The new app and desktop instant private jet charter booking allows six cabin categories and a wide booking area.
Elevate Aviation Group’s Elevate Jet has launched an instant-booking app, and you can also book on your desktop.
According to the press release, “Committed to delivering the very best to clients, Elevate Jet combined the company’s 30 years of operations and client service with state-of-the-art artificial intelligence tools to create a platform that eliminates the outdated practices that have long frustrated travelers and finally modernizes the booking experience.”
CEO Greg Raiff says, “Private aviation has always promised luxury, but too often delivers frustration.”
He adds, “The Elevate Jet app changes everything.”
Raiff continues, “In seconds, clients can see pricing, select the right aircraft, and book with confidence. It’s private jet travel reimagined for the digital age.”
It is the latest of now more than a dozen websites from operators, brokers, and hybrids that have crossed the click-to-clunk rubicon, at least in practice.
Click to clunk notes that you can book a confirmed flight at guaranteed pricing in one online visit.
You don’t have to wait for confirmed pricing to be emailed later.
The clunk is that after you click the buy button, the next step shows up at the airport, and the cabin door closes on your private jet charter.
In terms of clicking and clunking, the Elevate Jet interface features modern design and aesthetics.
It’s very much an Aman or Four Seasons experience from a look-and-feel standpoint.
Like all online booking apps, read the terms and conditions carefully.
One-way flights carry a 100% cancellation penalty after booking, though if you put $100,000 on the account, you can get improved terms.
The Elevate app offers booking across aircraft type categories, from turboprops to long-range jets.
Hot deals – empty legs – are prominently displayed.
There were dozens of what were termed Hot Deals.
For example, there was a heavy jet seating up to 13 passengers from Miami to Orange County, California, for $35,700 and an ultra-long-range jet from Van Nuys to Teterboro on Wednesday for $40,800.
Unlike some competitors, there wasn’t a calendar to view price variations by date.
On the other hand, a nice feature was that you could select the arrival time, and it would tell you when you had to depart.
There were also prominent warnings about fuel stops and high-density airport charges.
It wasn’t possible to book a flight from Miami to Santa Monica, an airport with a runway that would be legally impossible to land a charter jet.
It also passed our Hawaii test, only providing nonstop capable aircraft.
Other instant booking apps fail these tests.
While they won’t end up performing the flight and would need to refund your payment, the point of these apps is supposed to be transparency and reducing friction.
Yes, there is a low bar for press releases in this segment.
Currently, instant booking for the Elevate Jet app is available over the same area as its fixed-rate jet card.
Compared with instant booking pricing from the two other providers we compare, the pricing ranged from much higher to slightly lower.
That’s not bad.
In the modest amount of time we have spent playing around with the apps, we have seen some prices so inflated by the app that there was no risk in guaranteeing them.
In the release, Raiff says:
‘Travelers that regularly fly private know that a private jet is a time machine. They save valuable time on every flight. But why save time on a private jet just to waste that time talking for hours? It doesn’t make sense. The new Elevate Jet app solves that problem and more. It also gives clients full transparency so they know exactly what they are paying for and can book with confidence with no surprises at the end of the flight.’
Elevate Jet says it has used AI to help make things flow more smoothly, and that as more users use it, the AI will continue to enhance the experience, Raiff says.
Part of the play is the backing of Elevate Jet and Private Jet Services Group.
Raiff says the same vetted operator set is used by its “terrestrial” charter sourcing.
The app “integrates the company’s 300-point internal flight checklist that captures both critical operational requirements and individual traveler preferences. This checklist documents everything that shapes the outcome of a flight, from regulatory and safety considerations to the personal details and preferences that define a private aviation experience.”
When you are booking with a 100% cancellation penalty, the who is the operator question becomes more important.
Like other purveyors of instant booking apps, the idea of time savings is constructed by comparing it to the old-fashioned way of calling or texting two or three brokers, then waiting for hard quotes, comparing the quotes, and putting down a credit card.
You then have to figure out the wire transfer.
The concept of instant booking saves time and reduces payment friction.
The tradeoff is the customization you get when you talk or text to a real person, particularly a competent broker.
Do you want the best price or a stand-up cabin?
Are you good with any light jet, or do you want a Phenom 300?
Do you want a Phenom 300 at the best price, but only if it’s Argus-rated?
Will you also consider a CJ3?
Apps have yet to figure out those nuances.
And while the instant booking apps are often a good experience individually, they don’t account for the time it takes to click back and forth between two or three apps to compare pricing and so forth.
In other words, would it have been just as easy to call or email a couple of your favorite brokers and get on with your day?
Elevate Jet offers a separate high-touch booking service through Private Jet Services Group.
It will be interesting to see which way clients go.
Raiff sees a robust market with multiple players.
During Corporate Jet Investor last November, he asked attendees, “How many people here have Lyft and only Lyft on their phone?”
The answer was “very few.”
Raiff said, “Everyone who’s got Uber and Lyft on their phone got to a day they were leaving a concert or they were leaving an airport and Uber just kept cancelling and you’re waiting and you’re waiting and you’re waiting and finally you said, ‘Okay, forget it I’m going to go download this Lyft thing that I know about and see if that comes, and for those of you that stuck with Lyft it’s because Lyft showed up on a day at a moment in time when Uber couldn’t deliver you a car reliably in that moment.”
He noted some rideshare users toggle between rideshare apps to compare prices.
Raiff sees the app launch as part of our overall journey to getting what we want faster.
He notes that at one time it took weeks to receive a letter from England to the U.S., before FedEx, faxes, email, and now DocuSign, which means you can sign off on that big deal with somebody on the other side of the world in under a minute.
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