“… taken to a security room by American Airlines. There he was interrogated – and forced to buy a new ticket – according to the boy’s father.<p>That’s all because when he checked in at the ticket counter, the agent saw his North Carolina drivers license, and suspect that the reservation which included a flight from Charlotte to New York was really a throwaway or ‘hidden city’ ticket. In other words, the boy was traveling to Charlotte but had booked a point beyond – in this case, New York, because it was cheaper. And they had no intention of flying all of the segments they’d booked.”<p>Interrogated and forced to buy another ticket because he was <i>suspected</i> of using Skiplagged(he was, but there’s no way the agent knew).<p>Airports are a trip - full of low-barrier to entry jobs with way too much power.
> Plus, you can only book these one way because if you throw away anything other than the last flight in your itinerary the rest of the trip gets cancelled.<p>I did the round trip once - well 3/4 trip anyway - back when I was a poor student. I woke up really early to board a bus for a 3 hour drive to a faraway city, where I then boarded a plane that less than an hour later had me back in my originating city (the airline's main "hub.") There I changed flights and continued on to my destination. On the return segment days later, however, I left at the midpoint and went home. This cost several hundred dollars less than the more direct alternative.<p>Airlines tend to overcharge at their hub cities because they face little competition.<p>I don't see this as a moral quandary either way, it's more like counting cards at Blackjack: the casinos don't want you to do it but it's not illegal, so if you can do it successfully, great. But if you get caught you have to pay the price.
It never occurred to me that we've been victims of surge pricing long before it became the new hip way to rake in bonus cash thanks to the example of Uber. Air travel has always been this shell game. Travel from point A to point B should be the same, no matter what, no matter when. This would render all of this trouble- the suspicion, the workarounds, the enforcement- moot.
> The passenger has reportedly received a 3 year ban from the airline.<p>I wouldn't be surprised if some major airlines would have a shared banned passenger database. Something like a no-fly list but for people who broke various fine-print airline rules. He might find himself not being able to fly on any airline for 3 years.
> Plus, you can only book these one way because if you throw away anything other than the last flight in your itinerary the rest of the trip gets cancelled.<p>Engineer in me twitched.<p>You can fly any prefix of flights, and drop any suffix. :)
This is beyond nonsense. How is having a contract that something <i>less</i> costs <i>more</i> even legal?<p>There should be rules that make it illegal to force contracts where they can charge more for less.<p>If I want to take the risk of reroutes, or want to cancel midroute in transit, that should me my right. Anything beyond that is ridiculous.
This, from an airline that has declared bankruptcy twice in the past decade. The audacity of modern American corporations is best observed through airlines. United Airlines begged for (and received) stimulus during COVID after it blew literally all of its cash on stock buybacks in the year or two prior.
Ah! Fare arbitrage surfaces again! Quoting below -<p>"when one individual is traveling from Millbrae station, a suburb south of San Francisco, to Embarcadero station which is downtown San Francisco, and at the same time a second individual is traveling from Glen Park station, a residential area in San Francisco,to Berkeley station. The two tickets cost (according to 2014 fare chart) $4.50 and $4.20 respectively. But if during the segment between Glen Park station and Embarcadero station the two travelers agree to exchange their tickets the cost becomes $5.10 and $1.85. So from a total cost of $8.70 a simple ticket swap saves $1.75 or 20% "<p>Someday I might write about the amount of light and fury generated by the paragraph above.
Seems like we need some legislation to prevent airlines from price gouging direct flights. Any flight that includes a stopover in a city should not be cheaper than flying to that city nonstop.
I try to avoid American Airlines like the plague at this point honestly. Last few flights I've had with them the landing was so rough it practically threw my back out. I've not had that problem with other airlines. It's like AA can't afford wheels. Doesn't surprise me they're doing insane stuff like this too.
But government intervention is socialism! Or...but free market is the most optimal! Or...whatever other flawed argument.<p>The US continues to prove corporations (and people) cannot be trusted. Governments and regulations are there to protect people.
> Flying to Charlotte instead of New York, at a cheaper price, is stealing.<p>This is perversion of morality at its peak. Just because the airline prices the direct flights higher than an indirect flight through a connection doesn't mean you're stealing. To suggest that the airline's right to profit (from a practice of questionable ethics) outweighs my right as a consumer to leave the airport and cancel the rest of my trip is outrageous. To call this "stealing" as though you're taking the property of the airline. Nothing is "stolen" here. If I go to a restaurant and pay for a three course meal, but decide I'm full after two courses, the restaurant can't sue me for not eating a third plate.<p>The kid in this article wasn't even in violation of a contract: just because he intended to leave the airport doesn't mean he'd violated a contract yet. I can't even imagine how the airline would take action against a passenger for this. Talk about thoughtcrime.
I would love to know of another service or product where NOT using the product results in being detained. Airlines sound more and more like a cartel than anything these days.