Is the flight to Dubai more expensive than Bangkok? All the mysteries of your ticket price
Let's call them pricing mysteries. That is, the pricing systems that govern airline ticket prices. The most obvious of the [...]
Let's call them pricing mysteries. That is, tariff systems that regulate airline ticket prices. The most obvious among them is the cost of round-trip tickets, which on international and intercontinental flights is lower than one-way tickets. But how, the common passenger wonders, do two flights cost less than one?
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The curious phenomenon in the U.S. exists even on domestic flights and has engendered a countermove by savvy passengers, who buy a round-trip ticket (e.g., a New York-Miami-New York) when they really only want to fly the New York-Miami, because the round-trip costs less than the one-way flight.
The important thing, in this case, is that the leg not flown is the second, because if it is the former, the ticket automatically loses its validity, as the fare rules when ticketing online explain. The practice, which has been called skiplagging, is so widespread that American Airlines has announced measures to deter it.
But round-trip for less money than one-way is not the only pricing oddity. So is the fact that Stopover flights always cost less than direct flight between two of the same cities. One example is that of a much-flown route from Italy, that to Dubai. Between Milan and the Emirati city, for example, Emirates' direct flight (which takes 6 hours one way and just under 7 on the return) always costs more than the same route with Qatar Airways and stopover in Doha (which takes between 9 and 10 hours depending on the flight chosen and the length of stay in Doha).
An example? Milan-Dubai with outbound on October 1 and return on October 8, 2023 costs 902 euros with Emirates and 850 euros with Qatar Airways. Here the price difference is not much, and the passenger might choose to spend those extra 50 euros to enjoy a faster trip without the anxiety of connection (his and his checked baggage).
Right here is the point: companies know that non-stop flights are more 'valuable', which are more popular with travelers and tend to keep their prices high, confident that they will still collect high demand. Those that involve a stopover between two cities, on the other hand, will set a lower price than their direct competitor that flies non-stop, precisely to entice customers to choose their, of flight.
The same thing happens on the Atlantic as well: again taking October 1 and 8 as the round-trip dates between Milan and New York, we see that the non-stop airlines all have higher prices than those between the two cities that include a stopover: with Neos we travel at 566 euros, with ITA Airways at 609, with Delta at 656 and with Emirates at 685.
If there is a stopover, prices (on the same dates) drop to 461 euros with British/American (via London Heathrow), and to 545 and 546 euros with Swiss and Austrian via Zurich and Vienna, respectively. Of course, while the non-stop flight lasts between 8½ and 9 hours, the trip with the stopover lasts, with the best flight combinations, between 12 and 14 hours.
But there is a third case in which the mystery of pricing thickens even more: when flying, with the same airline, to a distant destination costs less than flying to one much closer. Let us take, again, the case of Emirates and the same dates of October 1 and 8 for the round trip: we have seen that the flight between Milan and Dubai costs 902 euros. Well, the one to Bangkok, which is another seven-hour flight from Dubai, costs 821 euros. That is, 80 euros less.
How is this possible, you may ask? There are essentially two factors here: the number of flights and seats offered by a company on a particular route and the destination itself. Bangkok is a very popular destination and extremely well connected to Europe, competition is high, and that is why prices are generally quite low, despite the distance. Even more so for those flights that involve an intermediate stop.
