Aviation Discussion

[eoff]

I think perhaps I should clarify my point, there are occasions where after boarding the number of people on the plane does not match what is expected from the paperwork at the gate.

 

[najaB]

They only sell as many seats as there are on the plane. Everyone has a ticket, it's just there's no seat number on there

They typically sell the number of seats plus a few. And offer a couple hundred dollars to anyone willing to take a later flight if everyone shows up.

 

[Bletchleyite]

How do they deal with the situation where they have too many or few people on the plane. Quite hard to work out what has gone wrong if people are not in assigned seats.
Although I suspect this is more about being able to offer higher price seats in EJ's case.

They know who's boarded because their boarding cards are scanned before they get on.

It was a bit of a "win-win" for Sleasy. It doesn't, it turns out, make a massive difference to boarding times (and they did quite a bit of trialling to prove that), and passengers hated the "scrum", and yes, as you say, they could get an extra income stream from premium seats, though probably not a huge one as before people who cared about where they sat bought Speedy Boarding.

I think perhaps I should clarify my point, there are occasions where after boarding the number of people on the plane does not match what is expected from the paperwork at the gate.

I've been on a scrum-boarded easyJet flight when that happened (though only once that I can recall, and that's in about 200 sectors I've flown) - they went through the plane rechecking boarding cards. Bit of a nuisance, but it doesn't happen often.

They typically sell the number of seats plus a few. And offer a couple hundred dollars to anyone willing to take a later flight if everyone shows up.

Yes, but that's dealt with before they even start boarding, they don't have everyone cram on then ask a few to get off when there are not enough seats!

To be fair, easyJet don't do an awful lot of overbooking, it isn't necessary with their business model because if you don't show up you lose your money. The main reason for doing overbooking is to deal with people on full-fare flexible tickets who can just not show up and then rebook to another flight - same with hotels, where most offer a "cancel by noon on the day of arrival" sort of rate where the chance of reselling the room is near-zero. The only reason you get it on easyJet or Ryanair is when there's a faulty seat, they're a cabin crew member short or they've swapped from an A320 to an A319. And again, this is from extensive experience flying easyJet, about 200 sectors.

KLM, on the other hand, always overbooked the 1500-ish Schiphol to Heathrow to an utterly ridiculous extent, and had people hacked off about it every single week.

 

[AM9]

... though probably not a huge one as before people who cared about where they sat bought Speedy Boarding.
I've never bothered with speedy boarding even when travelling as a couple, my wife usually snoozes even on short haul so it doesn't matter where we sit. There's been quite a few times where the incoming EJ flight has been sent to a remote stand requiring the passengers to be bussed from the departure lounge. That's when those who paid for speedy boarding wasted their money as there was no way that the 'speedy order' was maintained when nobody knew which side of the bus they were getting on or off. ...
... The main reason for doing overbooking is to deal with people on full-fare flexible tickets who can just not show up and then rebook to another flight - same with hotels, where most offer a "cancel by noon on the day of arrival" sort of rate where the chance of reselling the room is near-zero. The only reason you get it on easyJet or Ryanair is when there's a faulty seat, they're a cabin crew member short or they've swapped from an A320 to an A319. And again, this is from extensive experience flying easyJet, about 200 sectors.

KLM, on the other hand, always overbooked the 1500-ish Schiphol to Heathrow to an utterly ridiculous extent, and had people hacked off about it every single week. ...

That's when the EU 261/2004 regulation punished an airline for overbooking (known as 'bumping' in the trade), if the service wasn't very frequent. O'Leary whined about that for years saying that compensation for a delay should be realted to the fare paid, i.e. not compensation but a partial or full refund, (just like delay repay is). Well he would as many of his (basic) fares were just a few pounds. Had the EU let him get away with that, his airline's behaviour would have been even worse that it was! I don't knowif 261/2004 still applies to UK citizens from this year.

 

[Bletchleyite]

That's when the EU 261/2004 regulation punished an airline for overbooking (known as 'bumping' in the trade), if the service wasn't very frequent. O'Leary whined about that for years saying that compensation for a delay should be realted to the fare paid, i.e. not compensation but a partial or full refund, (just like delay repay is). Well he would as many of his (basic) fares were just a few pounds. Had the EU let him get away with that, his airline's behaviour would have been even worse that it was! I don't knowif 261/2004 still applies to UK citizens from this year.

easyJet and Ryanair haven't been heavily overbooking since well before EU261 was a thing - their business model doesn't require it, because you lose your money if you don't fly. That was firmly aimed at the traditional airlines who, like the KLM example I mentioned above, were doing it all the time.

I do, as an aside, agree with him - the Delay Repay approach of it being a proportion of fare (including taxes and any additional fees paid like baggage, not just the meaningless "base fare") is much more sensible - though he should also be obliged to provide a hotel, evening meal and breakfast if overnight. Though perhaps I would apply an additional "minimum compensation for being bumped from a flight that actually operates" - remember that EU261 doesn't just apply to being bumped, it also applies to cancellations or long delays, provided it wasn't caused by weather or similar. Indeed I've never been bumped (I was offered voluntary once but didn't take it because I didn't like the alternative offered), the only time I've ever had EU261 was a cancellation due to staff shortage, and it was well in excess of the fare paid.

 

[AM9]

easyJet and Ryanair haven't been heavily overbooking since well before EU261 was a thing - their business model doesn't require it, because you lose your money if you don't fly. That was firmly aimed at the traditional airlines who, like the KLM example I mentioned above, were doing it all the time.

I do, as an aside, agree with him - the Delay Repay approach of it being a proportion of fare (including taxes and any additional fees paid like baggage, not just the meaningless "base fare") is much more sensible - though he should also be obliged to provide a hotel, evening meal and breakfast if overnight. Though perhaps I would apply an additional "minimum compensation for being bumped from a flight that actually operates" - remember that EU261 doesn't just apply to being bumped, it also applies to cancellations or long delays, provided it wasn't caused by weather or similar. Indeed I've never been bumped (I was offered voluntary once but didn't take it because I didn't like the alternative offered), the only time I've ever had EU261 was a cancellation due to staff shortage, and it was well in excess of the fare paid.

In 2015, we were bumped on an outbound flight LHR-KEF (Reykjavik) after a severe storm cancelled all flights there on the Saturday (in 2015). We had a 24hour delay and on return to LHR, the Sunday flight was overbooked and we were then bumped onto the evening flight from LGW. The compensation was £400 which was more than the fare paid for the outblound journey. I don't agree with your view that compensation should be related to the original fare. That is a refund. Compensation is in recognition of the loss by the passenger which in our case was a day of ouir holiday, which as a minimum included one night's accomodation (not cheap in Iceland). Then there's the loss of holiday time, so £400 was no bonus, - it probably didn't even cover the actual losses. Had the fare been a bargain basement booking, our other losses would have been the same.
The EU intended the regulation to make airlines responsible for the consequences of their operating failures (in our case, the 8 hours between the LHR departure and the actual Gatwick flight), - they knew that the Sunday flights would be overbooked by the number of passengers turned away the previous day. They should have provided sufficient capacity, having saved by cancelling the Saturday flight. *
Icelandair as an airline I found to be very good, but there are plenty of less creditable operations that would frequently cut corners were it not for the penalty that 261/2004 imposed.

 

[Bald Rick]

KLM, on the other hand, always overbooked the 1500-ish Schiphol to Heathrow to an utterly ridiculous extent, and had people hacked off about it every single week.

If you want overbooking, try flights to Australia in the first week of December. We were offered a ridiculous sum to go the following day, plus a night in the hotel. Almost a refund, effectively. Unfortunately we were routeing via Singapore to meet friends for a night at Raffles, which we didn’t want to miss. Must be one of the most expensive Singapore Slings in opportunity cost!

 

[Bletchleyite]

In 2015, we were bumped on an outbound flight LHR-KEF (Reykjavik) after a severe storm cancelled all flights there on the Saturday (in 2015). We had a 24hour delay and on return to LHR, the Sunday flight was overbooked and we were then bumped onto the evening flight from LGW. The compensation was £400 which was more than the fare paid for the outblound journey. I don't agree with your view that compensation should be related to the original fare. That is a refund. Compensation is in recognition of the loss by the passenger which in our case was a day of ouir holiday, which as a minimum included one night's accomodation (not cheap in Iceland). Then there's the loss of holiday time, so £400 was no bonus, - it probably didn't even cover the actual losses. Had the fare been a bargain basement booking, our other losses would have been the same.

I don't consider it reasonable for transport operators to have to compensate for consequential loss in any form*. It opens a can of worms - where do you stop - what about a businessperson who missed signing a £1bn deal because of a flight cancellation?

Compensating you for the loss of your hotel night is a matter for your travel insurance, and the airline should provide you with a hotel and meals in addition to any refund/compensation if the delay is long enough to need it.

* Other than that if you miss your rail connection you should be and are accommodated, but that's not compensation for consequential loss, that's allowing you to complete the journey you paid for.

 

[najaB]

To be fair, easyJet don't do an awful lot of overbooking, it isn't necessary with their business model because if you don't show up you lose your money.

I was speaking to Southwestern, not EasyJet. Overbooking is far less common under EU regulations than in the USA.

I don't consider it reasonable for transport operators to have to compensate for consequential loss in any form*.

EU261 isn't intended to compensate for consequential loss, which is why it's a fixed amount. It's supposed to compensate for the airline not providing the contracted service. If it was to compensate for consequential loss then you would need to submit receipts, etc.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I was speaking to Southwestern, not EasyJet. Overbooking is far less common under EU regulations than in the USA.

Even before those regulations existed easyJet and Ryanair didn't overbook as a matter of course*. It just isn't a necessary part of their business model. The reason to do it is because of flexible tickets (which is why hotels also do it, because most people book hotels as flexible bookings, even the budget hotels). I believe Southwest have a more legacy-airline-like fares system - they aren't just easyJet in "Stagecoach stripes" - and so they might well need it to avoid flying empty and unpaid-for seats.

* Going back and watching the BBC easyJet documentary highlighted this a couple of times, where they did do it as an "out of course" thing to get someone who had got stuck onto a flight and made a big thing of it not being usual practice, though the system lets them do it manually if they need to.

 

[TravelDream]

They typically sell the number of seats plus a few. And offer a couple hundred dollars to anyone willing to take a later flight if everyone shows up.

Sorry, I meant to say issue as many boarding passes as there are seats. Should really think more before I type. Airlines also issue gate passes to standby passengers, but they don't allow someone to pass the boarding gate and are exchanged for a boarding pass if a seat becomes available.

Almost all airlines sell more tickets than seats. Ryanair is one of the exceptions who don't. Some airlines sell a lot more though it tends to vary by an airline's experience of how many passengers are no shows (Generally a lot on a Friday afternnon/evening business flight and few on a holiday flight in peak season). I was once on an El Al flight where they had 35 more people checked in than they had seats. I volunteered to get bumped for an extra night in a 5* hotel in Tel Aviv and a decent wad of cash (quite a bit more than we paid for the return flight). Work were fine with me taking an extra day off 'working from home'.

No airline is going to offload somebody with a boarding pass who has already sat down on the plane if they are overbooked nowadays. Google David Dao if you don't know why.

 

[packermac]

Also remember that some times the flight is "oversold" not because there are more tickets sold than seats, but because the freight being carried is more valuable or time sensitive than a few passengers and the cost of 2bouncing"them to a hotel with a wad of money.
We used to regularly off load passengers in lieu of strawberries out of LAX, especially when headwinds are forecast. There is of course a pecking order, it would not be a Gold Card holder you were kicking off, unless of course they volunteered.
I had suppliers who became very aware of which flights were likely to be oversold and played the system to their benefit either by getting upgrades or being a volunteer to stand down and fly the next day.

 

[najaB]

Also remember that some times the flight is "oversold" not because there are more tickets sold than seats, but because the freight being carried is more valuable or time sensitive than a few passengers and the cost of 2bouncing"them to a hotel with a wad of money.

It can also be that the seats have been sold to codeshare partners, who haven't then been able to on-sell them to passengers.

 

[Bletchleyite]

It can also be that the seats have been sold to codeshare partners, who haven't then been able to on-sell them to passengers.

Do they really still do quotas like that rather than just having a live interface between the two booking systems so any given seat can be booked under either flight code?

 

[najaB]

Do they really still do quotas like that rather than just having a live interface between the two booking systems so any given seat can be booked under either flight code?

Depends. Some airlines are tightly integrated and operate a common/linked booking system (e.g. AA/BA/IB) where you can use a booking reference generated by one airline to check in on the other's website. In other cases there's a codeshare arrangement but it operates on the block assignment basis. I believe this is still the case with BA/QF and DL/SQ.

 

[AM9]

Depends. Some airlines are tightly integrated and operate a common/linked booking system (e.g. AA/BA/IB) where you can use a booking reference generated by one airline to check in on the other's website. In other cases there's a codeshare arrangement but it operates on the block assignment basis. I believe this is still the case with BA/QF and DL/SQ.

Well BA anb IB are part of the same corporation, and probably share a common ticket network anyway.

 

[najaB]

Well BA anb IB are part of the same corporation, and probably share a common ticket network anyway.

Yes, they're both owned by IAG, but as far as I'm aware their booking systems are separate but speak with each other in real-time. Other airlines whose systems speak with IAG include RJ and AY.

 

[FQTV]

Aer Lingus hopes to begin marketing Manchester > US flights from this Friday (8th January 2021). We should then find out the routes and operating details.

I see those being *reallY* well patronised if they start any time soon. Not.

I’m minded to agree!

There are actually some Aer Lingus fares lurking in the distribution systems which are only valid for travel from 1st July to the 31st August this year.

I can’t currently see when they were loaded, but they could be a precursor to the flights themselves being loaded for an initially short operating season.

Circling back on this, Aer Lingus has now loaded availability for three new direct routes from Manchester to New York, Orlando and Barbados.

There will be daily-ops to New York (JFK) from the 29th July 2021, and five times weekly to Orlando from the same date.

Barbados will be thrice-weekly commencing 20th October 2021.

The routes would appear to be aimed fairly squarely at competing with Virgin Atlantic, and also filling some of the space left by Thomas Cook.

 

[Aictos]

Has anyone flown to Eastern Europe and if so is there any destination that can be recommended? I've been to Estonia so anywhere apart from there.

 

[telstarbox]

Prague is great, both for general sightseeing and interesting transport. Probably not quite as cheap as it was.

 

[Bald Rick]

Prague is great, both for general sightseeing and interesting transport. Probably not quite as cheap as it was.

Seconded. Budapest too. Great in summer. Not an option this year, I suspect.

 

[daodao]

Circling back on this, Aer Lingus has now loaded availability for three new direct routes from Manchester to New York, Orlando and Barbados.

There will be daily-ops to New York (JFK) from the 29th July 2021, and five times weekly to Orlando from the same date.

Barbados will be thrice-weekly commencing 20th October 2021.

The routes would appear to be aimed fairly squarely at competing with Virgin Atlantic, and also filling some of the space left by Thomas Cook.

Why has Aer Lingus been given 5th freedom rights between the UK and USA?

 

[KT550]

Why has Aer Lingus been given 5th freedom rights between the UK and USA?

Flights will be operated by a new U.K. company, Aer Lingus (U.K.) Limited

 

[najaB]

Flights will be operated by a new U.K. company, Aer Lingus (U.K.) Limited

AKA British Airways 2.0.

 

[GRALISTAIR]

Yes, but that's dealt with before they even start boarding, they don't have everyone cram on then ask a few to get off when there are not enough seats!

Correct in >99% of cases. There are rare exceptions. The infamous United Airlines dragging off a passenger already seated - about 2 years ago.
Then myself on September 19th 2010 also United. I flew from PDX - DEN - on UA but it was a very hot summer day in Denver. Anyway I boarded my next flight from Denver to Atlanta. Announcement. Sorry. Denver is already > 1 mile high and with the heat the lift just would not be there. Captain refused to take off because of this. GA came on and asked for 4 people to volunteer to get off the aircraft. I did, was given $300 compensation and put on a Frontier Airlines flight leaving two hours later.

But in general it is rare.

 

[najaB]

But in general it is rare.

Even rarer now. The FAA has been tightening up their enforcement of the rules around overbooking and the Airline Passenger Bill of Rights has been introduced in Congress. If passed this would give US passengers compensation rights that are in line with EU261.

 

[GRALISTAIR]

Even rarer now. The FAA has been tightening up their enforcement of the rules around overbooking and the Airline Passenger Bill of Rights has been introduced in Congress. If passed this would give US passengers compensation rights that are in line with EU261.

Yes indeed and about time too in my humble opinion. There must absolutely be no more Doctor David Dao type incidents ever again.
United: David Dao, doctor dragged off flight, speaks out (courier-journal.com)

 

[Jamesrob637]

Prague is great, both for general sightseeing and interesting transport. Probably not quite as cheap as it was.

Still reasonable if you know where to go!

 

[Bald Rick]

Then myself on September 19th 2010 also United. I flew from PDX - DEN - on UA but it was a very hot summer day in Denver. Anyway I boarded my next flight from Denver to Atlanta. Announcement. Sorry. Denver is already > 1 mile high and with the heat the lift just would not be there. Captain refused to take off because of this. GA came on and asked for 4 people to volunteer to get off the aircraft. I did, was given $300 compensation and put on a Frontier Airlines flight leaving two hours later.

Couldn’t the pilot just have asked everyone to go for a big wee? Would have saved bout 4 persons’ worth of weight.

 

[TravelDream]

Has anyone flown to Eastern Europe and if so is there any destination that can be recommended? I've been to Estonia so anywhere apart from there.

Too many places to list haha.

People have already mentioned Prague and Budapest. Both incredibly beautiful cities, but they can be incredibly touristy (pre-Covid obviously) and are nowhere near as cheap as they used to be. Still, if you haven't been, they are definitely worth visiting. If you go, I'd definitely go outside of the summer holiday peak as they are both just too busy.

I have also traveled a fair bit around the Czech Republic. There are some truly beautiful towns and cities there which tend to be less touristy. Check out Cesky Krumlov, Pilsen (home of the beer) and Brno which are all interesting.

Poland is another country which is surprisingly beautiful. There's the obvious Krakow and Gdansk, but there are more off the beaten track places which are really nice like Torun. Poland's another place which is nowhere near as cheap as it used to be. I was in Warsaw last summer and all of the relatively trendy bars packed full of locals in the centre were pushing 15 zloty plus for a pint of beer. That's about £3. You can still get a sub £1 in Poland, but only in the provinces in less fashionable bars.

If you want less touristy and cheap, Ukraine is also decent. Lviv is a little like how I imagine Krakow was 20 years ago. Wizz and Ryanair both fly there from the UK so it's not too difficult to get to. Kiev also has its charms considering it's a major city.