> Mr Zaman has launched a fundraising campaign to gather cash to fight the legal battle against United and Orbitz. So far he has raised $10,538 (£6,776) of the $15,000 needed.
considering, as the article says, this only works with one way tickets, and no luggage, how many people would be taking advantage of this that a lawsuit is necessary?
How is this lawsuit worthy at all? I don't understand how his identifying this "price loophole" is anything other than "innovation". A lawsuit for "lost revenues" simply because a 3rd party found how to save people money seems ridiculous.
if you don't ordinarily check luggage (like most people seem to do nowadays), all you have to do is buy two one way tickets.
the only downside is that you'll get selected for extra screening more often.
A friend of mine would always get the dreaded SSSS because he booked lots of last minute one way tickets for work.
Signing up for TSA PreCheck almost completely eliminated that problem. If you are willing to give up a bunch of info and pay the government, you can skip the "random screening."
Airfares aren't priced on a cost-plus basis, they're priced based on what the markets will bear. For instance, MKE-BOS has no non-stop options, so lots of airlines compete for one-stop business funneling passengers through their hubs. This drives down prices.
Compare this to ORD-BOS, which only has a few non-stop options. Those non-stop carriers (United, American and JetBlue) can charge a premium compared to, say, Delta, which can only offer one-stop options.
Passengers in captive hubs looking at monopoly routes (Houston, Detroit, Atlanta) have it even worse when looking for non-stop routes.
So a traveler looking to buy ORD-BOS will see high prices on the non-stops. I frankly don't see the problem here—almost every product is priced based on what the market will bear rather than cost+margin.
