[Smile] What's something small that really makes you smile?

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Networkn
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#3370622 5-May-2025 15:42

Rikkitic:

Competition may crimp their ability to price gouge as much there.

How many airlines do you think can be profitable in a dispursed low population country like NZ?

Rikkitic

Awrrr
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#3370623 5-May-2025 15:49

Yeah, it's hard to make ends meet with all that Bluetooth and free Internet! $700 one-way from Tauranga to Wellington, anyone?

Plesse igmore amd axxept applogies in adbance fir anu typos

networkn

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#3370653 5-May-2025 18:34

Rikkitic:

Yeah, it's hard to make ends meet with all that Bluetooth and free Internet! $700 one-way from Tauranga to Wellington, anyone?

Do you know how much it costs to run that route? Divide that by number of passengers plus make some profit (since that is the business they are in).and is their profit excessive? Also only the 787s which really only operate internationally are getting those Bluetooth functions.

freitasm

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#3370699 6-May-2025 08:38

networkn:

Rikkitic:

Yeah, it's hard to make ends meet with all that Bluetooth and free Internet! $700 one-way from Tauranga to Wellington, anyone?

Do you know how much it costs to run that route? Divide that by number of passengers plus make some profit (since that is the business they are in).and is their profit excessive? Also only the 787s which really only operate internationally are getting those Bluetooth functions.

I think that's the point of the post you are replying to. International routes have competition, so to keep prices at a level that can sell against other airlines, they have to price domestics services at a higher level to subsidise the Bluetooth and free internet features for those 787.

Note "Bluetooth and free internet features" is probably a collective for all the features available and probably don't cost that much on the big scheme of things.

But as you said, that is the business they are in.

networkn

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#3370811 6-May-2025 09:39

freitasm:

I think that's the point of the post you are replying to. International routes have competition, so to keep prices at a level that can sell against other airlines, they have to price domestics services at a higher level to subsidise the Bluetooth and free internet features for those 787.

Note "Bluetooth and free internet features" is probably a collective for all the features available and probably don't cost that much on the big scheme of things.

But as you said, that is the business they are in.

I think my point got missed. Low Volume routes in NZ are expensive to run as you need to take all the operating costs, and divide it by a relatively small number of passengers. It's not uncommon for a flight to run with only 2-3 passengers onboard.

In reality, it's not the domestic airfares subsidising the international refit, it's the international profits, that subsidise the cost of running low volume routes within NZ. I don't like having to pay big money to fly domestically either, but it's fair to pay whatever the costs plus a modest profit is.

Being government owned, Air NZ falls under quite a lot of scrutiny with it's profits and it's charges. I don't believe there is a lot of 'gouging' going on.

Rikkitic

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#3370886 6-May-2025 11:37

No-one is going to persuade me that a $700 one-way fare to any place in this country is fair or reasonable. Air NZ employs what they like to call 'dynamic' pricing, though a better label might be 'whatever we can get away with'. Air New Zealand used to be the airline of New Zealand and it comported itself accordingly, acting as a kind of treasured national institution rather than just another money-grubbing international rip-off outfit. I will take the bus to Auckland before I will enrich these buggers any further.

Plesse igmore amd axxept applogies in adbance fir anu typos

johno1234

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#3370887 6-May-2025 11:43

networkn:

I think my point got missed. Low Volume routes in NZ are expensive to run as you need to take all the operating costs, and divide it by a relatively small number of passengers. It's not uncommon for a flight to run with only 2-3 passengers onboard.

The last time I personally saw that happen was about 1987. I fly domestic a lot but almost always to a main centre, Queenstown or Dunedin. If it is a non-business flight I would try to get a cheaper seat which theoretically would be the less full one, but never seen any jet flight not full or mostly full. If such a thing was not uncommon I expect the airline would reduce that schedule's frequency. Jetstar would just cancel the flight - I have seen that happen. Perhaps AirNZ as national carrier would consider themselves duty bound to operate the flight.

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k1w1k1d

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#3370888 6-May-2025 11:46

Tesla owns Peterbilt trucks to tow their trucks around.

Tesla uses long nose Peterbilts??

johno1234

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#3370891 6-May-2025 11:51

Rikkitic:

No-one is going to persuade me that a $700 one-way fare to any place in this country is fair or reasonable. Air NZ employs what they like to call 'dynamic' pricing, though a better label might be 'whatever we can get away with'. Air New Zealand used to be the airline of New Zealand and it comported itself accordingly, acting as a kind of treasured national institution rather than just another money-grubbing international rip-off outfit. I will take the bus to Auckland before I will enrich these buggers any further.

Likewise.

AirNZ used to be an organisation that I admired so much. Very high engineering, flight/cabin crew, and aircraft quality. In the airline lingo, a top quality soft and hard product.

Now... I somewhat despise AirNZ. Their pricing is exorbitant. I am lucky to fly business class occasionally for work and their prices are higher than the likes of Qatar for a hard product that is vastly inferior. Jetstar used to be a bit hopeless but these days their domestic product compared to AirNZ lacks only schedule frequency. The aircraft are about the same. Their price is about half.

The only thing that keeps me on AirNZ is the loyalty program and even that keeps getting downgraded every year.

eracode

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#3370904 6-May-2025 12:27

Looking for a new pair of shoes yesterday, found a $215 pair on the ‘net that looked OK so went to the shop. Found the shoes, $215 on the sticker, tried them on, all good - so I said “I’ll take these please”.

The assistant rang up the bill - $103. I asked if that was right. “Oh yes, these are on sale at the moment”. There was nothing on the website, not a single ‘sale’ sign in the shop, no special or changed price on the price tag - nothing. Pleasant surprise.

Sometimes I just sit and think. Other times I just sit.

eracode

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#3370960 6-May-2025 19:10

Had another experience in the same vein as the above a couple of months ago. Four of us were arranging to hire a car in Australia for ten days in May. Did a prelim check on the ‘net and found that a mid-size SUV would cost around AUD1,700 from two or three of the mainstream, reputable hirers - with full sensible insurance cover with a ~$500 excess. Sounded reasonable to us.

We left it for a few days before going back online to book. In the meantime, I had double-checked how our credit card cover worked for overseas car hire. In short: Only one type of cover - automatically up to $5,000 cover for excess paid on hire car claims.

Went back online, found a reputable hirer who would greatly reduce the hire charge if we accepted $5k excess on the insurance (I know that’s AUD and our cover is NZD). But wait, there was more: They were offering a 20% discount for May at the location at which we wanted to pick-up and drop-off (Melbourne).

Cost was AUD800 > NZD900 for the ten days - versus the AUD1,700 we would have been OK with. Very reasonable given we’re splitting it between two couples.

Sometimes I just sit and think. Other times I just sit.

Tinkerisk

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#3372148 11-May-2025 07:21

I'm currently working on a yakitori charcoal grill. The experiments are promising. 😁

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Tinkerisk

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#3373681 16-May-2025 09:43

Time for change. Every day, a single superfluous thing has to go until at some point there are only necessities left.

Senecio

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#3373695 16-May-2025 09:57

Is a yakitori charcoal grill a necessity? 😄

cddt

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#3373699 16-May-2025 10:16

Rikkitic:

No-one is going to persuade me that a $700 one-way fare to any place in this country is fair or reasonable.

$700 is about four days work on minimum wage. When you think about it, the ability to travel five hundred kilometres over rough terrain in about an hour, in exchange for the profit of about four days of unskilled labour is extraordinarily cheap.

My referral links: BigPipe | Mercury

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