Tag Archives for throwaway ticketing.
American Airlines confronted a reader over throwaway ticketing when he arrived at the airport. He was told that he had better fly all of the segments in his itinerary that day, and that American would be watching.
Instead, the reader got off of his flight to Philadelphia and went home, never taking the last flight on his reservation. As promised, American flagged him, suspended his account – and demanded restitution for past instances of throwaway ticketing.
Airlines have tried to crack down on the money-saving practice of ‘throwaway ticketing’ for years. You buy a flight to somewhere that connects beyond your final destination because it’s cheaper, and just don’t take the flight.
A reader was recently approached by American Airlines customer service staff at the airport and warned against throwaway ticketing. He did it anyway. Here’s what happened.
Right now airlines will take any money they can, and employees may be looking for metrics and wins to justify their jobs, so it doesn’t surprise me – whether corporate policy or individual initiative – to see the airline going after violations that can extract incremental revenue, and to do it in a way that maximizes likelihood of payment.
Ben Baldanza, who used to be CEO of Spirit Airlines, now has a podcast. He told a story about when he ran marketing for US Airways and a rental car company in Greensboro, North Carolina wanted to buy frequent flyer miles to reward their customers for throwaway ticketing on his airline.
A flight from DC to Milwaukee via Chicago might be cheaper than flying non-stop to Chicago. So you add the connection from Chicago to Milwaukee, even though you don’t plan to take it. That’s throwaway ticketing.
That saves you money, but it violates airline rules. You may think you’re buying a seat on both the DC to Chicago and Chicago to Milwaukee flights, and you should be able to do whatever you wish with your seat (take the flight or not take the flight). The airline, though, thinks they’re selling you a ticket from DC to Milwaukee and argues that’s a different product than a flight from DC to Chicago.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
