Skift Take
Erratic airfares will likely be a theme over the course of the year. The question is how damaging, reputationally speaking, will the settling down period be for American Airlines, compared to the financial gains — short or long term.
It's been a fortnight since the American Airlines' airfare shakeup, and travel agencies continue to report fairly large discrepancies and some confusion — including a twist involving the carrier's smaller hubs.
Business travel platform AmTrav said its corporate customers pay more when not going through American's New Distribution Capability platform on at least 34 percent of bookings, with the difference averaging $128. However, one agency told Skift a gap of more than 400 percent recently appeared.
To recap: American Airlines told travel agencies and online booking tools they need to start using New Distribution Capability connections to continue to access its full range of fares, as the airline pulled some 40 percent of the fares from what the airline calls third-party legacy technology platforms (that use decades-old Edifact technology.)
This includes the global distribution systems Amadeus, Travelport and