Has Delta lost their minds?

[Mark Biggerstaff]

For my ATL to JNB in business class 27 May to 8 June... wait for it... 930,000 miles. After that flight and two first class seats to Saskatoon in Nov (son's HS grad present) even my Delta account is wiped. 2 million miler.

Well looks like we are on same flight!
I am May 27 also second row Delta Comfort

 

[Goose Cracker]

Well looks like we are on same flight!
I am May 27 also second row Delta Comfort

Ha! Well by all means, let's catch up. As it gets closer, just reach out and we can meet in the SkyClub at the Intl Terminal (F) at Hartsfield!

 

[sgt_zim]

I have never paid more than $1250 for round trip tickets to jnb.
Iirc I have flown dulles to fra to jnb twice. Once in June, and once in July. Flown from Durham to jfk to jnb in April iirc.

Some airports are very expensive to fly out of. I don’t fly out of Clt, which is 45 minutes from me. It is cheaper for me to take a train to dulles, and fly out of dulles than to fly out of clt. I also book about 5-6 months in advance.

Another tip is to clear your cookies, or check prices in igcognito mode. If you keep checking prices, the airlines algorithm will slowly keep raising prices.

Exactly right. I work for the software company that writes the software for booking seats. If you fly over salt water on an international carrier, they're using our software. About half the domestic airlines use our software. Southwest and Lufthansa have been our customers for 30+ years.

 

[jeff]

I have never paid more than $1250 for round trip tickets to jnb.
Iirc I have flown dulles to fra to jnb twice. Once in June, and once in July. Flown from Durham to jfk to jnb in April iirc.

Some airports are very expensive to fly out of. I don’t fly out of Clt, which is 45 minutes from me. It is cheaper for me to take a train to dulles, and fly out of dulles than to fly out of clt. I also book about 5-6 months in advance.

Another tip is to clear your cookies, or check prices in igcognito mode. If you keep checking prices, the airlines algorithm will slowly keep raising prices.

Do you mean the airlines have a way to track you and raise prices ? Please explain to some one who is not real computer savvy.

 

[Graham Hunter]

I have never paid more than $1250 for round trip tickets to jnb.
Iirc I have flown dulles to fra to jnb twice. Once in June, and once in July. Flown from Durham to jfk to jnb in April iirc.

Some airports are very expensive to fly out of. I don’t fly out of Clt, which is 45 minutes from me. It is cheaper for me to take a train to dulles, and fly out of dulles than to fly out of clt. I also book about 5-6 months in advance.

Another tip is to clear your cookies, or check prices in igcognito mode. If you keep checking prices, the airlines algorithm will slowly keep raising prices.

I do none of the above. I always end up with cheaper tickets than when I started.

 

[jeff]

I do none of the above. I always end up with cheaper tickets than when I started.

Please let us know how you get tickets cheaper than the rest of us?

 

[sgt_zim]

Do you mean the airlines have a way to track you and raise prices ? Please explain to some one who is not real computer savvy.

It isn't that they "track you," per se. Most commercial enterprises have web sites that use "cookies," semi-temporary text files stored on your computer. The programmers who write the code for their web pages can write anything to the cookies, including your browsing history for that website. It actually isn't nefarious. Most of the data collected in cookies has to do with ensuring identity (the computer kind of identity) to make sure you're not spoofing somebody else, and that somebody else isn't spoofing you. They can use cookies to store images and other things on your local hard drive. If they have a very busy web page, reloading those images into their web page from your local disk the next time you go to that web page is WAY faster than sending those images over the internet, and means their servers don't have to do as much work. A few MB of files stored on your computer for future use may not sound like much, but consider that outfits like Amazon, Delta, Microsoft and the like get millions of hits per day.

Using cookies means that generally after your very first visit to a website, that website will load WAY faster on subsequent visits than it did on the first one. If nobody used cookies for things like this, it would probably slow the internet down to like it was in the days when we all used dial-up modems at 33 kbps to surf.

 

[Graham Hunter]

Please let us know how you get tickets cheaper than the rest of us?

Don't know if I get tickets cheaper than anyone but I do know I start looking early and when I find the price that works for me I book it. Sometimes it takes 2 days sometimes 2-3 months,

 

[sierraone]

Agree with Graham, unless it is a last minute deal that pops up that you want to take, plan you hunt in detail 6-8 months ahead and buy your ticket 5-6 months ahead. You stand a much better chance of saving considerable money on the air fare.

 

[Mark Biggerstaff]

Ha! Well by all means, let's catch up. As it gets closer, just reach out and we can meet in the SkyClub at the Intl Terminal (F) at Hartsfield!

Will do!! Looking forward to it.

 

[sgt_zim]

Sundays are generally best for buying airline tickets.

 

[Scott CWO]

Exactly right. I work for the software company that writes the software for booking seats. If you fly over salt water on an international carrier, they're using our software. About half the domestic airlines use our software. Southwest and Lufthansa have been our customers for 30+ years.

@sgt_zim - So it’s your fault!?! Lol.

Have any other tips for us neophytes? Is there a break on Sundays, etc...?

 

[sgt_zim]

Sundays you'll find fares generally a bit lower I think just because of lower web traffic to the airlines and 3rd parties who book flights.

I don't actually write the software, I try and keep our software and the networks free of bad guys.

 

[Philip Glass]

Did you search the travel dates on Priceline’s website? You can easily see for yourself what Delta charges. Good way to double check a travel agent.

Or just get the Delta app and it’s super easy to check

 

[Philip Glass]

Something doesn’t sound right. But then again it’s Delta. They suck. I booked my flight thru Expedia New York to Namibia end of May $1300. SA all the way.

SA sucks for the most part but it’s cheap. I’ve done it through DC and if the price is right I’ll do it again.

 

[Philip Glass]

Well looks like we are on same flight!
I am May 27 also second row Delta Comfort

I am May 26th!

 

[Philip Glass]

No matter how expensive it is or the trouble they cause us DL200 is the fastest way to get to Africa for most of us. The business class is usually $10K and Comfort+ is only a tiny bit more comfortable but affordable. The planes are full and they can charge whatever they want.
I will be very interested to see the new premium economy that they will likely have next year some time, it will be expensive but true premium economy and a real option over business class. No date has been posted for DL200 to get the 777 remodel but should be late this year or early next year.
Philip

 

[jeff]

Delta is not always expensive , last year my wife and I got round trip tickets from Missoula mont. for $ 1,411 it was the about the cheapest we could find anywhere. It was advertised as a major carrier non stop from Atlanta but wouldn't tell who with, but since that was was the only non stop I knew it had to be Delta and booked them.

 

[jeff]

P:S that was peak season July too.

 

[Ridgewalker]

Ouch! You guys are making my bank account hurt from what I paid for my July-August trip this year! Guess I’ll need to be more careful my next trip with the granddaughter so I can afford another animal for each of us.