Are Aer Lingus plus fares worth it?

Boulevardier · 26-11-2014 04:53PM #1

I recently booked my Xmas flights to visit my sister in the UK, and decided to go mad and book myself "plus" tickets instead of normal economy.

I have a case to check in, but my other consideration was that a "plus" booking may be easier to change if necessary. However, on closer inspection I think I was mistaken on that.

OK you get a bag and a seat reservation included, but these are worth, I estimate, 18 Euro in total, while the "plus" supplement is 32 Euro.

What else am I getting for my money? Was there any real point in my getting "plus" tickets?

munchkin_utd · 26-11-2014 05:12PM

a 20kg bag is €30 at peak times, so including christmas
check-in in advance can cost up to €25 on short haul for an emergency row seat aparantly.
combined is 55 euro, which is a fair bit more than 32 euro

coylemj · 26-11-2014 05:28PM

It's not worth it. I was caught out last year by the vague promises which talked about airport lounges, flexible booking etc but none of them applied to the basic 'plus' supplement. Of course I only discovered this after I paid up.

If you do an online check-in 30 hours before the flight you can select your seat for free, the seats in Airbus emergency rows don't have any extra legroom and you can't store anything on the floor so they're not worth paying extra for and if you want to pay extra to sit at the front, go ahead and be my guest but don't expect me to genuflect as I pass you.

munchkin_utd · 26-11-2014 06:44PM

coylemj wrote: »

It's not worth it. I was caught out last year by the vague promises which talked about airport lounges, flexible booking etc but none of them applied to the basic 'plus' supplement. Of course I only discovered this after I paid up.

If you do an online check-in 30 hours before the flight you can select your seat for free, the seats in Airbus emergency rows don't have any extra legroom and you can't store anything on the floor so they're not worth paying extra for and if you want to pay extra to sit at the front, go ahead and be my guest but don't expect me to genuflect as I pass you.

you are presuming nobody is fussed on what seat they get, and at the same time have no bag.

but, suppose youre 6foot 6tall and must have an emergency seat with the extra legroom and you have a heap of stuff for a long stay so need a checked in bag, then the plus deal is (seemingly) cheaper than booking the 2 items separately.

Also, some (Ryanair frequent fliers) travelling with aerlingus have an inexplainable need to have a boarding pass printed out weeks in advance and see this as being as essential as bringing your passport, or breathing air (even though aiport checkin is free, ALWAYS). So for them having the boarding pass printed in advance is essential, and if they have a bag in addition then the deal would make sense.

Yamanoto · 27-11-2014 09:59AM

coylemj wrote: »

the seats in Airbus emergency rows don't have any extra legroom...

I often avail of the extra legroom in 13 A/F on the A320's .

You'll also get GC points on a plus fare OP, though just how useful those are is open to debate.

First Up · 27-11-2014 10:04AM

Yamanoto wrote: »

I often avail of the extra legroom in 13 A/F on the A320's .

You'll also get GC points on a plus fare OP, though just how useful those are is open to debate.

I always go for Row 13. As well as extra leg room, you often get an empty seat beside you as many people apparently think Row 13 is more likely to crash than any other.

Are Aer Lingus plus fares worth it?

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