Air Travel Advice, Deals, Tips, News | AirTravelGenius.com Blog (21)

Air Travel – Flying Green?

December 9th, 2006

Flying from the UK will become more expensive from February 1st 2007. The Treasury will be doubling the rate of Air Passenger Duty (APD) as follows…

Short-haul flights:
Economy Class £10 (was £5)
Business Class £20 (was £10)
Long-haul flights:
Economy Class £40 (was £20)
Premium Economy/Business/First Class £80 (was £40)

So passengers flying long haul premium economy will be hit hard in the wallet with an £80 ($150) duty charge.

The extra revenue raised will be going to the general budget and not to any specific environmental projects. Green groups welcome the charge as a way of reducing passenger numbers. Not surprisingly, the airline industry remains strictly opposed to any increases in aviation taxation. Low cost carrier Ryanair states on its website:

“Taxing air transport will not have any effect whatsoever on reducing greenhouse gas emissions but will have substantial adverse effects on European economic growth.”

Flying Green

Virgin Atlantic is this month experimenting with towing its 747-400 aircraft to the runway area to reduce costly fuel consumption whilst taxiing. The trials will take place at London Gatwick and Heathrow with co-operation from the BAA and air traffic control. If successful they hope to carry further testing in the USA next year.

Environmentally friendly flights

A small minority of travellers choose to donate money to charities such as World Land Trust in order to offset their carbon emissions from flying. You can input your route details on their site and it calculates the average amount of carbon emission involved and how much you should donate to offset the CO2. The money is then invested in environmental projects worldwide such as reforestation programs.
For example, a return flight from London Heathrow to Seattle would emit 1.69 tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere which corresponds to a donation of £12.59.

However with the sharp increase in APD, the uptake for voluntary carbon offset is likely to stay low unless the airlines themselves get more involved.

Photo Credit: Frank Arman

Tags: carbon offset, co2, flying, virgin atlantic
Posted in Environment | Comments Off

L’Avion – All Business Class Paris to New York?

December 5th, 2006

Yet another all business class airline is preparing to hit the skies. L’Avion plan to operate a five times weekly service from Paris Orly to Newark New York using a Boeing 757-200 configured with 90 business class seats.

The start-up is due to commence flights on 27th of December 2006, although it is unclear whether the airline has reached agreement with the US aviation authorities. Special offer prices will be €1000 return and the normal fare will come in at €1600 return which will considerably undercut the major carriers.

L’Avion (also known as Elsyair) is aiming to get 10% market share on the popular Paris – New York route. However with only one aircraft, they will need to provide great service to gain a loyal customer base. MaxJet and Eos Airlines have been successful flying all business cabins from London to New York – can L’Avion follow suit?

We will probably see Air France drop their business class fares to the USA in response. In addition it is possible that Maxjet could enter the Paris – New York market themselves next year.

Tags: All Business Class, l'avion, new york, paris
Posted in All Business Class | Comments Off

14 Tips to Lower Your Business Class Airfare

December 4th, 2006

Generally, first class and business class air travel is quite expensive and can run to thousands of pounds / dollars for an international return trip. Here are 14 tips to help you reduce the cost of flying in the premium cabins. Some tips will also apply to flights in economy class:

1. Be as flexible with your travel dates as possible and book in advance to get the cheaper fares. Some online booking engines such as Orbitz and Travelocity have flexible date search tools for US searches which are very helpful in tracking down the lowest available airfare over a set period of time. Unfortunately, international flexible searches have recently been restricted on both sites mentioned.

2. Don’t buy your ticket too close to your departure day – you will likely have to pay the full published fare – this can be very expensive. Full fare tickets are generally only bought by corporate travellers on official business trips.

3. Avoid travel on peak business days like Monday and Friday. Include a Saturday night stopover to lower the fare further.

4. Be flexible with your departure airport for your trip – this may sometimes yield a lower fare. Some online booking engines such as Orbitz will allow you to check prices from nearby airports.

5. Consider any ground transportation costs, especially if your airport is some distance away. For example, if you travel Virgin Atlantic Upper Class on a higher fare you will get a complimentary chauffeur driven car at both ends of the journey. Passengers flying to Los Angeles will be driven to any desired location in California.

6. Fly through hub airports – this is usually cheaper than flying non-stop. Lower prices can also be had by booking overnight ‘red-eye’ flights – those comfortable first class seats will help you sleep a little better!

7. Always check the price of your flight itinerary using a number of major online booking engines to ensure you cover all the Global Distribution Systems (GDS) networks. There are 4 mainframe GDS databases which power the airfare market worldwide – Sabre, Worldspan, Galileo and Amadeus. Some online agents will be biased towards a single GDS so you will want to cover your bases by double checking elsewhere. Also price up the flight directly at the airline website.

8. Phone a travel agent to see if they can better your online quote. You should consider also contacting a specialist business class / first class consolidator – they will have access to a number of unpublished airfares not available elsewhere. Generally, using an airline consolidator is optimal when booking around 4 to 8 weeks in advance.

9. Purchase a premium economy seat if available on your carrier – this is a seating class between economy and business class on an international flight. In an overbooked scenario, you are much more likely to get a free upgrade due to the very limited number of premium economy seats available.

10. Always join up with your airline’s frequent flyer reward program. If you can reach elite status you will be given special perks such as free lounge access, upgrade priority and seating / boarding privileges. Some US airlines automatically upgrade elite members to first class on a space available basis.

11. Consider flying on some of the new trans-Atlantic ‘all-business class’ carriers such as MaxJet, EOS Airlines and Silverjet which offer premium service at a reasonable price.

12. From the Western USA consider flying business class to Asia on one of the Asian carriers such as EVA, China Airlines and Korean – they often have very good value deals. Chinatown consolidators can be another source of very low airfares to Asia.

13. Keep informed! Watch out for special offer business class fares available on the major airlines – sign up for their email customer lists.

14. You could always ask to purchase a one class upgrade at the airport. This can be done at check-in, at the gate or in the frequent flyer lounge if you have access. Airlines offer upgrades on international flights for as little as $200 – this is significantly cheaper than booking a business class or first class ticket outright. Alternatively, buy an economy ticket and use your frequent flyer miles to upgrade to business class.

For more comprehensive advice check out the Ultimate Airfares & Upgrades Guide.

Tags: airfare, Tips
Posted in Tips | Comments Off