The Increasing Costs of Travel
Some of the rules for a lower priced ticket
Airlines like to play follow the leader. One starts a seat sale – the others match it. One changes a key policy – and others are sure to follow. For airlines, no policy is ever set in stone.
An example of altering policy (in this case to the detriment of the flying public) is with US Airways and its if-you-don’t-use-you-lose ticketing policy. And in the copy cat ways of airlines, it appears that other large U.S. carriers have followed suit.
In what seemed an enduring policy of the larger U.S. airlines, most non-refundable tickets could be changed for a fee or rebooked for a later date (again for a fee) as long as the new travel date fell within one year of when the ticket was issued. Although the customer had to pay some form of service charge, at least the value of the ticket was not lost if for some reason the ticket could not be used as booked.
Having this option provided passengers with a benefit that charter airlines (and other low-cost airlines) rarely offer – the entire value of the ticket would not be lost if you couldn’t travel as booked, and you would be able to retain the value of the ticket as a credit towards future travel. Further, passengers were not obligated to provide exact dates and flights for the future travel. Airlines may have encouraged passengers to rebook as soon as possible, but they were not forced to do so.
So what happened?
US Airways declared bankruptcy. In an effort to reduce costs and return to profitability, they enacted a massive change in ticketing policy.
US Airways decided to rid itself of policies that served as an advantage over low-cost carriers. It decided to make less expensive tickets the least attractive by removing the ability to hold onto a non-refundable ticket and use it as a credit for future travel. Passengers must change tickets in advance if they are not using the original dates and times booked for or lose the entire value of the ticket. And passengers now pay to standby for a different flight on the day that they are booked to travel on.
One supposes that the rationale behind such policy changes is to encourage passengers to purchase more expensive tickets and to keep passengers from making changes to less expensive tickets. However, with new restrictions, the question seems to be why would passengers choose a scheduled carrier over a low-cost or charter airline when they have removed some of the benefits of traveling on them – namely, being able to use an unused ticket as a credit towards unspecified future travel and being able to standby for other flights on the day that a passenger is booked to travel.
And then American Airlines, Continental Airlines, Delta Airlines, Northwest Airlines, and United Airlines decided to follow US Airways’ policy trend.
A synopsis of policies which affect most non-refundable tickets:
- Changes to non-refundable tickets must be made before the original date of travel that was booked for expires (additional fees involved).
- Changes to non-refundable tickets must involve specifying exact dates and times for travel, and cannot be used as credit towards unspecified future travel (additional fees involved).
- If changes are not made to non-refundable tickets prior to the first date a flight is booked for, the entire value of the ticket is lost.
- Same day standby travel is permitted only after a passenger has paid a fee to do so (for most flights this will be between $25 and $100) for flights that passengers have been able to standby for without any additional fees in the past.
Some major U.S. airlines have decided to follow a route of stronger restrictions for their less expensive tickets. The cost of doing so may be losing passengers to low-cost airlines, and frustration both on the parts of front-line airline workers (who are required to enforce more restrictive policies), and passengers who are left with less options should they not be able to travel exactly as originally booked.
Airline policies are subject to change – with enough negative passenger feedback (taking business elsewhere, bombarding airlines with complaints, etc.) returning to more passenger-friendly policies is possible. For what one airline does, another is sure to follow. For now, it is important to know that the tactic of airlines replicating each others’ policies has led to more restrictions for your non-refundable ticket.
