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Last week, Delta quietly rolled out a basic-economy option for award travel on select routes. Basic-economy fares are slightly less expensive than regular economy, but they come with significant restrictions. Delta began selling basic-economy fares on paid tickets in 2012; in 2017 American and United followed suit.
Image courtesy of Delta.com
The Details
Delta has confirmed that the ability to book basic-economy awards is a test at the moment, and the pricing is only available on select routes:
- Phoenix (PHX) to/from Minneapolis MSP
- Charleston, SC (CHS) flights to most destinations in the U.S. and Canada
The new basic-economy awards are subject to the same restrictions paid basic-economy tickets:
- No changes or upgrades
- Seats assigned at check-in
- No cancellations
These fares are especially painful for Delta's top-tier Platinum and Diamond Medallion members, since they lose the chance for a complementary upgrade, preferred seating, and free changes up to 72 hours prior to departure.
Our Take
Although a new lower-priced option might seem like a good thing, basic-economy awards will likely be a poorly disguised price increase for most Skymiles members. When Delta began rolling out basic economy on paid fares in 2012, the price to buy regular economy went up by $30-50 across the board.
Instead of providing a cheaper option for flyers, basic economy simply added new restrictions at the same price as the previous economy airfare. Those who wanted the luxury of picking a seat prior to checkin and the privilege of changing or cancelling their flight (for a huge fee) were simply forced to pay more for the same economy class product they received before.
Not surprisingly, Delta is marketing the new basic economy awards as “introducing new ways to redeem SkyMiles,” and “increasing the value of their awards.”
If Delta continues to expand basic economy awards, it seems quite likely other U.S. airlines will follow. The only silver lining may be that it took nearly five years for American and United to follow Delta's lead with basic economy on paid tickets. Given the complexity of managing award tickets, let's hope their next effort to copy Delta takes even longer.
Source: One Mile At A Time
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Great post!
beware the basic economy restrictions
Not a positive development.
Please come later, the devaluation.
Sadly… if Delta gets away with this, others will follow!
Agree! And that’s a pretty big potential devaluation of award points
It nice to have the barebones limited options, but delta is not normally known for that type of offering. Interesting.
I have been looking to get into delta!! Great thanks!
more sad news…
Yet another example of an airline making the booking and flying experiences more painful for their “valued” customers.
Many standard economy awards of the international partners do not allow you to pick a seat.
jim p: good suggestions
I get that these are the lowest class tix with the most restrictions, but they should loosen up on the restrictions for the Platinum and Diamond Medallion members
Delta has a good business idea in the basic economy. For award redemption this seems poor choice. My objection with pts is to travel FC or furthest possible distance.
Delta used to be one of my favorite domestic airlines, but like its competitors, they are quickly looking to increase prices and devalue miles.
Lucky those who fly out of CHS
I think without an award chart this barely makes sense. My guess is that this just makes the rest of the regular economy flights bump up in miles, but we can’t tell because there isn’t a published award chart.
I’m interested to see how this turns out.
The only hope is that the other airlines will not follow.
I wish Delta had a proper award chart, this just seems sad.
nice “increase”!! lol
Really hoping the test fails and they decide to abandon their plans but that’s just wishful thinking 🙁
We all know how Delta operates with their tests on making money — and then we all know how other airlines follow suit 🙁
That’s what I’m afraid of.
Hmmm. Need more information.
Definitely not good news for Delta members.
A thinly veiled devaluation. I hope the others don’t follow suit, but I have a feeling they might.
They will 🙁
Maybe some saved miles at the beginning but in my opinion after a couple of years there will be an increase of requested miles for awards.
It says basic, but will increase the price. Ambush marketing
these awards are just terrible. We need airlines like Virgin America & Jetblue back
Does basic economy is just a fluff PR stunt to be able to charge more for the same seat.
We need more international competition to do fifth freedom flights to drive domestic carriers into competiting.
and back to sly pesos we go..
Do not like the direction it is going to!
We may not go for basic economy changes but there is a segment of the buying public who does seem to purchase them.
Wow! It used to be that you could ensure you were at the bottom of the priority list during irregular operations by being on an award ticket…now you can really be at the bottom on a basic economy award ticket! Yuck.
Hey Delta, please stop “increasing” the value of our awards. kthxbye
How much to sit in the cargo hold?
Thanks for the hearty laugh in the face of bad news to start my day.
Yes, this award please go away.
not a good sign…
The race to the bottom continues.
Is it really a race though? Pretty sure Delta is out-pacing anything else AA or UA is doing.
This is one of those experiments that I think I hope I want to see fail! Regular Coach with FF should be the stopping point for award fares.
Airlines are giving us less and less!
this is just part of an overall trend. fewer benefits, race to the bottom, etc.
Just a way to raise the cost of regular economy tickets, which will never return to the old price if they get rid of basic-economy.
Totally agree
This doesn’t sound like good news
Definitely not! 🙁
#notanenhancement the drive to the bottom continues….
I see this one both ways. On one hand, yes, we know the value won’t be there most likely if rolled out worldwide, and chances are the value of the SkyMiles will not make it worth while on a cost per point basis.
On the other hand, if i were having to run for a weekend to, say, family nearby on a short trip…well, I could possibly see the value on a short <1-2 hour flight.
Another way to get your points without giving you anything of real value
More garbage from Delta disguised as “increased value.” Who’s surprised?
Sad to hear this and I also believe that others will jump on board. Sad that we get less disguised as more.
Seems like a way for them to raise the price of a standard ticket.
And it’s easy for then to do it too because there’s no published award chart.
Basic economy is absolute crap. If nobody were to buy it, they would eventually do away with it.
But people are buying it — they won’t get rid of it.
It is a great way to get status chasers to pay more money.
Oops…this is not good…
I have to believe that for most folks this goes on the list of “things we never wanted to see”… hopefully it won’t go much further than this pilot program. I tend not to be overly pessimistic, but this appears to me like the first step toward raising the cost of “regular economy” awards.
Can you bring carry on bags? If there’s room.