A teen traveling solo for the first time from Gainesville, Florida to Charlotte was 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.
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.
The boy’s father said he booked the ticket using Skiplagged, which helps find such throwaway options, but he didn’t know that airlines frowned on this. The dad always books with Skiplagged, and has for years, but the child had never even traveled alone before. The boy was on his own and confessed.
“Interrogated a little bit, ultimately taken to a security room,” added Hunter Parsons. “They kind of got out of him that he was planning to disboard in Charlotte and not going to make the connecting flight.”
…An American Airlines representative canceled the ticket and made the family purchase a new direct flight ticket.
Throwaway ticketing is a practice that’s gone on for decades. Airlines often charge more money for non-stops than they do for connecting itineraries. So people book a flight with a connection through the city they want to travel to, and just don’t take that second connecting flight. As a result, they can often save money, but there are risks.
It is not illegal to engage in throwaway ticketing. It violates airline rules. And people disagree with the ethics. You ‘agree’ to the airline’s contract, with terms you likely do not know about, when you buy the ticket. Is it unethical to violate an adhesion contract, with whatever airlines decide to throw in there? You’re buying seats on two flights, isn’t it up to you whether to use those seats or not? To the airlines, though, a trip between Gainesville and New York is different than a trip from Gainesville and Charlotte and comes with different pricing. Flying to Charlotte instead of New York, at a cheaper price, is stealing.
More important than the ethics for many are the risks. If your flight is delayed or cancelled, your airline may want to re-route you through a different hub than the city you actually wanted to fly to (and get off in). You can’t check bags, because those will go to your final ticketed destination rather than where you’re flying. And if you’re forced to gate check a bag when overhead bins are full, you’re in a bind. 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.
And of course since you can’t check bags on a ticket like this, you really shouldn’t check in at the airport and involve a live agent in the process. Check in online or using the mobile app. And if you don’t do that, at least use a kiosk.
This story surprises me because I wouldn’t expect American Airlines corporate security to be on-site in Gainesville. Much more likely, I’d think, would be for the passenger to be met on arrival in Charlotte which is a hub and more likely to have airline staff that might handle this.
According to American Airlines, they “didn’t know about that part of the incident” but shared,
Purchasing a ticket without intending to fly all flights to gain lower fares (hidden city ticketing) is a violation of American Airlines terms and conditions and is outlined in our Conditions of Carriage online. Our Customer Relations team has been in touch with the customer to learn more about their experience.
The passenger has reportedly received a 3 year ban from the airline. There’s no leniency for juveniles. The family also had to purchase a new ticket for him to travel – effectively a walk up non-stop to Charlotte – and didn’t receive a refund for the original ticket. This last part seems wrong to me.
- The ticket shouldn’t be ‘cancelled’, no violation of American Airlines fare rules took place. The passenger was stopped prior to travel, which means they never ‘got off in Charlotte and didn’t take the connecting flight.’
- Instead they were told they couldn’t use the ticket they’d purchased for their intended trip. So they should have been allowed to apply the value of their ticket towards the purchase of the new one.
The exception here would be if the throwaway ticket was in basic economy, in which it would lose all value if not flown. But given that the passenger is receiving a three year ban for something they actually did not do (because American stopped them before they could), why not just say “ok, I’ll fly on to New York” as the ticket entitled them to do? Then get off in Charlotte anyway. Because they’re getting the three year ban penalty either way. Doubling down on the penalty and the extra ticket cost seems punitive for the kid’s first offense.
Normally an airline won’t catch someone doing this as a one-off. The story of this teen is highly unusual. Interestingly the Biden administration’s proposed airline fee disclosure rules would require any website displaying airline schedules to show specific fee information prominently. They treat airlines as owning that fee information, and allow airlines to choose which sites to work with and provide fee data to. By not distributing the fee information that websites are required by law to display, airlines can shut down services like Skiplagged that they do not like.
(HT: @RossFeinstein)
You can bet there’s more to this story. If the father was a repeated offender, a son with the same name could have been caught in a trap set for the father.
On the other side, does Skiplagged really not warn its users that airlines can void your ticket when you don’t intend to fly the last segment? If so, the buyer should demand a refund from Skiplagged.
@ Gary — I’ve got mixed feelings in this. The father is stupid, and AA corporate security needs some staff cuts. Otherwise, I suspect the rest of the story is a bit hyperbolic.
The AA Contract of Carriage is fairly clear on the cancellation and lack of refund – it’s the reservation, and does not require taking the flight:
Reservations made to exploit or circumvent fare and ticket rules are prohibited.
Examples include (but are not limited to):
Purchasing a ticket without intending to fly all flights to gain lower fares (hidden city ticketing)
If we find evidence that you or your agent are using a prohibited practice, we reserve the right to:
Cancel any unused part of the ticket
Refuse to let the passenger fly and check bags
Not refund an otherwise refundable ticket
Charge you for what the ticket would have cost if you hadn’t booked it fraudulently
Require you refund to us any compensation we provided like bag delivery costs, and reimbursement for clothes or toiletries because of late or lost bags
I’m more intrigued by the fact that he is a minor and the airline interrogated him. I would have expected them to require an adult present. After all, as far as I’m aware minor’s can’t enter into a contract in the United States but I’m not a lawyer. As such, shouldn’t an adult over the age of 18 been required to be present during not only the interrogation but also since the minor can’t enter into a contract shouldn’t the adult who purchased the airfare be banned from the airline instead of the minor? This is an interesting situation but likely could have been handled better on the part of American Airlines. But it doesn’t surprise me because many of their staff love to escalate conflicts rather then deescalate.
For once, good for American Airlines! While I abhor the pricing of tickets that encourage throw-away or “skiplagged” pricing, when people intentionally cheat the airline, they should be punished. Some airlines have done away with bereavement fares for the same reason. I once had a passenger who asked for a bereavement fare to attend his grandmother’s funeral. But then he made the mistake of asking about carrying golf clubs as checked luggage. I politely asked the name of the funeral home (which is legal) and he gave it along with the telephone number. I put him on hold and called the “funeral home”. When the “funeral home” answered, all I said was, “This is XXXX with YYY Airline” and without prompting, the “funeral home” said, “Oh, Mrs. ZZZZ is here”. BUSTED. Canceled his reservation, and had the airline block further reservations in his name. BTW, direct flights can be more expensive than nonstops from the same city pairs. Each airport does charge the airline a fee, which the passenger will be reflected in the price.
If they’re going to die on this hill, then they should immediately stop cancelling onward reservations with their automated system for people they *think* will misconnect. If their claim is that the product sold is a trip from X to Y, then cancelling reservations for an onward segment proactively and forcing in some cases people to spend an overnight at Z is a tacit admission that the trip is two segments and can be manipulated at the point of connection for various needs.
I feel bad for the kid. Imagine you flying for the first time by yourself, ever, and you are pulled into an interrogation. I would look at air travel differently from then on.
@ptahcha – but without the action to actually abandon the segment, the passenger could still take the segment!
Just think, if AA had decided he couldn’t make the connection there to NYC, they’d have given his place to someone else.
HINT when skiplagging…get the shortest connection layover time possible when flying AA
J/K
He was detained – but didn’t break a law? Very familiar with the rules about detaining suspected shoplifters, and a violation of the law has to happen first. Private security can’t just detain someone because they ‘think’ they are going to do something. He didn’t even break the contract, because he didn’t have the opportunity. Saying you are going to break a contract and actually doing it are two different things. If this truly went down as detailed, it sounds like a lawsuit waiting to happen.
So the airlines try to play the moral game when someone tries to save money, but they will give your seat away to someone else who is paying more than you did for buying a ticket last minute and put you in a crappy seat and not refund you. Their morality only works in their favor.
Maybe the airline should practice consistant pricing… not charge let’s say $280 one way to NYC thru Charlotte… and charge $330 one way direct to Charlotte… skip lagging would disappear if they charged only $200 direct into Charlotte
Airlines are welcome to have whatever pricing schemes they want. But they can’t use a contract of adhesion to take away your inherent right to not be imprisoned. No one can force you to go somewhere or stay somewhere absent certain circumstances where there’s evidence you’ve committed a crime, and violating a contract of adhesion is not a crime.
The kid should file a DoT complaint for IDB and get his 4x original fare back, and stick the airline with the penalties for not following IDB disclosure.
Should also sue the airline for detaining a minor. (Although we may be jumping the gun in assuming a parent wasn’t present, as one would assume a 15-year-old isn’t driving himself to/from the airport and questionable how he’d book another ticket on his own.)
It should be illegal for airlines to ban skiplegging.
If they want to stop that practice, they should price their tickets fairly.
A flight with a stopover should never be cheaper than a flight directly to that stopover.
My best guess at what happened: the kid himself has been skiplagging for years. Although it was his first time flying alone, he had accompanied his father on the many years of hidden city tickets previously purchased. At some point, AA security flagged all associated accounts for the next prohibited flight. He was not able to check in because the PNR was flagged and instructions were given to the agent at check in to thoroughly question the passenger. So the agent did not just suspect something was wrong and choose to harass a teenager, but had specific background and instructions laid out in the PNR.
From there, who knows. Maybe the agent went too far in the “interrogation”, maybe they “detained” him in a super scary room in a tiny airport… or maybe the teen quickly fessed up and was compliant while the agents followed the instructions they were given, which required some time in another area to work out while not holding up everyone else trying to check in. It sounds like AA is trying to get to the bottom of that part of the situation, which may or may not have been handled as they would have liked, especially given the age of the passenger.
Meanwhile, dad goes on a victimization media strategy for doing something he knew was against the rules. I don’t buy at all that he never realized what he was doing… skiplagged itself has instructions about what to do and caveats that it’s against the rules. I just did a dummy booking and there’s a clear pop-up that you have to acknowledge that states, among other warnings, “Airlines don’t like when you miss flights to save money so don’t do this often”. Sending a kid on a solo trip using hidden city ticketing is a risk, regardless of whether it’s illegal.
OTOH, I don’t blame him for taking the opportunity to shed light on ridiculous airline ticketing structures and policies that fly in the face of logic. But he’s not a victim here.
“Taken to a security room”? I’ve never known any airline to have a “security room”. They may have taken him to a “secured” location–a back office or another place the general public doesn’t have access to.
There are really only a couple of ways to get caught doing this. First, you’ve done it before and been caught, and you’ve been flagged by the airline. Or you ask to check a bag only to the connecting city and not the final destination–that’s a sure way to throw up a red flag.
As a previous poster commented, there’s more to this story that’s not reported here.
But, as previous people have noted, in a way it’s the airlines fault for having pricing practices like this that can be exploited. Most airlines–not just AA–do this.
“Taken to a security room” and “interrogated” are the father’s terms to describe what happened. This from the man who admits to violating the terms of carriage on American tickets for years, and for then putting his unaccompanied minor son in this situation. To me it smacks of him desperately trying to throw shade on American. I would not use his terminology in replying here and think it should not have been repeated in the headline to this post.
If someone essentially kidnapped my child and forced my child in a closed room with them, I’d be more than happy to serve my lifetime jail sentence for what I’d do to them.
I truly mean that.
In reality, I’d make sure to get the name(s) of whomever wanted alone time with my child and make sure the world knew they were a pedophile.
Think friends, neighbors, school, future employers. Every time. I’d never let it go.
On the other hand, major airlines have been experiencing so many flight disruptions due to staffing shortages lately, yet they continue to over sell flights knowing full well they are going to leave passengers stranded in airports, sometimes for days on end. Major Airlines, if you can’t deliver as advertised, SELL LESS TICKETS!!! Give yourself some headroom to manage the delays. This is corporate greed at its worst, and is pretty close to fraud in my eyes. They’re not holding up their end of the deal, so I don’t blame anyone for trying to hack the system a little.
Great take Gary.
The crime, if it is, never occurred. I hope the dad sues the hell out of AA.
I can’t believe people still fly legacy airlines. “Skiplagging” is not even a thing when you can buy a budget airline ticket for 1/4 the price.
I see nothing wrong with this. I’ll tell you what is wrong and that’s jamb packing us into seats so ridiculously close you can’t be the least bit comfortable. For charging us for every little thing anymore. To hell with these airlines.
I believe the passenger’s family has legitimate grounds to sue American Airlines for the following reasons-
Intentional withholding of contracted services- Even though AA’s contract of carriage prohibits intentional skiplagging- this is not legally enforceable. A consumer purchasing a product or service is free to consume all, part or none of the service unless their action causes the business to incur additional costs. Given that this individual had no checked in baggage, there was no security risk or operational disruption. Think about opting to go for a set menu deal at a restaurant that is priced lower than indiviidual dishes on the a la carte menu. You opt to go for the starter and main course but skip the dessert. Would the restaurant staff be justified in interrogating you on whether you actually intended to have all the courses? Or better still force feed you the dessert? Why is this any less ridiculous here? This is probably the reason why skiplagging was not declared illegal by the courts even though the airlines tried.
Violation of privacy: Airlines cannot insist on passengers declaring their final destination unless it is for legitimate reasons- safety and security which clearly wasn’t the case here.
Discrimination: Given the above the airline’s action to ban the customer for 3 years is discriminatory.
Additionally, the aggressive and punitive actions taken by AA, interrogating an unaccompanied minor in a security room can be malevolent negligence, intimidation and harassment.
Additionally, the wording of AA’s contract of purchasing a ticket without the intent to fly is too broad. By this logic, passengers purchasing a lower priced return fare even though they intend flying one way may be questioned by AA.
The family could get a sizeable out of court settlement from AA- they won’t risk an adverse judgment as it will open up a whole new can of worms that will impact the whole industry.
While AA may consider skiplagging stealing, I consider AA charging more for a short flight than a longer thru-flight routing “gouging.”
The violation of Conditions of Carriage did not occur. I hope the boy’s father finds the best justice that money can buy and holds AA accountable for intimidating the young man.
If this teen was skiplagging before and AA has a record of this, the airline has a reason to cancel all the following reservations. This would be akin approaching a person who is just entering a store and presenting that person with an evidence of the previous shoplifting.
Several years ago, one of my friends was trying to find an award ticket to fly back to RDU from Europe in summer months. AA agent on the phone suggested booking XXX-LHR-RDU-CLT and simply skipping the last leg. But I guess this is different for the award tickets?
After the American people have given these airlines bailouts time after time, They need to STFU and honor ANY reservation and ticket that is paid for regardless. I guarantee the next time these airlines come hat in hand to the American people for a bailout it won’t end well for the airlines.
I worked at GNV for AA while in college, there is no security room. We have a tiny office behind the ticket counter, and that’s it. No where in the story does it say he’s a minor, but a teen. If he was in GNV, he was probably at UF and 18, returning home for the summer.
@ Kuloko — I have often wondered the same thing.
if AA does that to me , I will be the beginning of a Class Action Law suit. F them if i don’t want to use any part of a ticket I own. If they had transparency with their pricing , maybe, but it’s all a Scam. How stupid are their customers that believe AA’s BS, them saying it cost more to only use half a ticket when you paid for all of the same damn ticket. Keep saying it over an over and it will still be ‘Chikin Shit’
Imagine if McDonald’s operated like the airlines:
A teenager purchases a large combo meal at McDonald’s, because it is less expensive than purchasing all of the individual food items individually. A McDonald’s employee believes that the teen may not eat all of the food, so before the teen leaves the restaurant, the employee takes the teen to the back office of the McDonald’s. Under duress, the teen confesses that he was going to throw out the food that he could not eat. McDonald’s then takes away the remaining food that the teen fully paid for, forces him to buy the food items individually at a more expensive price, refuses to refund his initial purchase, and then bans him from all McDonald’s for three years.
Most people would find the aforementioned scenario ridiculous on McDonald’s part. With the airlines it is even worse, because unless the passenger agrees to the onerous terms of the airlines, then he will be stranded.
I am not a great supporter of government regulations, but when an industry has repeatedly shown wanton disregard and abuse of their customers, it is time for government intervention. In addition, unconscionable contracts are immoral and illegal and such contracts should not be enforced by the state.
A custodial interrogation of a minor is illegal. AA deprived the youth of his “liberty.” AA took a policy dispute/violation and made it into a crime on their part. If he was truly detained, AA will be significantly liable – much more than the alleged lost revenue.
@Eternal Tech –
Good example. I suspect the “security” person had other things in mind when forcing a child into a closed room under duress, however.
We need names.
Airlines selling multi-segment fares should publish clearly the differential prices based on the passenger’s choice of termination. For a ticket from AAA-BBB-CCC-DDD, the published and advertised fare may be $xxx, but the eTicket receipt ought to declare clearly that, absent off-schedule airline operations,
– $yyy additional fare will be collected if the passenger terminates at BBB.
– $zzz additional fare will be collected if the passenger terminates at CCC.
Airline contracts of carriage already stipulate that passengers may be charged a fare difference for hidden-city behavior. However, the exact fare differences are not shown to the traveler on eTicket receipts. The law ought to require airlines to publish these fare differences. The law ought not to ban the practice of hidden city fares.
I abandoned a connection home out of Miami because a friend messaged and wanted to meet up. As my plane from Mexico was landing I booked a Turo car and a hotel and drove to dinner.
Same damn thing in practice. AA can kiss my brown ass.
The airlines have managed to make the flight selection process worse than shopping for a used car – but where the car prices change every day. So no wonder that skiplagging is a thing. In this case it sounds like AA has a monopoly on Gainesville to CLT but will compete on price to JFK. Who exactly is gaming the system here?
AA gets what they deserve.
@JC1 It doesn’t say the person was a minor, it says they are a teen. Could be 18 or 19, therefore an adult.
Airlines can cost cheaper? for absolutely no good reason…and they frown upon this? if “skiplagged sells the tickets why dont they go after “skiplagged…because its not illegal…well if its not illegal than this boy can sue the airline right?
It wasn’t corporate security it was a manager. I was there.
Whatever Gary Leff feels means nothing. They BOUGHT the ticket with intent. It’s like catching the shoplifter before they exit the store. It’s theft. Same theft if a flight attendant upgrades someone on board, they get fired.
Protocol was followed, and hopefully the teen learned a good lesson despite his theiving cheap parents trying to play the system.
I have never been able to understand the airlines position on this as anything but pure greed and intimidation. If one buys a seat from Point A to Point C and decides they want to get off at Point B, it’s their business and their prerogative. They paid for the seat all the way and it’s theirs whether they’re in it or not. This is so clear it hurts!
Sure, they can do whatever with their planes and make their own rules, ban people, etc. HOWEVER, they CAN’T KIDNAP CHILDREN. What they did was illegal and someone needs to go to jail for it. The airlines are not all powerful. What they did was beyond the pale. There should be a civil AND criminal case thruwn at them.
https://www.travelweekly.com/Agent-Life/If-airlines-sold-paint
Read this 25 years ago, authored by the great Al Hess, sums up things nicely, including today’s absurd predicament.
Given all the problems with AA and the industry in general, this is what someone (in their little domain) choose to focus on. What could this “illegal practice” possibly amount to, one-billionth of lost revenue?
What the industry should be annoyed at is the missed opportunity to give / resell the thrown away seat and collect “twice”. It used to be courtesy to tell a Southwest flight attendant when you were exiting as not to mess up their head counts, thru or otherwise.
At this point, it really feels like the airline industry’s overall mission is to screw over its customers. If you’re going to continue to increase prices while decreasing the quality of your service, you can’t be upset when people try to find affordable workarounds. I’ve resorted to some very long and inconvenient road trips in the last 10 years because air travel has become so incredibly unpleasant I’d rather spend a few days in a car than half a day dealing with this nonsense—50% of flights delayed or cancelled, stranded overnight in connecting cities with no hotel vouchers, lost bags, decreasing legroom…
Did that kid feel free to leave? I bet you he did not. Holding him was a crime. You cannot hold someone on suspicion of violating a contract.
This kind of thing makes my blood boil.
@ATOAGENT:
You stated: “It’s like catching the shoplifter before they exit the store. It’s theft.”
Actually, this situation has nothing to do with shoplifting or theft.
An analogous situation would be a shopper purchasing three items at a store, but leaving one item behind. Paying for more than you use is not considered theft in any rational country.
What is next? If your mobile phone carrier provides you 10 GB of data per month, but you only use 5 GB, the carrier forces you into a back room and cancels your service?!
So Airlines can OVERbook a flight but we can’t “under”book?
ATOAGENT Like catching a shoplifter hahahahahah. That’s the dumbest thing I’ve read in a while. Dufus.
@GatorGuy and @C, If you watch the story, you will see the interview with the father and aviation attorney, and comment from AA. Yes, he IS a minor. Assumptions here… especially about where he goes to school etc. Gator Guy is doing more assuming than AA…
Still another sterling example of why I won’t fly to anyplace in the CONUS I can drive to.
Just act dumb and clueless, maybe it will all go away. Dad knew better, he should man up instead of acting like a nub.