Asides

Cheap Flights

By brokencode ⋅ April 9, 2008 ⋅  Email This Post ⋅  Print This Post ⋅ Post a comment

Low cost airlines tickets are very flexible and efficient organizations with a cost structure that is very different from the one of traditional airlines. Cutting many costs allows them to offer very competitive prices.

Costs are optimized mainly in the following areas:

• Tickets sales are direct, Internet being the main channel. By shortening the intermediation chain, costs can be deeply reduced.
• Smaller and cheaper airports are used, that are also less jammed by traffic.
• On-board services and crews. No meals are served. Fewer crew members are used, and airplanes need less cleaning.
• Full usage of aircraft capacity. Airplanes always fly full charge and fly more often to amortize costs. They have faster load/download times (25/35 minutes vs. 2 hours of traditional companies).
• Newer and all equal aircraft. Low cost companies fleets are made all of the same make of planes, all new ones and easy to service, in order to have them all at maximum efficiency.

To operate cheap flights, airlines must have specific characteristics to allow them to keep prices as low as possible. The basic ones are:

• A single passenger class, with free choice of the seating place.
• A single airplane make (in order to optimize service costs), such as Airbus A320s or Boeing 737s (for instance: Ryanair uses Boeing 737 series, EasyJet favors both Boeing 737s and Airbus A319s).
• Airplanes have more seats (for instance, Lufthansa’s Boeing 737s carry 132 passengers, EasyJet’s ones carry 148).
• Lower weight allowance for both hand carried and stored luggage.
• No free meals or beverages are served on board, but they are available to buy.
• Crew members fulfill multiple tasks (mainly stewardesses and stewards).
• Intensive use of airfleets. For instance, EasyJet flies an average of 10.7 hours a day, while British Airways flies 7.1 hours. Airport stops are shorter (with a faster turnover, usually 25 minutes between flights), and flights are shorter too.
• Connections are made using convenient secondary airfields, often far away from town centers, without slot restrictions, little air traffic and lower airstrip fares.
• Straight peer-to-peer connections without luggage transfers to other coincident flights (separate check-in and check-out), no coordinate flight plans with other airlines.
• Expenditure savings trough direct ticket sales, especially trough the Internet and outsourced call centers, automated check-ins and, occasionally service fees.
• Certain offers (as low as 0.99?) are only valid for in-advance bookings or are limited offers, for a relatively low number of seats.
• Lean management (savings on staff). For instance, Germanwings in Cologne employs no more than 50 people.

It is usually better to book your cheap flight in large advance, at least 15 days before leaving. Better offers are for departures from Mondays to Thursdays: Better to avoid leaving on week ends. Always buy return airline ticket and be ready to take off at unusual times (early mornings or late evenings).

Tags: airline ticket, airline tickets, Asides, cheap flight, cheap flights