Don’t Get Stung Inter-Island
If you plan on flying inter-island, here’s a word to the wise, watch out. It’s a new era in Hawaii transportation, and this isn’t good news for visitors (or those of us who live here).
We had two years of affordable airfares within the islands, which has now come to an abrupt halt. The good deals started with the entry of Mesa’s Go! Airlines, and was further aided with the entry of Mokulele. Unfortunately, however, Mokulele decided to call it quits recently, which returned Hawaii to the two-airline duopoly of Hawaiian and Go!. Island Air remains a relatively minor, non-jet third player which is aligned with Go!.
Inter-Island airfares are on the rise, and they won’t likely be stopping where they are at. They are working against us in three distinct ways:
1. Base fares. The base fare has risen steadily over the past number of months and today sits at $58, per segment, plus tax. If you’re flying from Maui to Kauai for example, that counts as two segments, and you can plan to pay approximately double, or over $100 each way. I expect the airlines will attempt to raise the base fare to approximately $80, as conditions permit.
2. Demand-based pricing. As you can see from the above photo, the base fare is not always available. And you should not count on it. During any “projected” period of demand, the carriers are raising the price to as much as double the base rate or more. The fares in the image are between Lihue and Honolulu, mid-week, next week.
3. Ancillary fees. Inter-island carriers have implemented bag fees of $10 for the first bag and $17 for the second bag. Ouch. Don’t forget to watch for excessive change fees as well.
Here are my suggestions:
1. Plan your inter-island transport well in advance. When buying mainland to Hawaii tickets, have a look at inter-island pricing before making your trans-Pacific reservations. That way you’ll have some idea of what to anticipate. Once you’ve purchased your mainland to Hawaii tickets, buy inter-island tickets as soon as possible, but keeping change fees in mind.
2. Avoid inter-island flights whenever possible. That means flying directly from the mainland to your Hawaii destination. Even though that may cost more than flying to Honolulu, it won’t likely be as much as the cost and inconvenience of inter-island flights.
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And what makes this ultimately sad is that with the demise of the Inter Island Hawaii SuperFerry, there is no viable alternative for interisland transportation!
What a short-sighted view that was to kill what would have been an extremely prosperous venture that would have resulted in hundreds of jobs for the Hawaiian people…now look at how many jobs were made by the alternatives to the SuperFerry…I think that number is zero! Along with the alternatives to high-priced airfares…
Ed
So what’s the Hawaiian people’s perspective on the situation (it obviously doesn’t just impact tourists)? I thought the entry of Go into the market, eventually killing off Aloha, was considered a negative.
Thanks Ed and Oliver,
Yes ferry service is really wanted and needed. Unfortunately, the Superferry was laden with problems from the outset.
For those of us living and working here, high airfares are simply crippling. It makes it hard to go to work, visit family, and more.
Aloha Airline’s owners ran the company into the ground. Their demise became inevitable. Go!/Mesa hasn’t been well received from the outset. Mokulele didn’t have a viable business plan in order to survive.
Aloha, Jeff
So that leaves only Hawaiian Air to screw us customers with imaginary fees and constant nickel-and-diming!