Plane Fares. What are they thinking?

There's probably a good reason for it, but here it goes.  On pricing plane fares, we found one way tickets ranging in the $1000-1200 range.  The round trip fares are only $348 each way- so around $700 after fees.  So the airline makes it cheaper to fly you twice, spend twice as much fuel, feed us twice (and fill hubby up with alcohol twice since he is extremely afraid to fly) than to just send us there once?

I am guessing it must be because they are trying to limit/discourage people just flying over and staying?  Doesn't it occur to them anyone intent on staying- legally or not are going to opt for the cheaper fare?

Anyone have any ideas why this is so? 

No idea, it's always been that way... but can you tell me where you're seeing $348 and what time of year that is for?! I need to travel to the UK for my PhD and can't find less than $600 right now and I'm willing to travel any time.

balmerhon, the $348 is half of the round trip, so when you do the RT it's $700.

However, I've seen flights for $515-$550 from DC -> London (I'm looking at Thanksgiving week, but I've also checked for late October and the fares are similar)...leaving on a Thursday, coming back the following Monday (10 days total).  I believe the site's been linked here before by other posters - atiflights.com.

OK. Duh. Misread her post!

Thanks for the link... I'll have a look.

OK. Duh. Misread her post!

I did too, at first, out of eagerness to snag that super low fare now.

Sorry- that was misleading.  I was going through British Airways (that's the only way my husband will travel) and they break it down show outbound flights at a rate of $XXX and the inbound at a rate of $XXX.  I tried to uncheck the return portion but they wouldn't let me! Bummer.

$600 for a single person to go seems okay.  How about $3500 for a family of 5?  EEK!  There goes anything I might possibly make from selling the stuff in my house!  

No idea, it's always been that way... but can you tell me where you're seeing $348 and what time of year that is for?! I need to travel to the UK for my PhD and can't find less than $600 right now and I'm willing to travel any time.

Have you tried studentuniverse.com?  You can register as long as you have an email address associated with a university and I've recently seen October flights for around $500 including all taxes.  I've found really excellent deals on there in the past, so it's worth bookmarking for the future, at any rate.  I once flew from Raleigh to Frankfurt roundtrip for $250 *after* taxes! 

none of it makes sense...I just checked a flight with continental from Newark, NJ to London Heathrow on Monday Sept 21st and it is $522 which is reasonable. The same flight on the same carrier from Newark to Bristol for the same day is $2,839.00 how do they figure this out...One way is $965.00 it is ridiculous ...and when I looked at British air they were charging $620 but have charge $200 in fees and a bunch more in taxes...so at the end of it the total of the flight was $1400.00....I think if they want to continue to make money and keep their airlines running they should lower their fares somewhat..and I have air miles with continental but the restrictions and rules are so tight they don't allow you to use them...

none of it makes sense...I just checked a flight with continental from Newark, NJ to London Heathrow on Monday Sept 21st and it is $522 which is reasonable. The same flight on the same carrier from Newark to Bristol for the same day is $2,839.00 how do they figure this out...

Isn't it something to do with the popularity of the flight route? If more people fly to London from Newark than to Bristol, then the airlines can charge lower fares without losing money (or, the other way around, they have to charge more to go to Bristol because not so many people book onto those flights). I live in Bristol, but I have always flown to the US from Heathrow or Gatwick because flights from Bristol can cost several hundred pounds more!!

Isn't it something to do with the popularity of the flight route? If more people fly to London from Newark than to Bristol, then the airlines can charge lower fares without losing money (or, the other way around, they have to charge more to go to Bristol because not so many people book onto those flights). I live in Bristol, but I have always flown to the US from Heathrow or Gatwick because flights from Bristol can cost several hundred pounds more!!

I've found this to be the case with my routes I think--I go through Newark, but I fly into Birmingham instead of London (I've been told I'm on my own in terms of getting back to Northampton if I fly into London ). When I was booking my last flight, I had to do a RT ticket since it was 400 USD cheaper than a one-way (though much of the cost of my tickets come from flying out of the west coast, so it's almost 6,000 miles per trip). I'm thinking like Bristol, Birmingham isn't an overly popular airport compared to the ones in London so the prices are a bit bigger.

With that said, I only ever fly Continental since they can give me the most direct route between Oregon and the UK--just one layover in Newark, which is lovely

that makes sense...thanks for setting me straight ladies...I will say I always fly continental because it is the most direct and most inexpensive of all the airfares I can find

Juliebug, icelandair flys from certain US airports to Scotland and charges low rates for the one way.  I got my one way from Minneapolis to Glasgow for under 400$  Might be worth taking a lot.

One-way fares are much higher than round-trip fares because it's usually business travellers who buy one-way fares. And since their company picks up the tab, they (the traveller) doesn't care about the price as much. Business travellers are not as price sensitive as leisure passengers.
One-way fares are less restrictive than cheaper round-trips -- if you compare the fare rules for one-way fares you'll see it's easier and/or cheaper to change the dates, that travel isn't restricted to certain days, and that you can purchase them much closer to the travel dates. In exchange for this flexibility (which, once again, is targeted towards business travellers who may have to change plans or book tickets at the last minute), you pay more.
If you're not willing to pay for that flexibility, you'd buy the cheaper roundtrip. And the rules for that will mean you'd have to pay a lot to change the travel date, you may be restricted to travelling only on certain days, and you have to purchase the ticket at least X days in advance.

It's all about segmenting the customers. Why to you think movie theaters charge less for midweek matinees?

Just wanted to add that I recently booked flights to Boston for Thanksgiving on American Airlines. We leave LHR the Wed night before Thanksgiving and fly out of BOS that Sunday evening (to be home for work on Mon morning). Flights were $500 each/ round trip...on American's actual site. I don't understand it either. Since I am paying the same for a one-way to LHR this week from Tampa. I think you just have to shop around and purchase on the right day of the week.

A week ago I found one-ways through Aer Lingus for less than $500.  They have more city choices than Icelandair I think.  I couldn't get to Minneapolis - my closest cities are Detroit and Chicago.  Only crap thing is the ONE checked bag allowance!!