Who on earth pays for 1st class flight tickets

[Gregoravitch]

Just got home from a lovely holiday from the US.

We splurged out for Premium Economy tickets and it was bliss, as you enter the aircraft we had to walk through first class and my word it was so bloody extravagant and packed, their didn't seem to be an empty seat.

Out of curiousity I had a look at the prices for the very same flight journey that we took for a first class ticket and the cheapest I could find was around 3 grand and the most expensive was 7 grand

3 bloody grand, if I could afford it I probably would but it seems horribly expensive. A return ticket would be 6 grand and that's more then our entire holiday for 4 for a fortnight cost.

Who are all these people paying these prices?

I'm also very envious, those first class seats looked very comfy

mazarineblue I buy my own tickets with my Amex card, & get refunded by work in order to accumulate points.

Thanks Mix56 - just wondered as we have all sorts of policies about declaring benefits-although I imagine it will be a cold day in hell before the public sector are entitled to take first class flights-even first class trains are a no-no!

We do most long haul flights in business or first on Oneworld carriers. We usually pay with points as my husband flies a lot to the West Coast and I do half a dozen Asia trips every year with work. Taxes for points fares are the same for first and business so we generally choose first if it's available!

Other than that, careful shopping means Business Class can be bought much cheaper. Our longhaul holiday this year is on Qatar, bought when they were doing 2 for 1 business class fares. Cost pp was the same as economy.

First is sometimes cheaper than business because most FTSE100 companies ban First and so less tickets get sold compared to business - I'm very surprised at the number of people claiming to fly First with their jobs. We are banned from booking first class fares, even if First is cheaper.

But even if you buy your own Economy tickets for your work, you will accumulate points that you can use on your personal flights

I would if I could!

When I was a teenager we were booked business class (paid by my dad's employer) and then there was some issue which resulted in a different plane being used - which had less business seats... so we got upgraded to first it was only a 2 hour flight but wow.

I think of these business/first flights whenever I'm on a flight for my employer... sadly I don't think the school would pay for me to fly business along with the 30 teenagers I'm chaperoning (on second thought, leave the teenagers in economy )

Long gone are the days when I travelled overnight for work but my employer did pay business class. My previous employer had his own private 727 which was incredibly luxurious and comfortable for him (own bedroom) though frankly not much better than premium economy for his staff and employees!

One of DP's hobbies is flying - he's had a private pilot's licence for over 20 years and he has to fly a certain number of hours per year to maintain it so I do get flown around in nice planes from time to time (I refuse to go up in the small, old ones he thinks are fun for little outings that make me vomit).

Never flown first class sadly We collect BA airmails, through having an Amex card, and converting Tesco points. We have a couple of lots of flight s a year to Europe by doing this, but only in Economy.
We have flown long haul with BA in business and thought it was quite poor value for the amount of airmails we used, and taxes we paid..

I have some work colleagues who fly 1st class, they have canny ways of getting relatively cheap upgrades. They make £60k+ / yr & (obviously) are travelling solo for work.

I have a family of 6. 6x first class would be > my entire annual salary.

erinaceus Ohh I've ALWAYS wanted to sleep on a train. Please tell what it's like

From what I have seen on short haul flights on 737s the seats don't look any more comfortable than in economy. I just think you get better food
On BA Club Europe the seat is exactly the same as in Economy, but they leave the middle seat empty. The only thing you really get for that extra money on short haul is lounge access.

DW and I generally fly first class when we go away.
We aren't that extravagant day to day despite being fairly wealthy so we figure why not holiday in style and comfort... After all if you can't spoil yourself on hols then when can you?

I'm related to someone that works for Virgin so me and DH have flown to New York for £95 each return in Upper Class. On most flights there will be people in upgraded seats just paying staff travel rates.

I've a cousin who's a travel agent in Australia, and she always comes home first class as she gets a discount / airmiles etc. The last ticket would have cost €15k full price.
She had a seat which pulled out into a proper bed, pyjamas supplied etc. She was gently woken two hours before landing to say her shower was ready, and breakfast would be served afterwards. Sounds amazing!

Having flown BA club with work, it is so much more pleasant than easyjet. Sadly I could never afford it myself!

It's interesting to read so many comments from pp saying how they'd rather spend the money on nicer hotels/better eating out/whatever while on holiday.

For me, the travelling IS part of my holiday. Getting to the airport, having a cheeky glass of fizz (yes, even at 7am! ) and being able to go into the lounge and relax, preferential boarding, then simply enjoying the fancy bits and pieces on board before we've even taken off. We are like kids in a sweetshop at all this stuff, because its all part of the excitement of going away and travelling in relative luxury!

Then all the niceness and comfort of the bigger, better seat and cabin, right down to getting your bags quicker the other end, and not feeling and looking like a zombie after a long flight. And then knowing it'll all be lovely for the return journey too, which is so much tougher than travelling out.

But even if you buy your own Economy tickets for your work, you will accumulate points that you can use on your personal flights

My employer generally doesn't allow people to book their own flights, we have to go through a service company, but even when they do, they took the airmiles etc for their own use.

Luckily, we haven't been asked to give up the points accumulated when paying for petrol used for business trips yet, but I'm sure they would if they could.

I took my elderly mother to New York first class. She never been there, (neither had I) only flown occasionally but loves planes/flying. She used to run out into the garden every time Concorde flew over.
She's finding it harder to get around and had surgery which makes even car journeys a bit uncomfortable. she will probably not fly anywhere again.
Obviously I know I'm lucky to be able to afford it but it was worth every penny. I will never in my life forget her face.

shotsfired - I think for me (and I'm only speaking personally) flying is just a horrible experience. Even in business, it's vile. No amount of lounges, free chocolates and champagne that I can't really taste makes the waiting around/security/sensation of sickness in the air/noise in the cabin/obnoxious fellow passengers seem less frustrating and annoying.

I think this is because I'm the kind of person who is impatient and just likes to GET places. I spend red eye flights stark awake, wondering how it can be possible for something that moves as fast as an aeroplane to crawl across the map so slowly. It doesn't move any faster in first class than it does in economy. I think I would be a LOT more tempted by something like Concorde where luxury = speed.

Shots, I get that, but that only applies if you can afford the expensive flight AND the nicer hotels etc.

For a lot of people it's an either/or choice, and I guess some people would decide the flight only lasts a few hours in comparison to a week or however long of staying in places and eating out etc.

My dad used to fly business to the other side of the world weekly, so after a decade has points to fund most of my parents' holidays for the next decade. He wanted to buy my family some flights with them but sadly points aren't transferable, so they had the trip of a lifetime to New Zealand going first class, instead. They said it made all the difference to them but for less than a 10 hour flight it probably wasn't worth it.

I got to go First and business a few times as an unaccompanied minor, which was quite fun but I didn't like caviar then and we weren't allowed wine, plus the flights were short.

I love doing it. I'm fat so it's bliss to be comfy and not get 'the look' and I love the lounges before hand, extra luggage allowance and separate checkin/bag drop/security.

Re: flights and hotels. The luxury version of the flight is many times more than the normal version compared to a luxury hotel premium over a more normal one.

For example a business class flight costs £3k on a plane where economy costs less than £500. For a hotel, the luxury 5 star version might be £200 pn, whereas 3/4 star could be around £100 pn.

People see paying twice as much for a very nice hotel that you stay in for a week as better use of the money than paying up to 10 times as much for the flight, that lasts a few hours. They can also decide to buy some of the 'free' elements in economy for much less (lounge access, drinks, meals). £50 would get you all of these, so you have everything except the extremely expensive comfy seat. Unless you truely have loads of money, or are having a treaty once in a lifetime holiday, business class is a lot of money to spend.

Firstly I have not read the whole thread but I can honestly say that unless I was seriously rich say by winning the lottery I would rather suffer being uncomfortable for a few hours than waste £3,000 to £7,000 flying first class.

Obviously people can choose what they spend their own money but to me paying these sort of prices to fly first class is just wasteful beyond belief.

Personally I would rather spend £8.40 on a prescription for some sleeping tablets and try to sleep the best I could in economy or premium economy.

Perhaps I am just tight??

IamViolet I have only done it in this country. There are two sleeper routes that I know of, London to Scotland and London to Cornwall. I tried a sitting ticket and never again. Now I will only go if I can book a cabin to myself or with someone I know in the other bunk. The first time I went, I was alone, and the notion of sharing the cabin with another person whom I did not know was...not one that appealed to me, but no worse than staying on ones's own in a youth hostel dorm.

There is a dining car for eating in, and the sleeping ticket typically gets one access both to the first class lounge at the departure station and showers at the destination station depending on the existence of either of these. In the cabin one has a sink and two bunks and a light over ones bed and space to put a bit of stuff. I believe that luggage gets loaded elsewhere on the train, much like a flight, but I am not sure that I remember.

One gets breakfast on board: tea, coffee, and a choice of cornflakes or a croissant. Between all of that, the rocking sends me to sleep. There is an attendant who will wake you up in good time for you to get off at your destination station by knocking on your cabin door. I am yet to find out what it is that happens if you do not wake up Maybe they unlock the cabin from the outside and throw cold water over the passenger? I sleep so well on trains that I imagine that this would be a risk for me if i were to go to a destination other than the end of the line.

My boss does on work trips, because he usually takes an overnight flight to the US then has to work/ give lectures straight away, it's so he can sleep/ prepare. The company who sponsors his work pays.

Then there's rich people (the bastards) and people who travel a lot for work and use air miles.