Joe Sharkey At Large

Delta and United slapped in still another price hike yesterday in the form of fuel surcharges.

Can the rest of the unindicted co-conspirators major airlines be far behind?

Here’s last night’s report, and running update on the fare increases (including fare increases and fuel-charge increases) this year, by Rick Seaney of FareCompare.com:

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By Rick Seaney:

“Tonight at 8:00pm EDT, United Airlines matched the Delta Air Lines initiated airfare hike early in the day on the bulk of its route system – the hike – in the form of a fuel surcharge – is either an additional $10 or $40 roundtrip depending on the type of airfare and city pair.

“This leaves four remaining legacy airlines yet to match , including American, Continental, Northwest and US Airways.

“I have been asked to update our airfare increase timeline, noting whether the hike was base airfare or fuel surcharge related which I have done below. Effectively to an end-consumer there is not difference a hike of the base airfare or fuel surcharge as the two are combined and sales tax applied (not broken out separately on domestic airline tickets). That said there is a not so subtle difference for corporations that have negotiated airfare discounts – these discounts are only applied to the base airfare and not the fuel surcharge which reduces the overall effectiveness of these contracts.

“Our updated 2008 Increase Timeline follows:

1. January 3^rd, initiated by United, $10 roundtrip, base airfare hike, successful (sticky)

2. January 11^th, initiated by United, $30 roundtrip, fuel surcharge hike, unsuccessful

3. January 17^th, initiated by American, $20 roundtrip, fuel surcharge hike, unsuccessful

4. January 24^th, initiated by Continental, $20 roundtrip, fuel surcharge hike, successful (sticky)

5. February 22^nd, initiated by United, $10 roundtrip, base airfare hike, successful (sticky)

6. February 28^th, initiated by Delta, $10 roundtrip, base airfare hike, successful (sticky)

7. March 7^th, initiated by United, $10 roundtrip, fuel surcharge hike, successful (sticky)

8. March 14^th, initiated by United, $4-$50 roundtrip, base airfare hike, successful (sticky)

9. March 19^th, initiated by Delta, $10 roundtrip, fuel surcharge hike, unsuccessful

10. March 27^th, initiated by Delta, $10 roundtrip, fuel surcharge hike, unsuccessful

11. April 9^th, initiated by United, $4-$30 roundtrip, base airfare hike, successful (sticky)

12. April 15^th, initiated by United, $10-$20 roundtrip, fuel surcharge hike, successful (sticky)

13. April 24^th, initiated by United, $4-$70 roundtrip, base airfare hike, successful (sticky)

14. April 28^th, initiated by Delta, $10 and $40 roundtrip, fuel surcharge hike, pending

“Note that I have closed out the 13^th hike of last week with a notation that it was widely successful.”

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