Pricing Strategies
What Are Pricing Strategies?
Pricing Strategies are custom fare adjustments that you can apply on top of your route’s base ticket prices. They allow you to set percentage-based discounts or surcharges for certain flights or passengers, based on criteria you define. In essence, a pricing strategy can lower your fares to attract more passengers or raise them to deter certain passengers – giving you fine-grained control over who boards your flights. These strategies can be scheduled (with start/end dates) and targeted to specific scenarios, acting as a powerful tool to shape your airline’s demand.
Key points:
Base Fares vs. Adjustments: Every route has base prices for Economy, Business, and First Class. Pricing strategies then apply a percentage change (positive or negative) to those base fares. For example, a –20% strategy gives a 20% discount off the base fare, while a +20% strategy adds a 20% surcharge.
Multiple Strategies: You can have multiple strategies active at once. If a passenger falls under more than one, the effects stack additively – e.g. two 10% discounts yield an overall 20% discount. (Discounts combine up to a max of 100% off, meaning fares won’t go below free. Surcharges have no fixed cap, so prices can increase without a hard limit.)
Class-Specific: Each strategy can be limited to certain cabin classes. You might apply a strategy only to Economy passengers, only to First Class, or across all classes. If no specific class is toggled in the strategy, it will apply to all cabin classes by default.
Filter Negation (Exclude). Any Route or Demand filter can be negated to target everything except the specified value or condition. In the UI, toggle the ⛔ “Exclude” control on a selected filter to invert it. Summaries and chips display Not … phrasing (e.g., “Routes not departing EGCC”).
How Pricing Strategies Work
When you calculate demand for a route, FSCharter checks all active pricing strategies for your company and sees which ones apply. A strategy will apply to a given flight only if all its filters match (explained below). The system evaluates strategies in the context of each passenger group to determine an adjusted ticket price, then uses that price to decide if those passengers can afford to board your flight.
Filtering by Route: First, FSCharter filters your strategies by the current route. Any strategy with route-based criteria (like specific airports or distance) is considered – if the route doesn’t meet those conditions, that strategy simply won’t apply. (For example, a strategy set for “routes under 500 nmi” would be ignored on a 1000 nmi flight.)
Filtering by Passenger/Demand: Next, for each group of passengers wanting to travel, the system checks demand-based filters of your strategies. These criteria target attributes of the passenger’s journey (such as their origin, final destination, journey length, etc.). All demand filters in a strategy must match a passenger group for the strategy to affect them. If the group doesn’t meet the criteria, they don’t get that discount or surcharge applied.
Calculating the Adjusted Fare: If one or more strategies apply to a passenger group, the percentage adjustments are summed up. For example, say you have a 10% off strategy for short flights and a 15% surcharge for first-leg connections, and a particular passenger qualifies for both – the net adjustment would be +5% (–10 + +15). This net percentage is then applied to the base fare for that cabin class to get a modified price. A positive total means a higher price than base, and a negative total means a discount off the base. (All discounts are applied first and fully, then surcharges add on; effectively, it’s an additive combination.)
Affordability Check: Finally – and most importantly – FSCharter uses the modified price to decide if those passengers will actually board. Each passenger group has a budget for their entire journey. The system allocates a portion of that budget to your flight based on the distance it covers relative to their whole trip. The passengers will only board if your ticket price is within that affordable share of their budget. If your price (after any strategies) exceeds what they’re willing to pay for this leg, they’ll choose not to fly with you. In other words, raising the price via a strategy can filter out passengers who can’t afford it, and lowering the price can attract passengers who otherwise might not afford your flight. This affordability filtering happens automatically as part of the demand calculation.
Example: Suppose a group’s total remaining travel budget is £500 and they have two legs left (your flight plus another of equal distance). Roughly speaking, they might only allocate about £250 to your leg. If your pricing strategies push the ticket to £300, that exceeds their budget for this portion, so they won’t board. But another group heading only to your destination might be willing to spend their entire £500 on your flight (since it’s their final leg), so they would still board.
All of these calculations ensure that pricing strategies consistently influence both the demand estimates (route demand summaries) and the actual boarding when you assign an aircraft. The same logic runs in both cases, so a strategy’s effect on passenger numbers is predictable.
Defining Filters (Route & Demand Criteria)
When creating a pricing strategy, you can set Route Filters and Demand Filters to target exactly when the strategy should apply:
Route Filters: These filters restrict the strategy to certain flights based on the route’s characteristics. You can filter by:
Departure or Arrival Airport – e.g. apply only to flights departing EGLL (London Heathrow) or arriving KLAX (Los Angeles).
Departure or Arrival Country – e.g. apply to any route that lands in a specific country. For instance, a strategy could target all routes arriving in the United States.
Route Distance (Less or Greater than X) – e.g. apply only to short-haul routes under a set distance, or only to long-haul routes over a certain distance. (Distance is measured in nautical miles.)
If you don’t set any route filter, the strategy is assumed to apply to all routes by default. If you do set filters, a route must meet all of them. For example, if you filter for “Departure Airport = EGLL” and “Greater Than 2000 nmi”, then a route must depart Heathrow and exceed 2000 nmi distance for the strategy to trigger.
Demand (Passenger) Filters: These filters narrow down which passenger groups on a given route are affected. They target properties of the passengers’ entire journey (not just your flight). Some of the demand filters available:
Final Destination (Arrival Airport or Country): Target passengers whose ultimate destination is a specific airport or country. For example, a filter for arrival country = Japan means the strategy only affects travelers who are trying to get to Japan in the end – even if your flight alone doesn’t reach Japan.
Origin (Departure Airport or Country): Conversely, you can filter by where the passengers started their journey. E.g. you might give a discount to anyone who began their trip from your airline’s hub airport.
Journey Distance (Greater or Less than X): Target passengers by the total length of their trip. Greater than 5000 nmi might single out globe-trotters on very long journeys, whereas less than 500 nmi finds those on short trips.
Journey Leg Position – First or Last:
First Leg filter catches passengers who are on the first segment of their journey (they haven’t flown any prior legs before your flight).
Last Leg filter catches those for whom your flight is the final segment to reach their destination. If a passenger will reach their final destination when they get off your plane (no further connections), they count as “last leg” – this is especially useful because such passengers will pay their full fare upon reaching your destination, unlocking all remaining revenue for their ticket at that point.
Collaboration (Collaborative vs. Non-Collaborative):
Collaborative passengers are those whose journey involves multiple airlines or hand-offs in a partnership network. In other words, they are being passed between different carriers as part of an interline/partnership agreement (e.g. a traveler you picked up who will connect onward with a partner airline, or someone who came from a partner onto your flight).
Non-Collaborative means purely self-contained trips with no partner hand-offs – essentially “fresh” demand that hasn’t been handled by any other airline and is starting with you. (This typically refers to passengers who have not left their original departure point yet and are flying entirely on your airline.)
If no demand filters are set, the strategy applies to all passengers on the route. If you do set filters, a passenger group must meet every one of the conditions to get the strategy’s price change. For example, you could target “passengers on the last leg and whose final destination is in the UK” by combining Last Leg + Arrival Country = UK filters – only those finishing their journey in the UK on your flight would match all criteria.
Using these filters, you can be very specific. You might create one strategy for short-hop economy passengers out of your hub, and another for long-haul business-class transfers, each with different discounts. This flexibility ensures you only adjust prices for the situations you intend.
Strategy Effects on Who Boards
By tailoring prices with strategies, you effectively influence which passengers decide to fly with you. The affordability check in FSCharter is what connects your pricing strategies to passenger behavior: if a certain group of passengers becomes “too expensive” for what they’re willing to pay, they simply won’t board – leaving room for others who can pay. Likewise, lowering fares for a target group makes it more likely those passengers will choose your flight over alternatives.
In practical terms, pricing strategies let you shape your load in line with your business goals:
Filtering Out Unwanted Demand: If there are passengers you don’t want to carry, you can strategically price them out. A common use-case is avoiding passengers who won’t pay you until much later. For instance, suppose many passengers on your flight have far-off final destinations (meaning they’ll connect through partners and you only get paid when they eventually finish their trip). You might create a strategy that heavily surcharges any non-Last Leg or collaborative travelers on that route. Those connecting passengers will see a high price and likely choose a different routing, whereas passengers who will finish their journey at your destination (and pay upon arrival) can still afford to board. In effect, you’ve used pricing to ensure only final-leg passengers fly with you, so you get immediate revenue from all tickets on that flight.
Attracting Targeted Passengers: Conversely, you can lower prices to attract certain kinds of demand. If you’re part of a partnership and don’t mind waiting for downstream revenue, you might discount collaborative journeys (e.g. giving 10% off to passengers coming from or heading to partner flights) to fill your plane. Those passengers might not have chosen your flight at full price, but with a discount they’ll board, contributing to your long-term revenue stream. Another example: if you have excess First Class capacity, you could apply a strategy like “50% off for First Class on routes over 2000 nmi” to entice luxury travelers on long-haul flights. The strategy would apply a discount only in that scenario, hopefully boosting your premium cabin occupancy without affecting other routes or classes.
Balancing Demand and Revenue: Pricing strategies let you strike a balance between flying full and maximizing profit. You can experiment with different filters and adjustments. For instance, a moderate surcharge on very long journeys might trim some ultra-budget travelers (freeing seats for higher-yield passengers), while a small discount on short hops could boost your load factor where you have competition. The net effect can be tailored to your goals – whether it’s immediate cash, higher yield per passenger, or simply higher passenger counts.
Remember that strategies can be turned on, off, or scheduled, so you can adjust your approach as conditions change. For example, you might run a limited-time promotion (via a strategy with a start/end date) that discounts certain routes to build goodwill or respond to a competitor, then have it automatically end. All the while, FSCharter’s demand engine will continuously re-calculate which passengers join your flights based on the latest pricing.
Pricing strategies are a powerful feature to manage your airline’s demand:
Flexible Filters: Define when and to whom a price adjustment applies – by route, destination, journey type, etc. – allowing highly targeted pricing policies.
Discount or Surcharge: Set percentage changes to your base fares (e.g. –5% up to +100% or more) that can stack together if multiple conditions are met.
Demand Shaping: Influence passenger behavior through affordability – unwanted passengers can be priced out, while desired ones can be incentivized to board.
Use Cases: Avoid carrying connecting passengers who delay your revenue by restricting to final-leg demand, encourage partnership transfers with special fares, run promotions for certain markets or classes, and much more – all without micromanaging each route every time.
By understanding and utilizing pricing strategies, you gain an important tool in FSCharter to direct who effectively boards your flights. It’s not just about setting the “right” price universally – it’s about the smart price for the right situation. With well-crafted strategies, you can ensure your aircraft are filled with the passengers that align with your company’s objectives, whether that’s maximizing immediate income, building long-term network revenue, or optimizing the mix of passengers you carry. Use this feature to fine-tune your operations, and adjust as you learn how different strategies impact your company’s performance.