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Manchester Airport Long Haul Flights and Fares Pages
Headancer
Posts: 19 Forumite
Manchester Airport currently have a major marketing drive promoting their direct flights, especially long haul BUT I was just wondering how many potential pasengers have trouble navigating the various air fares search pages ?
Rather than "promoting a direct" a service Ex Manchester most times this option appears as a "tick box" BUT crucially is buried or is actually "off-page" within the search engine.
The the "returned values" then seem to side step what is the most convenient flight by selecting lowest price.
You may say well thats fine but this entails diverting them via Amsterdam , Paris or London etc.
22m people live within 90minutes of Manchester so it is much more convenient to fly direct.
There are flights to most major US Cities, as well as Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Doha, Singapore, Keflavik etc but my God try finding them ......
By way of example try putting in say
Manchester - Chicago
out 5th Dec back 19th
1 adult
Many sites will return a flight with DELTA (an American airline) but route you via Amsterdam with KLM (A partner Airline).
Price £400
If by some miracle you manage to find the direct service
with American Airlines it is amasingly £150 MORE....!!!!!!
Interestly one site did have the direct service but listed it at £1500 !
Some don't even bother listiing the Manchester services at all and in most cases intensify the problem by defaulting to London giving people North of Birmingham the "illusion" that Heathrow is the only way of getting out of the Country.
I happen to know that AA fly Ex Manchester to Chicago but if you didn't you would simply assume there was no direct service unless of course you happened to alight on their own web site to start with !
It's £150 cheaper to fly backwards into Europe, and then takes twice as long to get to the destination!
...AND what about the environment.
It's a situation that really only effects Manchester because of the long haul network it has built up.
If you happen to put London in where there is actualy a choice of departure airports offered, they will tend to default to the London flights of which there are many !
If you put in a regional airport it's equally academic because the majority have no direct long haul flights so they route you via London or Europe as well.
It tends not to effect short haul flights because most punters will put in EasyJet, Ryanair or Jet2 and will automatically land upon a direct service ex Manchester that way !
These sites should fall under some kind of review, it's a system which is really beyond crazy.
Rather than "promoting a direct" a service Ex Manchester most times this option appears as a "tick box" BUT crucially is buried or is actually "off-page" within the search engine.
The the "returned values" then seem to side step what is the most convenient flight by selecting lowest price.
You may say well thats fine but this entails diverting them via Amsterdam , Paris or London etc.
22m people live within 90minutes of Manchester so it is much more convenient to fly direct.
There are flights to most major US Cities, as well as Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Doha, Singapore, Keflavik etc but my God try finding them ......
By way of example try putting in say
Manchester - Chicago
out 5th Dec back 19th
1 adult
Many sites will return a flight with DELTA (an American airline) but route you via Amsterdam with KLM (A partner Airline).
Price £400
If by some miracle you manage to find the direct service
with American Airlines it is amasingly £150 MORE....!!!!!!
Interestly one site did have the direct service but listed it at £1500 !
Some don't even bother listiing the Manchester services at all and in most cases intensify the problem by defaulting to London giving people North of Birmingham the "illusion" that Heathrow is the only way of getting out of the Country.
I happen to know that AA fly Ex Manchester to Chicago but if you didn't you would simply assume there was no direct service unless of course you happened to alight on their own web site to start with !
It's £150 cheaper to fly backwards into Europe, and then takes twice as long to get to the destination!
...AND what about the environment.
It's a situation that really only effects Manchester because of the long haul network it has built up.
If you happen to put London in where there is actualy a choice of departure airports offered, they will tend to default to the London flights of which there are many !
If you put in a regional airport it's equally academic because the majority have no direct long haul flights so they route you via London or Europe as well.
It tends not to effect short haul flights because most punters will put in EasyJet, Ryanair or Jet2 and will automatically land upon a direct service ex Manchester that way !
These sites should fall under some kind of review, it's a system which is really beyond crazy.
0
Comments
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It's £150 cheaper to fly backwards into Europe, and then takes twice as long to get to the destination!
The airlines that offer non-direct where there is a direct service available need to offer a cheaper fare to make up for the inconvenience.
If they were the same fare surely everyone would opt for the direct flight
I am traveling from Edinburgh to Zurich next week - it was less than half the price to go via London than on the direct flight. My choice is to spend the additional 3 hours on the travel time and save over £100
the airlines that fly direct can charge a premium for those that do not want the inconvenience0 -
but the logic is beyond belief......
If you live near London you pay no premium, but if you live near Manchester......you pay more !0 -
but the logic is beyond belief......
If you live near London you pay no premium, but if you live near Manchester......you pay more !
How on earth is that remotely "beyond belief"? It's 100% logical... The more convenient a flight is and the less competition it has, the more expensive it gets.
Airlines don't plan their schedules around the environment, they plan it around what's most profitable for them. It's blatantly obvious that Manchester to Chicago via Amsterdam is usually going to be cheaper than Manchester to Chicago direct as a) there is no competition on the direct route, b) they need to offset the inconvenience of backtracking and spending longer on the plane and c) there is going to be much higher capacity on the route that goes via Amsterdam so there will be more of the cheapest fares.0
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