Did Porter Airlines reveal the re-imbursement rate paid by Alaska Airlines for Porter flight reservations using points?
Most airlines in Canada, impose a minimum 7-day advance purchase restriction for any possibility of a discounted fare. If you purchase a flight more than 7 days in advance, you will pay a fairly reasonable cost to fly between Ottawa and Toronto:
If you book similar flights, less than 7 days in advance, regardless of how full the flight might be, you will be paying significantly more money. This can be observed in the picture below. This type of price difference is very common amongst all airlines in Canada, except Flair Airlines.
Booking request for a flight on short notice
I received a call from a good friend of mine, looking to buy a ticket from Ottawa to Toronto round trip on short notice. Similar to the example above, flights were nearly $1,000 round trip, even though the flight was quite empty. However, I knew that Alaska now partners with Porter Airlines. When I searched for flights on Alaska Airlines, the desired flights were available for 9,000 Alaska Mileage Plan points and US$84.66 in taxes and fees.
I went to the Porter website to ask for a flight confirmation from their system. When I got the email, at the bottom, had this “receipt” available.
Alaska paid how much for the Porter Airlines flight?
Honestly, I was very surprised to learn that Alaska possibly paid C$170 for the round-trip ticket. The C$124.84 is roughly equivalent to US$84.66, accounting for currency rate fluctuation. However, Alaska paid approximately 1.4 cents per point for my flight on Porter Airlines. That was significantly higher than I would have imagined. Ben had posted that back in 2013, Singapore Airlines from Bangkok to Singapore used to be re-imbursed just US$35. To hear Alaska paying roughly US$125 for a Porter flight in Economy Class comes as a big surprise.
