Are the big airlines trying to kill multi-city ticketing?

[jimntx]

Interesting pricing anomaly found by Brett Snyder (Cranky Flyer) Anybody have an explanation?

BRETT SNYDER recently ran an online search for flights from Washington Reagan to Dallas-Fort Worth to San Francisco and then back to Washington. He found something strange. If he booked the three legs of the flight as separate one-ways with American Airlines, the total cost was $412.80. But if he wanted to book the whole multi-city itinerary together, American was charging $1,837.20!!!! (Explanation points mine)

I mentioned on another thread my namesake nephew's luck with an SEA-DFW-BHM and return same stops for Thanksgiving. Total was $400 round-trip.

 

[La Li Lu Le Lo]

Interesting pricing anomaly found by Brett Snyder (Cranky Flyer) Anybody have an explanation?

BRETT SNYDER recently ran an online search for flights from Washington Reagan to Dallas-Fort Worth to San Francisco and then back to Washington. He found something strange. If he booked the three legs of the flight as separate one-ways with American Airlines, the total cost was $412.80. But if he wanted to book the whole multi-city itinerary together, American was charging $1,837.20!!!! (Explanation points mine)

I mentioned on another thread my namesake nephew's luck with an SEA-DFW-BHM and return same stops for Thanksgiving. Total was $400 round-trip.

Jim I used to audit airline tickets at TRIAD before I started working for TULE. There were all kinds of bizarre fare rules that resulted in vast differences in price.

 

[eolesen]

It's all dependent on how the fare rules are configured. A lot of these ultra-cheap one-way fares aren't combinable, which can come into play when a pricing request is no longer a round-trip itinerary.

This is how business travel agencies earn their keep. Folks clicking around the intraweb at home won't necessarily know how fare rules work behind the scenes...

 

[La Li Lu Le Lo]

It's all dependent on how the fare rules are configured. A lot of these ultra-cheap one-way fares aren't combinable, which can come into play when a pricing request is no longer a round-trip itinerary.

This is how business travel agencies earn their keep. Folks clicking around the intraweb at home won't necessarily know how fare rules work behind the scenes...

I can tell you for FACT (first hand experience) travel agencies violate fare rules all the time. The debt is rarely collected in full if at all.

 

[eolesen]

Things have changed a bit on that front. I worked a bit with debit memos in my last role... Maybe it's not seen as being enforced as much in the US, but I know for a fact it's watched like a hawk in a lot of countries.