chrispy

Hi,
Anyone know why the cost of flights is so much higher when you are going from Aus to the UK against the otehr way around? It is the same company, same planes, same websites etc and yet a flight for two people from Perth to London return is $4891 while London to perth return same company is $3792. Tries for Singapore airlines and Emirates and Expedia.. why are we being penalised or ripped off here? Sure there will be some rational business explanation but the difference is over a grand that could be better spent! Is there any way of getting around this?

Cheers

Chris

Vash the Stampede

Because the airlines know a captive market when they see one.

tieve

I've found this too and it really frustrates me... I've never known if I was just choosing the wrong times of the year to fly Brisbane to London or if they really were more all the time.

It's a good job the exchange rate is so favourable for us in Australia at the moment so my wages are working out better and therefore slightly more spending money when I'm visiting the UK soon.

viksta1000

WARNING CONTAINS GEEKY TECHNICAL CRAP!!! - also fuel costs more going from oz to the UK because the planes tend to fly higher to try and catch the jet stream, also more fuel is used as australia has a lot of turbulant air at around 34,000 ft, and the jet stream is at around 42,000 ft, so the planes must fly through the turbulant air to get to the jet stream.

NERDY, I KNOW lol

Vik

tieve

lol geeky but interesting... thanks

What it still doesn't explain though is why it still costs more... I mean pricing return flights from Brisbane - Brisbane i find more expensive than London - London. Both flights have the cheaper less fuel London - Brisbane leg and the more fuel usage Brisbane - London. Are Aussies penalised for living at the expensive end?

deryans

It's a bit of both, Viksta almost correct in that the prevailing winds at altitude are mostly NWesterlies over central aisia out of singapore and bangkok, so the SYD-SIN-LHR and BKK-LHR sectors mean your average 744 is pedalling against the wind.

It's also Northern Winter now up north, so that means legally you must carry extra fuel , especially if the discharge point is LHR, for holding, weather and so forth.

For example, around this time of the year, occasionally the QF1, 2, and 5's have zero payload capacity for belly cargo, and often a block on seats, i,e, an empty section of Pax seats, because they cannot carry a full load on the SIN/BKK - LHR sector.

still does not explain away the price difference tho'

Turblence has nothing to do with it, save for flying around depressions and adverse wx, thus increasing the fuel requirement.

chrispy

The difference is that the location and distance etc are the same, htese are prices for Australia to London and back (expensive) versus London to Australia and back (cheap), therefor the same flights in effect.. so plane height, turbulent air, jet streams etc make no difference, just Aussies get ripped of by the same companies

EvannTel

Lots of things are different prices. Its just the way it is.

In UK Penfolds Bin 387 is around £15 a bottle. Here its $55 - ad its got to get and expensive airplane over there! Like air travel though, its still a necessity!

WelshSarah

I thought it was cos it wus uphil!!!

asprilla

That explains the expensive airfares... Penfolds are sending all their products around the world by airfreight !!

moneypenny20

Fascinating science but as you say, doesn't explain the price difference - a return ticket does the same route regardless of whether you start from the Uk or from Australia.

The airlines fleece you from Australia because they can. The government are very tight as to which airline can and can't have a route, the airlines then have less reason to fight for business so can happily charge what the hell they want, also presumably the fact the percentage of residents wanting to fly overseas is less, they feel the need to make as much as possible out of a small amount of people.

Whatever the reason, it sucks and it totally negates the oft mentioned posts from people still in the UK that "it's only 24 hours away and we plan to travel back once a year".

viksta1000

another reason is the amount of money the airport owners are getting from the number of airlines passing through their airport.

Eg.
London is the busiest airport in the world
Over 470,000 aircraft pass through the airport every year
over 63m passengers pass through the airport every year

While brisbane airport:
Around 130,000 aircraft pass through the airport every year
Around 15m passengers pass through the airport every year.

So as Heathrow are getting more business through the throughput of aircraft a passengers, they can charge the airlines less for various costs such as:
Parking
Landing costs
Maintainance
Storage
etc.

So as the airlines are charged less at london, the airlines can charge the passengers less.

However the same cannot be said about airlines passing through brisbane.

Now you may be thinking, the airlines have to pay Brisbane Airport co-operation ltd the same amount whether they are departing from brisbane, or arriving and doing a turn around in brisbane

This is not the case, remember, airlines will stay longer in their hub airport than they will in the turn around airport. So airlines such as quantas will pay more at brisbane, than an airline such as Air france.

Also airlines who have secondary hubs also pay more, eg. british airways has a hub in sydney, so BA will also charge more departing from sydney, same goes for emirates, but airlines such qatar airways, lufthansa and swiss dont have hibs their, so they charge less

This is the reason why airlines charge more, because the simple fact is that australian airports get less business

Sorry for the HUGE!!! post

Vik

Nu-Shooz

Not enough competition. So they charge what they want.

rockpeblar

A cheaper way of flying to London, but is more hassle, is to fly with Tiger to Singapore and then fly with say, Qatar, to London. Need to do an overnight in Singapore but does seem cheaper especially around August.

deryans

That's not entirely true, the prices for a given sector are annually regulated by IATA and published as an "agreed" pricing schedule across all the airlines, but typically the airlines can maneuver around this, for example Ryanair in Europe.

if you are getting to LHR and Back for less than 2K economy (say 1700-1800) then the airline is subsidizing your seat with first class and business class bums.

Emirates have (get this) 58 airbus 380's on order over the next 5-10 years That's going to force consolidation in a big way.