LETTER: Regular traveller disappointed with disparity in air fares on American Airlines
Concerned Citizen - Wednesday, November 23rd, 2011 at 5:02 PM
Imagine my amazement the other night when I went to book two flights on American Airlines (AA) from Beef Island to San Juan. The price: $755 for one adult and one child. My budget was $500.
Now, I’ve been pretty faithful with American Airlines over the past few years because they seem to be one of the most reliable airlines and I usually travel from Beef Island just for the convenience.
I was so discouraged that I actually looked for a price from St. Thomas (which I never have done before) and to my amazement, literally the same flight (for two people) was $181. I was sure that I did something wrong so I proceeded to check on another browser, but still the same: $181 compared to $755. How is this possible? The distance is virtually the same. Both flights quote 35 minutes.
Of course I booked the St. Thomas route.
This has been the price for the past two months when the BVI hopes to have a lot of tourists coming to spend their money here. Obviously this is going to be discouraging for them.
However, the huge difference in price has now made me wonder if the BVI has hidden taxes that AA is building into their fares.
Another way the BVI is losing revenue.
Concerned citizen.
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44 Comments
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Be good to have Canadian WestJet fly twice or three times a week into and out of Beef Island. They fly 737s. No prob. ALso AA avionics don;t hold a Candle to Canadian nav gear… seriously ..I been circvling for hours over Halifax Canada w in AA when WestJet would have landed first go. It’s their equipment is not certified for fog. But WestJet would love to fly to BVI with their new service announced this week.
Hey, hey hey… Jet Blue made it’s inaugural flight today to St. Croix. Also AA just filed some sought of bankruptcy earlier this month. I predict that with Red Jet and Jet Blue that AA dominance in the Caribbean is over. Their rates are too high, service standards are low and the let goes on. I used to be a loyal customer until a couple of years ago and a very bad experience, since then I have been flying Delta, South West and any other carrier that will get me to where I am going without having all the stress that AA imposes on their customers.
Can’t comment on pricing, as I do not know, but can say connections that were great 25 years ago are terrible now. Fewer flights and few direct flights from U.S. Longer runway will only be expensive mess, as A.A. is cutting back, not planning to make direct flights to islands. Why are they cutting back when flights are over booked?
WELCOME JET BLUE: RED JET AND ANYONE ELSE.
I could tell you a ton of stories traveling up and down from PR to Beef & Virgin Gorda but, I would get a heart attack. Nothing makes sense prices, etc. I don’t even want to tell you that today a man took 10 hours from PR to VG imagine that you could fly to Europe and back. Plus he had to pay $50.00 more as he was standing in line for over 15 minutes and they made him miss his flight as he was ONLY 15 minutes late for the 2 hours and so they said he had to pay $50.00 more to have a confirmed flight after they kept him waiting in line and flight was almost empty. Oh well at least he made it BYE
$700 can take me to Palestine. i better go Palestine then pr.
The excuse american gonna tell u is that Beef Island to SJU is an international flight and STT to SJU is a domestic one. Thats the reality of it.
The real reason is all the fees and taxes imposed by the BVI. A local company that sometimes that sometimes flies a late charter to Antigua to connect with BA has found that it is cheaper to have the pilot overnight in Antigua than come back to Beef Island and pay the night landing fees. So if the BVI is serious about attracting more people to come visit they will have to seriously consider eliminating landing fees and taxes.
Wow that really is an amazing difference.
Stop fliying with them – I heard JetBlue is having a bargain fligh out of St.Thomas.
By the way, how come the BVI don’t have their own airline?
How long to travel to PR by ferry, if there was one of course.
This is unheard of people need to stop traveling and just be content. One of these days they will not have any passengers or do they want us to travel?
AA flights are so high out of beef island because they don’t have any real competition, lenghten the runaway here come jetblue, see how fast there flight drop
Booking any flight less than 2 weeks out is going to cost plenty. Booking a flight that has a holiday between the departure and return is going to cost plenty. Expanding Beef Island is NOT going to lower fares and increase flights. Mainline carriers have put their equipment onto business routes which are much more profitable than leisure/vacation routes.
Someone was reading my mind cuz for the last few weeks I was fighting with different Online travel sites to find a decent ticket out of Beef since I was going (I’m here now) to NY.
No matter how I configure it and shift things around, the price was still high and the cheaper tickets had some RIDICULOUS waiting times (Me? Overnight in PR again for a flight? Lmao, funny story there, tell you later about it)
But through all the fluff I talking, for people who aint have a problem riding AA (I’ve been doing so for years and I’m an easy man to please who don’t keep things complicated and travel alone or with one person) you can get CHEAPER tickets by booking directly from their website.
Booking through other sites for a Beef to Puerto to (Final destination) ticket was around 800 or so, but mainly becuase I was doing this as a spur of the moment.
But booking through AA airlines, and going through St Thomas, I got a decent flight for 643. Granted I had to pay 50 for the ferry and 10 for the taxi it was roughly 700 but that’s because I booked LATE.
Long story short? Book through them website and try to do so in advance to get a decent ticket using St Thomas as an alternate route if you need it even cheaper.
Tickets from EIS – SJU really never used to been so high….I used to find tickets directly on AA.com for $78 each…going and coming….sometimes even $63 on a lucky day and after tax a ticket would cost me about $196.93 or $166.93. Either way it was still reasonable and that was standard price for a while because I went to PR almost every month when I was home on vkay. Prices did increase. I’m guessing because they cut fairs a little in the US they jacked them up elsewhere.
For example, my ticket from America to STT used to cost be about $550-600 coming home….this semester I found one for $429! Weeks later it dropped to $400 and stayed so for a while. You just have to know when to book. Don’t expect a deal if you book around high season and don’t book in advance.
Btw….just to inform you guys…there’s flight from STT-SJU for $39-59 dollars 1 way….I found a ticket round trip for $90.50….we all trying to save a buck!!!
RAY!!! You hit the nail right on the head, and I can say this as a former AE employee, now employed at another airline, as far as BVI news I wasn’t aware that “American Airlines” flew out of EIS, can I get a straight flight to MIA or JFK????…..get your facts straight…..it’s no secret that “American Eagle” has kindly separated themselves from AA so let’s stop bashing AA for the prices of $327.00+ tkt fee (priced today at from 18th -20th DEC) for a tkt to fly to SJU EIS round trip and give credit where credit is due American Eagle and your former Government VIP, who didn’t want to lower the landing fee’s but instead thought it was a great idea to add a LIAT flight to SJU with no way to get back unless you stop in SXM *sighs* Fraser you’re the best……now as far as competition the only reason why we probably can’t get any other airlines to fly here is b/c of those same taxes and landing fees and because our airport runway is maybe a little too small so cry me a river people ….and support your local venders for a chance.
if you want to get cheaper and faster flights, you could book flights with cape air and air sunhine.. the planes are smaller but they will get you there faster and cheaper
Cape Air is $410 round trip – even more expensive than AA
If you buy the commuter booklet from Cape Air the fare drops to $280 round trip. Even that fare has gone up by $80 because of all the BVI taxes and Fees
It will cost a lot more for BVI to Land in PR because of two reasons:
1. We are international while STT is US.
2. PR landing tax to airlines are HIGH, PR know they are the only real HUB in the Caribbean so they take advantage of this.
If we can build a big International airport we can become the 2nd HUB in the Caribbean for Planes and generate some money for our country by charging a reasonable landing tax.
It will also create lots of jobs.
can’t wait for Delta!!
See thats why we need the airport expand so we can give AA and Liat some serious competition. Prices will drop you see!!!
Better to first get the commitment on paper that the airline(s) in question will use the expanded airport. Just because millions get spent expanding it, it does not in anyway guarantee that airlines will flock to it. Unfortunately, AA has somewhat of a lock on the Caribbean market. For other airlines to enter into it, there needs to be sufficient traffic/passengers. That AA is down to 3 or 4 flights daily (used to be many more) does not exactly prove that there is a huge market to penetrate. As to LIAT, remember it’s an acronym for Left in Air Terminal.
but ayo didn’t want competition for water and cellphones?
I too believe in American Airlines but these prices are just too much!!! This needs to be looked into seriously!
I stop using AA long time now, they charge WAY more than other airlines and their seats are HORRIBLE.
I’m not paying more money for that horrible snack and old, dirty, broken seat.
The fares quoted are based on the booked load on the flight you are trying to book, if there are only a few seats left it will be expensive. I am flying from EIS on Friday and got a very good fare but it was booked weeks ago with American. Another hint if returning to an airline website is to clear your cache, if fares have gone down it knows what it previously quoted you and does this again, if you clear the cache you get the latest fare.
@ Advance Booking – Please explain to us non-technical people what is a cache and how to clear it. Thnx
I am not very tecnical myself, this was advice given to me and it seems to work. Go to control panel, then internet options and then delete browsing history. This should delete cookies and any stored information.
I do not believe that cached pages are a problem.
That was an excellent tip given by Advance Booking. They are right on. I know you ask for their explanation, but I might be able to help you.
The cache is where temporary computer memory is stored on your computer. You can clear it from your broswer. Most websites, especially commercial ones embed in your browser what are called cookies, or bits of information that collect and stores your browing history. Passwords as well as information that you input in forms is also stored there.
If you use Internet Explorer as many people do, go to Tools > Browsing History and Select Delete Browsing History. This will clear your cache, and in this case, any stored air fares from a previous visit to let say AA website will be deleted, and the new ones will appear. Hope that helps.
Great tip. Empty cash via a pull down menu on your browser (or google how to empty cache in whatever browser you are using)
We need to improve the ferry service and taxis in ST THomas then not need to use Beef Island
We have staff coming back and forth from the US and use STT – cheaper and quicker
You see the Tourists at the airport – Thank you for visiting Tortola now pay USD20. Nice parting present.
Everyone charges this fee in various amounts (it’s called Passenger Facility Charge in the US). If you look at your total ticket costs you will see this charge for each departure hub, included under fees. The fee helps offset operating and capital costs.
Nothing unusual here…
Well, it’s not just AA in terms of price and service. On one level, we expect fares to remain the same, yet we are all paying more for gas, electricity, groceries than we did last year. That said, AA has the corner on the market to EIS, and have very little competition in the SJU-EIS corridor. And, the govt wants to expand the airport….?
I often fly to the West Coast of the US, and have found that it is by far cheaper to fly via STT (including ferries, and taxis in STT) than EIS (when comparing, don’t forget to add the $25 departure tax you pay, plus the $20+ taxi from Road town, about the same as taking ferry then taxi to STT). Plus, STT gives you other airline options to the mainland. The price yoy pay, of course, is that you have to pay attention to the return ferry schedule, remembering that it takes a while to get your luggage when you get back to STT (because they load the plane first, then bring the luggage to the terminal).
However, if you must fly to/from EIS, be flexible in your dates and times of departure and arrival and keep in mind the travel season (applies to actually any airport). And, if there is a group of you, look into chartering a plane if you’re just going to SJU.
and they steal ur personal stuff from your luggage
Welcome 2 American Airlines….and their service is P O O R!
Based on my understanding of the airline pricing, there are several factors that are probably contributing to this notable difference in airline fares.
1. The B.V.I. is considered international vs the U.S.V.I. domestic despite their close proximity.
2. Landing Fees charged by the various governments/airports.
3. Flight Frequency & Fuel Cost, and
4. Government compensation/concession fees paid to airlines to fly to their destinations to compensate them even if they fly less than at full capacity.
Of those 4, government concession fees play a significant role in the ultimate price. As such the government that does not cough up or negotiate a decent compensation package, their visitors ends up paying higher prices. It all boils down to money, and more money, competition, marketing, and how much concessions are paid to the airlines to fly to their countries. Given this, the B.V.I. government will have to negotiate something with the airlines favorable to them in order to see decent fares for flight into the B.V.I. Short of that, I guess many of us will have to take the historical poor mans pilgrimage to St.Thomas to save a few bucks. Sigh.
You surely are an AA representative!
@PLEASE STOP IT! Stop what? Thinking? Having an understanding of airline pricing? What? God, I wish I were. I could benefit from some steeply discounted fares as an agent during these holidays.
Just out of curiosity. Can you tell me why you assumed I am an AA representative? I really will like to hear your response. Thanks
How come i had to pay $25 to carry my bag from STT to MIA… They said it was a international flight.
Don’t you see that they are bending the rules to suit themselves. If I could have sailed everywhere, I would……..
I feel your pain!!!! The Airlines have totally ruined my hoilday.usual EIS to SJU fare is ranges from $195 to $225 now its like 5 times that amount. I’ve just started planning my holiday travels and boy did i get slapped back and front!….American Airlines from STT to MIA is almost $600 Roundtrip (non stop) and last month i did that same route for $205. New york $700!! I am a die hard AA fan but now i think im gonna leave em! because they’ve joined the other GREEDY airlines who wants to charge an arm and a leg for a flight.
But JetBlue is gonna start servicing St.Thomas on December 15th, tickets are good, for now. STT-SJU for $90 Round Trip. Check it out
for real….., stop playing!!!
I feel you pain I’m also a big fan of AA, but we need to be real. If you understand the airline and routes purchases you will know that beef island is what keeping American Eagle alive in the caribbean. Beef dnt have a larger airline that can compete will A. Eagle to SJU. Thats why they hit us those prices plus some seats are more expensive than others.
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