Wizz Air, a Hungarian-based budget airline, hopes to attract more customers with a new “All You Can Fly” deal for travelers interested in taking unlimited flights across Europe. The subscription is currently available at a discounted annual fee of 499 euros ($547) that will rise to 599 euros ($657) on Aug. 16. If the deal sounds too good to be true, that’s because there are some hidden caveats. Subscribers must book flights up to three days before departure and will have to pay an additional flat fee of 10 euros ($11) per booking. The deal also only covers one personal item, meaning customers will have to shell out for carry-on or checked baggage.
The airline’s “All You Can Fly” deal, which will allow a total of 10,000 members to catch flights across European cities like Paris, Madrid and Vienna, shares parallels with a similar deal launched by Frontier Airlines last year for North American consumers. Members of Frontier’s GoWild! subscription also need to pay extra for luggage and additional add-ons like snacks, drinks and reserved seats and must reserve international flights 10 days in advance.
Wizz Air is hoping the initiative will entice new clients amid financial and reputational struggles. The company earlier this month reported 45 million euros ($49 million) in operating profits from April to June, a 44 percent drop year over year that was largely influenced by grounding of nearly one-fifth of the airline’s fleet due to engine inspections. And in February, the consumer group Which? found the carrier ranked the worst short-haul airline by U.K. passengers.
Airfare overall has managed to avoid any sharp increases despite inflationary pressures. While core inflation in July was up 3.2 percent from last year, airline fares in the U.S. were down by 2.8 percent, according to data from the Bureau of Transportation Statistics. Airline fares decreased by 1.6 percent month over month, making July the fifth month in a row it has dropped.
This decline can be partially attributed to a decline in jet fuel prices, Stephen Brown, the deputy chief North America economist at Capital Economics, told CNBC. Average aviation jet fuel prices for August are down by 17 percent year over year, according to data from the International Air Transport Association.
Those interested in saving even more money on air travel through Wizz’s new deal should take advantage while they can, as unlimited flight subscriptions have been historically short experiments for airlines. In 2009, JetBlue debuted an unlimited $599 “All You Can Jet” offer that proved too popular, with the airline running out of supply and suspending sales of the pass mere hours after releasing it.
American Airlines (AAL), too, rolled out unlimited lifetime tickets in the 1990s that were acquired by a few dozen travelers for $250,000 each, with the option to pay another $150,000 to add a companion feature. In the late 2000s, the airline terminated the program after realizing how much the lucky ticketholders, some of whom accumulated more than 30 million miles, were costing them in lost revenue.
