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I am planning on taking my baby daughter to the UK to visit my husband's family later this year and in the course of shopping for flight tickets, I noticed that Cathay charges an extortionate fare for infants.
The adult fare is (relatively) reasonable, at HK$6926 (incl of taxes/surcharges) but the infant fare is HK$3985 (all in)!!! Virgin, in contrast, charges a similar adult fare but only HK$901 for the child fare (all in). I double checked to make sure with CX that this was on the basis of the infant travelling with me in a bassinet, rather than in her own seat, which they confirmed. I also asked CX why they were so expensive in comparison but they could not answer me.
I was so surprised at the price difference and wondered if this is quite standard for CX and whether anyone feels that they do this to actively discourage flying with infants?
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12-02-2010, 10:06 AM #1
Infant flight fares
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12-02-2010, 10:38 AM #2
Wait till your infant becomes 2 years old and then you will shocked that most of the time you will have to pay full fare. The child fares are often a discount based on full economy so its cheaper to get a normal adult fare.
Thats one thing I hate about shopping for air tickets. You never know the true price with all the taxes and surcharges they throw on top. Its very hard to compare.
I have had the same issues with my infant daughter and child son. Basically you just need to compare the overall price for the whole family and go with the best based on that.
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12-02-2010, 12:25 PM #3
Its when you have these complications that I find a good travel agent is better than retyping stuff into various websites.
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12-02-2010, 12:54 PM #4
Yes - Cathay recently increased its infant fares from 10% of the full fare (meaning rack rate, not the discounted fare that most people pay) to 25%.
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12-02-2010, 01:41 PM #5
Excellent. A screaming baby causes more disruption to a flight than a whole row of adults. The "polluter pays" principal should apply ... where the pollution in this case is that of my ear drums....
Happy to hear Virgin is cheaper. If all the parents then fly with them, and the rest of us fly with Cathay, both parties will be happy.
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12-02-2010, 01:45 PM #6
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12-02-2010, 01:58 PM #7
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12-02-2010, 02:36 PM #8
At the Schipol gate last week I was delighted to see a party of about 20 primary school kids running wild. Oh bliss. Then some idiot decided they had to go through the full body scanner (obviously high on the terrorist profiling list) which held everything up for ages with the kids refusing to stay still for the scan. Luckily they put me in another section or put them in cargo.
Actually I don't object to the high fare for kids, they take up a seat like an adult so fair enough.
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13-02-2010, 01:26 PM #9
I always always make sure I'm as far from the bulkheads on long haul flights as possible so there's less chance of being kept awake all night...
Does the Virgin fare guarantee a bassinet? I was on a flight recently where there were more babies than bassinets, and it was just tough luck for those who checked in last - they had the baby on their lap for the whole flight.
Originally Posted by MovingIn07:
