Cheaper Easyjet price from overseas

brodev

I have lifted this off another forum. If I am not allowed to do this I appologise to the moderators and please remove.
Cheating Easyjet's Exchange Rates This may have been covered before, but in case it hasn't - here's the deal. It affects anyone paying stirling for flights (one-way or return) where the first leg is inbound to the UK.

I was about to press the 'go' button on some flights back to the UK next year, only I saw something odd with the pricing. Because I was flying from Spain, the price is quoted in Euros, so I'd used the drop down box on the top of the basket page to pay in stirling because I was using a UK card. Big mistake!!

The price for one of the legs was £21.76 - which didn't sound like a 'normal' easyjet price. So I re-checked - sure enough, the euros figure was 29.99 euros. So on another computer I tried to book a return from the UK coming back on that same leg... £19.99.

Okay - long story cut short. Easyjet, and probably several others, seem to round UP their prices when they convert to euros. 28 euros becomes 29.99.

If you then ask them to convert back to stirling at the payment screen, you then get the normal exchange rate conversion ON TOP - so a £19.99 flight becomes £21.76!

So... here's how I saved £20...

1. Search for a flight from the UK going out any time but coming BACK the day you want to fly OUT from Spain. Prices will be in stirling for both legs. Use the 'next step' button to take you to the flight basket.

2. On the 'flight basket step 3 of 5' page, use the form at the very bottom of the page and 'search for more flights' button to search for and pick a one-way flight from the UK to Spain, on the day you want to RETURN. This will also be quoted in stirling. Again, use the 'next step' button to take you back to your basket.

3. Finally, on the 'step 3 of 5' page, you will now have three flights - a return and a one-way. Simply click on the REMOVE button to remove the first (outbound) leg of the UK return flight which you don't need.

Result: family of four, originally paying £247... now paying £227...!

alanrowell

Sounds like Dynamic currency conversion

The simple thing is NOT to select GBP when the prices are in Euro

PBA

alanrowell wrote: »

Sounds like Dynamic currency conversion

The simple thing is NOT to select GBP when the prices are in Euro

Actually, the problem is caused by the lack of Dynamic currency conversion.

If easyjet was to set it's prices in one currency, and then let the prices in other countries fluctuate due to the daily exchange rate, there would be no consistency in it's pricing from day to day. Therefore prices are set in each local currency, at about the same rate. This means that prices are always slightly cheaper in one currency than the other. In the OPs example, booking the flight he wanted happened to be £1.77 each more if booked in Euro than in Sterling.

This isn't a case of Easyjet ripping anyone off, but it is worth remembering to check the price of each leg of a journey separately if you're on an airline like Easyjet or Ryanair, to make sure you're getting the best deal.

Altarf

Ryanair certainly do price their flights differently depending on whether you are booking a return from and back to the UK or a one way to the UK. Earlier this year when they were doing the £10 flights, because I wanted to return from a different airport I had to buy two 'one ways' and found that the return was €10 not £10.

Similarly I recently booked some more flights with Ryanair to a destination where you cannot do web check in at the far end. So Ryanair's system would not accept the selection of web check in, even though it was available on the outbound leg, and wanted to charge for desk check in for both. Again splitting the bookings allowed web check in on the outbound, and as an added bonus, the return leg flights were 1/3rd cheaper than if they had been booked as a round trip.

richardw

I worked this one out years ago when easyjet started doing a basket of flights.

Thomask

I experienced the same discount as Altarf.


I'm about to book a flight (one way) to Cork. Does this mean I should load ryanair.com/ie to check on the price before booking on the UK site?

richardw

ryanair.com/ie will quote the price in sterling, because you are departing from the uk

loveangel

i think there is some confusion here,there are several options for getting a foreign price, what i found myselfwas that it's best to shop around between the various sites, for example you can add the country codes after the main website name and you will be paying the price of people from that country. so for romania you go to www.easyjet.ru and then you still have all the language options but go to easyjet.gr - greece and you may find that your computer cannot translate it into n/w european characters. It's great fun beating all the budget flight companies.

richardw

You need to know what the rate your bank, B Soc or credit card co is going to use and what rate easyJet are using and just compare the prices in the different currencies.