Seating flight BA London to Miami

[AZjohn]

Why is there so much confusion about Comfort Plus, Economy Plus, and Main Cabin Extra ( pick your Airlines) not being Premium Economy???? Words and terminology have specific meaning in the industry!

Exactly;)

If it's really Premium Economy it will be called it. All these marketing gems of "Plus" and "Extra" are just terms that are trying to trick people.

 

Edit: Maybe "trick" is the wrong term. They sometimes offer extra leg room, sometimes not. But, they are misleading some into thinking it's the same as PE.

Edited September 7, 2017 by AZjohn

[pinotlover]

AZJohn;

 

With the common occurrence of people, such as workstocruise, interchanging the terms it's obvious that a lot of people are tricked!

[workstocruise]

You're right! My bad, I did call it premium economy when it is economy plus. What was I thinking? Whatever, I paid extra for the leg room. We recently flew home from NYC in a regular economy seat and I felt like the person in front of me was in my lap the whole way home so even upgrading to get a few more inches was worth the added cost.

[pinotlover]

Workstocruise;

 

Not picking on you, but the terminology is important. Oceania, for some of its cruises, offers a $149 upgrade to Premium Economy. That is PE, not Economy Plus, Main Cabin Extra, or Comfort Plus seating.

 

When people pay for the upgrade they need to know what they truly are getting! Additionally, except for only a very small number of AA flights, US domestic carriers don't offer PE service. Therefore, one opting for O's upgrade will be flying on a foreign carrier offering PE service for the transatlantic portion of the journey.

 

Therefore, if you sign up for PE, you will be typically routed through the European hub of that carrier(unless a direct flight exists) and then into Economy to the final destination. This will happen even if a domestic carrier flies non stop to the final destination. One's pre request for PE then dictates which routings they can take. It may not be the most convenient routing, but a routing that fulfills the PE obligations.

 

Is that is understandable? The crux of the issue is Premium Economy has a defined industry meaning. It should not be interchanged with other service levels. Additionally, if one had accepted a basic Economy ticket, from O, then attempted to individually upgrade to PE from that heavily discounted Economy ticket, it can be extremely expensive.

[Rob the Cruiser]

Call it whatever you want but I'm willing to pay for the extra leg room.

[workstocruise]

Well you're right pinotlover. I did have my TA contact Oceania for their price on upgrading to PE and it was $1200 pp, while I paid $120 pp. I did not realize that going through Oceania would mean using a foreign airline. Oceania usually puts us on Delta, United or AA. Good to know for future cruises.

[jsjs]

I do not know if any of the other airlines offer this or not but Air Canada allows you to bid on an upgrade. You place a "bid" and they will tell you if they accept it 72 hours before departure. I have also noticed that sometimes when I do online check-in there is an upgrade offer available.

[pinotlover]

US carriers don't typically do that. For some domestic flights, where I have booked Economy, at the end of the booking process, the airlines have cut in and offered me a special on upgrading to FC. Only happens occasionally.

 

In the past year, the majors have changed their pricing strategy for First Class. They were losing to much revenue with unsold seats and then giving free upgrades to high status flyers. What they've now predominantly done is to dramatically cut the difference in fare costs between FC and Economy. So historically on a flight where an economy ticket was $400 a FC would be $1k or more. Today, that FC ticket is $700, and the Airlines is selling them out and making more revenue off the lower price. I've got free Airlines upgrades out the bottom that are basically worthless. Today, if I want FC domestically, I pay for it, because in most cases, if I don't,someone else will.

 

On a recent Air Canada flight, I was offered an opportunity to bid to upgrade from a PE seat to BC. I passed because the min acceptance bid was to high for me.