Delta Pricing Patterns

[WayTooExcited]

Good morning, everyone. I hope you're having a great day.

So I'm having a slight freak-out moment and was wondering if someone can help. I've been keeping an eye on the price of the flights we're going to take to and from MCO in November. The price round-trip is higher than I want to pay right now, so I've been making sure there are enough seats for the four of us to sit together. The amount of seats available has slowly been getting smaller, but still, I've been holding out hope for a cheaper price.

Well, from the time I checked this morning around 8:45 to the time I checked about 10 minutes ago, the price for the round-trip flight went up $400! I am freaking. out.

So does anyone know anything about Delta's pricing patterns? Do you think it'll go back down?

Also if I book the flight, will Delta try to get it so we can sit together? We're traveling with my 5 year old and 18 month old who have never been on flights before and I'd like for us to be sitting with them...

Thanks for any help you might be able to give!

 

[pcstang]

I only fly delta because that's my only option from my local airport. I have read, no actual experience, that you should clear your cookies if you are constantly checking. Supposedly, in this case delta website, knows you are looking at specific dates and the price may go up because of this. Again, I don't know how true this is but, I've seen it mentioned several times.

 

[WayTooExcited]

I was thinking that as well, but I checked the price on the Delta app and it's the same.

 

[rwdavis2]

The fewer seats available then, most likely, the higher the price. I've given up getting a cheaper rate on Southwest in November. More flights keep getting sold out.

 

[WayTooExcited]

I think I'm going to try ONE more time to see if the prices go down at all. If not we'll just have to take the evening flights to and from.

 

[Sandi]

Good morning, everyone. I hope you're having a great day.

So I'm having a slight freak-out moment and was wondering if someone can help. I've been keeping an eye on the price of the flights we're going to take to and from MCO in November. The price round-trip is higher than I want to pay right now, so I've been making sure there are enough seats for the four of us to sit together. The amount of seats available has slowly been getting smaller, but still, I've been holding out hope for a cheaper price.

Well, from the time I checked this morning around 8:45 to the time I checked about 10 minutes ago, the price for the round-trip flight went up $400! I am freaking. out.

So does anyone know anything about Delta's pricing patterns? Do you think it'll go back down?

Also if I book the flight, will Delta try to get it so we can sit together? We're traveling with my 5 year old and 18 month old who have never been on flights before and I'd like for us to be sitting with them...

Thanks for any help you might be able to give!

On your question regarding getting seats together, do not purchase the "Basic Economy" fares. They are a little cheaper than the "main cabin" fares, but there are restrictions and choosing seats is among the restrictions. You'll get a pop-up warning, but even with that, some people seem surprised that they can't select seats. Sometimes you'll have to look at seats more toward the back of the plane to get seats together. Different purchasers will see different availability at different time. I've earned status on Delta, so I can see more seats available than others. Some seats will become available for upgrade purchase at 45 days out, so that's another time to look to change seats (it may cost more, but it might be worth it to you). Finally, if you can be content with one adult sitting with one child, it is often easier to find two seats together than to find 4 seats together. Good luck.

 

[WayTooExcited]

Yeah, my in-laws are travelling with their three kids and they got basic economy... I'm interested to see what happens.

When I got home tonight I saw that the price had gone down a smidge on the tickets. I snapped those suckers up REAL quick.

 

[vicarrieous]

I am waiting on tickets for January with Delta too. I see some good fares for flights the next 3-4 months but after that they seem higher. I wonder if I wait a couple of months if prices might come down if we get to be 4-5 months out, but I worry about it selling more seats and prices going up. I hate the airfare game.

 

[WDWNY]

I've had the same thing happen to me. Was looking for flights for spring break (last week of april for us) in december. Prices were 289 on delta. Went back the next day when I decided we should go prices were over 500 and never went back down so we didn't go. Hate the stalking airfare game guessing if you should buy or wait!!!!!

 

[Rich M]

Most airline deals come out on late Monday night and Tuesday morning. I usually find the best deals during this time. Prices tend to jump on Thursday night through the weekend and then settle back down after

 

[afan]

You also want to take the route into account. I know from Seattle Alaska is the only airline that flies nonstop so I jumped on the flight I wanted the day it became available. Its gone up since because there is just the one per day. If I'm flying to LA I can take my time because most airlines fly that route multiple times a day.

Delta added a nonstop flight to mco and I grabbed the red eye when it became available because it's the same as the Alaska flights. They've since decided to stop the redeye and they switched me to a connection in Atlanta but the price I got is still cheaper. I imagine more of our delta flights use a different hub from here.

If I'm happy with the price, dates and times I buy.

 

[sam_gordon]

I suggest people read these:

http://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/flights/2015/05/25/airfare-deals/27789869/
http://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/columnist/hobica/2014/11/25/finding-low-airfare/19490559/
http://www.hopper.com/articles/2309/5-myths-about-booking-flights

 

[Em's GiGi]

I hate Delta. The last trip I took with 3 friends was from Dulles to St Thomas last month. We booked our tickets and chose our seats FAR in advance and arranged ourselves to sit two by two. For 3 out of the 4 legs of that journey, to and from St Thomas, I was seated by myself and the 3 friends were seated together away from me. None of these were the seats we picked, of course. I'm a big girl and can sit by myself without freaking out, of course, but it would have been lots more fun to be chatting with a friend rather than sitting next to strangers. This has really never happened to me before - I've never had my pre-arranged seats taken away from me.

I don't know why they would be any more considerate of your seat choices than they were of mine. As I said, we looked carefully at the seat availability and chose seats that were designated available. We checked in ahead of time online as requested, but our seat choices were mysteriously and inexplicably changed when we showed up at the airport. Good luck to you!

Happily, we are flying Jet Blue to Disney! We committed to those tickets in April, when we finalized our travel plans - and I look at them occasionally to see if they have dropped. They have not - in fact, each ticket costs an additional $150 more than we paid in April, so I'm thinking we got the best deal around by booking early. Not to mention, we got the best choice of seats! Hopefully, Jet Blue will honor them better than Delta did.

 

[Iowamomof4]

On your question regarding getting seats together, do not purchase the "Basic Economy" fares. They are a little cheaper than the "main cabin" fares, but there are restrictions and choosing seats is among the restrictions. You'll get a pop-up warning, but even with that, some people seem surprised that they can't select seats. Sometimes you'll have to look at seats more toward the back of the plane to get seats together. Different purchasers will see different availability at different time. I've earned status on Delta, so I can see more seats available than others. Some seats will become available for upgrade purchase at 45 days out, so that's another time to look to change seats (it may cost more, but it might be worth it to you). Finally, if you can be content with one adult sitting with one child, it is often easier to find two seats together than to find 4 seats together. Good luck.

Thank you for spelling all of this out. I had no idea about the basic economy vs. main cabin fares! I'm beginning to regret my decision to fly at all. At least I know ahead of time about the fare differences.

 

[sam_gordon]

I hate Delta. The last trip I took with 3 friends was from Dulles to St Thomas last month. We booked our tickets and chose our seats FAR in advance and arranged ourselves to sit two by two. For 3 out of the 4 legs of that journey, to and from St Thomas, I was seated by myself and the 3 friends were seated together away from me. None of these were the seats we picked, of course. I'm a big girl and can sit by myself without freaking out, of course, but it would have been lots more fun to be chatting with a friend rather than sitting next to strangers. This has really never happened to me before - I've never had my pre-arranged seats taken away from me.

I don't know why they would be any more considerate of your seat choices than they were of mine. As I said, we looked carefully at the seat availability and chose seats that were designated available. We checked in ahead of time online as requested, but our seat choices were mysteriously and inexplicably changed when we showed up at the airport. Good luck to you!

Happily, we are flying Jet Blue to Disney! We committed to those tickets in April, when we finalized our travel plans - and I look at them occasionally to see if they have dropped. They have not - in fact, each ticket costs an additional $150 more than we paid in April, so I'm thinking we got the best deal around by booking early. Not to mention, we got the best choice of seats! Hopefully, Jet Blue will honor them better than Delta did.

I had a recent flight to Vegas. I booked my seat in January, specifically an "Extra Comfort" window seat. I then checked my seat assignment every week or so. Two days before the trip, they moved me to a middle seat. Not looking forward to a middle seat for a 4 hour flight, I called. After 15 minutes, the rep finally explained they changed the aircraft, which cut out three rows of Extra Comfort seats... including the one I was in. I wasn't happy. She offered to move me to a window seat in the back, but I elected to stay with the extra comfort (albeit a middle seat). It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be.

 

[perthgirl]

I have a dilemma. Need 2 tickets MCO to SFO for January. Delta currently $220 plus bags - do I grab it or wait for Southwest in July? I am from Australia so don't have a clue re the way US airlines release seats

 

[Masonmj84]

I fly on Delta a lot and, in my experience, the prices that are quoted more than, say, 5-6 months out are usually really high. Then, they usually start to trend down, but can oscillate pretty substantially on a weekly basis. Typically, the best prices you'll see are about 2-3 months out, then they start to go up again as you get closer to the flight date.

That being said, if you are flying at at really popular time (such as during a busy holiday period), they may fill the flight faster, meaning that prices never go down that much from their original generally high levels. Conversely, if they're having trouble filling the flight, you sometimes see really low fares within 2-6 weeks of departure.

When checking flights, I always look to see how many of the seats have been sold. If I'm at least 4 months out and the plane hasn't filled all that much and prices suddenly jump up, I don't panic as I figure they'll likely come back down. If, however, seats are starting to become scarce, I'll sometimes feel the need to bite the bullet (usually, however, I've been watching all along and will typically buy in a week where prices have oscillated down and the flight is moderately sold).

By way of example, Delta is currently showing outrageous prices for our planned 2017 spring break trip, especially for the most desirable dates and times (my top preferred itenerary is currently over $1300 for a basic, nonrefundable, coach round trip for one person - I can fly overseas for less than that). I'm very confident that prices will come down from there (not surprisingly, they've hardly sold a seat on those flights), just not sure how much.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

I would def. delete your cookies and if on chrome go into incognito mode as it doesn't trace your cookies. If on your phone and on chrome it will pick up your gmail account if you've searched on it so you would need to delete your cookies on chrome on your phone too. I'm not positive on the app if deleting data on your setting options would work the same way.

We just booked tickets to HNL from KCI (really MCI) for September and once I closed my window on my computer and went back into Delta's website the flight I wanted went up. Deleted my cookies and history and went into incognito mode..checked again flight was back to what it was when I had just checked not even 3 mins before. Also my husband was checking the same flight on his computer (which he was at the time in a completely different state) and the price was the same as it was when I first checked.

Did the same thing on my phone..same result price went up then I deleted my cookies went into incognito mode on chrome on my phone and price went back down again (my phone is logged into my main gmail account and my computer was logged into a different gmail account).