IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/pal/jorapm/v21y2022i1d10.1057_s41272-021-00326-x.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Premium cabin capacity sharing strategies: airline RM insights

Author

Listed:
  • Germán Escovar-Álvarez

    (Massachusetts Institute of Technology, International Center for Air Transportation)

  • Peter P. Belobaba

    (Massachusetts Institute of Technology, International Center for Air Transportation)

Abstract

This paper explores revenue management strategies for premium cabin capacity sharing, that is, accepting additional bookings in economy fare classes when some premium cabin seats are expected to remain empty. Two heuristics are presented and tested to evaluate the impacts of premium cabin capacity sharing on airline revenues and loads. These RM strategies are tested using the Passenger Origin Destination Simulation (PODS), which replicates the interactions between airline revenue management systems and passenger choice of airline itineraries, fare types and service offerings. Based on the simulations, the methodologies proposed can generate total revenue gains of up to 1.1%. However, two caveats are identified: first, losses in the revenue captured from premium fare classes are likely to be experienced due to displacement by economy fare class passengers. Second, premium cabin capacity sharing should only be implemented in the final stages of the booking process; otherwise, the sharing heuristics can result in revenue losses for the airline.

Suggested Citation

  • Germán Escovar-Álvarez & Peter P. Belobaba, 2022. "Premium cabin capacity sharing strategies: airline RM insights," Journal of Revenue and Pricing Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 21(1), pages 3-16, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:pal:jorapm:v:21:y:2022:i:1:d:10.1057_s41272-021-00326-x
    DOI: 10.1057/s41272-021-00326-x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1057/s41272-021-00326-x
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1057/s41272-021-00326-x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Alstrup, Jens & Boas, Soren & Madsen, Oli B. G. & Vidal, ReneVictor Valqui, 1986. "Booking policy for flights with two types of passengers," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 274-288, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Benoit Lardeux & Gabrielle Sabatier & Thierry Delahaye & Mourad Boudia & Odile Tonnet & Pierre Mathieu, 2019. "Yield optimization for airlines from ticket resell," Journal of Revenue and Pricing Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 18(3), pages 213-227, June.
    2. Feng, Youyi & Xiao, Baichun, 2006. "A continuous-time seat control model for single-leg flights with no-shows and optimal overbooking upper bound," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 174(2), pages 1298-1316, October.
    3. Popovic, Jovan & Teodorovic, Dusan, 1997. "An adaptive method for generating demand inputs to airline seat inventory control models," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 31(2), pages 159-175, April.
    4. You, Peng-Sheng, 2001. "Airline seat management with rejection-for-possible-upgrade decision," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 35(5), pages 507-524, June.
    5. Irene Ng & Nick K.T. Yip, 2009. "Mechanism design in an integrated approach towards revenue management: the case of Empress Cruise Lines," The Service Industries Journal, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 31(3), pages 469-482, February.
    6. Jeffrey I. McGill & Garrett J. van Ryzin, 1999. "Revenue Management: Research Overview and Prospects," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 33(2), pages 233-256, May.
    7. Richard E. Chatwin, 1996. "Multi‐period airline overbooking with multiple fare classes," Naval Research Logistics (NRL), John Wiley & Sons, vol. 43(5), pages 603-612, August.
    8. Christina Büsing & Daniel Kadatz & Catherine Cleophas, 2019. "Capacity Uncertainty in Airline Revenue Management: Models, Algorithms, and Computations," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 53(2), pages 383-400, March.
    9. E. Andrew Boyd & Ioana C. Bilegan, 2003. "Revenue Management and E-Commerce," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 49(10), pages 1363-1386, October.
    10. Robert A. Shumsky & Fuqiang Zhang, 2009. "Dynamic Capacity Management with Substitution," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 57(3), pages 671-684, June.
    11. Yingjie Lan & Michael O. Ball & Itir Z. Karaesmen, 2011. "Regret in Overbooking and Fare-Class Allocation for Single Leg," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 13(2), pages 194-208, December.
    12. Fukui, Hideki & Nagata, Koki, 2020. "How do passengers react to airlines’ overbooking strategies? Evidence from the US airlines," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 242-255.
    13. Cynthia Barnhart & Peter Belobaba & Amedeo R. Odoni, 2003. "Applications of Operations Research in the Air Transport Industry," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 37(4), pages 368-391, November.
    14. Ian Yeoman, 2022. "The continuing evolution of revenue management science," Journal of Revenue and Pricing Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 21(1), pages 1-2, February.
    15. Peng-Sheng You, 1999. "Dynamic Pricing in Airline Seat Management for Flights with Multiple Flight Legs," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 33(2), pages 192-206, May.
    16. Hans Buhl & Robert Klein & Johannes Kolb & Andrea Landherr, 2011. "CR 2 M—an approach for capacity control considering long-term effects on the value of a customer for the company," Metrika: International Journal for Theoretical and Applied Statistics, Springer, vol. 22(2), pages 187-204, December.
    17. Wei Wang & Darius Walczak, 2016. "Overbooking under dynamic and static policies," Journal of Revenue and Pricing Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 15(6), pages 534-553, December.
    18. Matzke, Andreas & Volling, Thomas & Spengler, Thomas S., 2016. "Upgrade auctions in build-to-order manufacturing with loss-averse customers," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 250(2), pages 470-479.
    19. Sergei V. Savin & Morris A. Cohen & Noah Gans & Ziv Katalan, 2005. "Capacity Management in Rental Businesses with Two Customer Bases," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 53(4), pages 617-631, August.
    20. Maddah, Bacel & Moussawi-Haidar, Lama & El-Taha, Muhammad & Rida, Hussein, 2010. "Dynamic cruise ship revenue management," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 207(1), pages 445-455, November.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:pal:jorapm:v:21:y:2022:i:1:d:10.1057_s41272-021-00326-x. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.palgrave.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.