are starting to add, but really, I don’t see it that way. It’s simply a fare increase but instead of adding blackout dates to the existing fares and filing new fares at a higher level (which is kind of a pain), they just added a blanket surcharge to make things easier for them. Might as well do it this way – you get the same result for the most part.

The most important thing here is that you won’t see anything different as a traveler. When you price out your ticket, that surcharge will already be included, so it’s not a nickel-and-diming type of strategy here.

Airlines have used peak pricing for years. Remember the traditional Southwest $99 sales? Those were only good on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Saturday. The rest of the week was $119. The difference here is that it’s just much more specific, and they’ve used a different method for increasing the fare.

One extra benefit for the airlines is that surcharges normally get added on after discounts are taken, though I can’t imagine too many people are traveling on corporate discounts or anything like that on the peak holiday travel days. I really think it was just the easiest way to do a narrow fare increase.

I suppose the news here is that technically, this is a different way of doing things, but ultimately, it’s just a fare increase. Flights on those days are always packed, so they’re just going to try to squeeze some more revenue out while they can. I imagine we’ll see more of this in the future.

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11 comments on “American and United Add $10 Surcharge For Peak Holiday Travel

  1. With all the checked bag fees, I’m thinking more people will mail holiday packages this year instead of packing empty suitcases with presents to take to family and friends. Could be a boom for the USPS, Fedex, and UPS this holiday season.

    I’m sick of fees and surcharges, just raise the fare and pay your bills like other businesses do. If you have to pay the extra $10 for certain travel dates then raise the fare. It’s just another way of tricking the public as the airline lets you think your fare is $99.00 but everything else that adds up to a total of $200.00 is taxes. They lead the public into thinking the extra money is government taxes which is not true.

    The airline industry must be at the top of a list of the most shameful businesses.

  2. David SFeastbay wrote:

    I’m sick of fees and surcharges, just raise the fare and pay your bills like other businesses do. If you have to pay the extra $10 for certain travel dates then raise the fare. It’s just another way of tricking the public as the airline lets you think your fare is $99.00 but everything else that adds up to a total of $200.00 is taxes. They lead the public into thinking the extra money is government taxes which is not true.

    It’s a quiet day for comments today . . .

    David – that’s not what’s happening here. Surcharges are included in the base fare whenever they’re advertised and they’ll be shown in the final price that you’ll see on any website.

  3. Ken wrote:

    What if you have tickets for those dates that were already purchased months ago?

    Absolutely nothing changes. This is just a fare increase, so if you already have your ticket, then you don’t need to worry.

  4. Wow what a lazy solution to yield management. I wonder if perhaps in 3-5 years we’ll see a swing back to all inclusive fares…will people get so annoyed at the false economy of many discount fares that they’ll begin to crave value again?

  5. CF wrote:

    David SFeastbay wrote:
    David – that’s not what’s happening here. Surcharges are included in the base fare whenever they’re advertised and they’ll be shown in the final price that you’ll see on any website.

    Not really, if you look in an airline computer either via AA reservations or a travel agent the price in the fare display does not show surcharges. You would have to look up to see what they are. At least for this blog it’s only $9.30 plus tax, but surcharges on international fares can really shock people. A (example) LAX-CDG-LAX on AA in business class DRT7EU would show as $8266.00 round trip if you just look at the airlines fare display. Then when your travel person books it, it adds 130.00 surcharge EACH WAY plus if going via DFW another 4.80 surcharge for a base fare now of $8531.00. That’s a lot higher then being told 8266.00, and taxes haven’t been added yet which would be (today) another 186.40. So you can see why I don’t like surcharges if they are added by the airlines themselves. Some surcharges are mandated by a countries government, like HKG, but if an airline just tacks one on then they need to be honest about it and increase the fare by that amount. They shouldn’t try and trick the public into thinking their fare is the same as everyone else and let the public think the rest of the amount is impossed by the government.

    Ok getting off my soap box now.

  6. David SFeastbay wrote:

    Not really, if you look in an airline computer either via AA reservations or a travel agent the price in the fare display does not show surcharges.

    If you’re talking about an actual fare display which really only a travel agent would see, then yes, it is excluded. But any consumer-facing site includes the amount.

    I went to aa.com and looked for a one way from LAX to Chicago on Jan 3. It showed $271 as the first result when using the pricing & schedule option. When you go to the next page, it shows a grand total of $281.60. The $10.60 that wasn’t included is made up of the September 11 security fee of $2.50, the $3.60 segment tax, and a $4.50 PFC. That’s it. The surcharge is included in the base fare.

  7. CF wrote:

    If you’re talking about an actual fare display which really only a travel agent would see, then yes, it is excluded. But any consumer-facing site includes the amount.

    Yes a real actual fare display that the airlines themselves use as well as any travel agency and onsite corporate travel department. Using a consumer-facing site a traveler would never really know the full breakdown of the base fare so wouldn’t know what the real fare is and how much the airline adds on for surcharges without telling you. Not that you have a choice on paying the surcharge, but at least the consumer would know the extra breakdown of where their money is going and could complain if they felt it was unjust. After all, elected officials love pleasing voters and could make changes.

  8. There are so many fees for this and that. I would rather just see one price and be done with it. I’m so tired of $5 for this and $10 for that. Just tell me what it’s going to cost and I’ll decide if it’s worth it. lol

  9. On a related note, has anyone noticed in the past few days that United has changed its fare search results? They used to post as everything included; now one has to click through to get the total tab. The all-in results were one of the few plusses (to me) that united.com had and now it’s as frustrating as the others in this regard.

  10. The consensus amongst travelers is that fees offend them. Airlines need to recognize this and start including fees into the fare on one line item.

    Would the average flier be happier paying a $300 fee-less fare, or a $250 fare that is all fees? It is something the airlines should study. But, nevertheless, heavy fees seem to work for RyanAir’s pricing model.

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