Fares are updated constantly. But fares are not updated constantly at the CRS level- they are only updated several times a day. There are certain times of the day where the CRS' are loading more fares than at other times (Tom Parson's explanation is partially correct). There are set times to release but also on-demand releases each day.

The above applies for domestic US/CA fares and transborder fares. International fares are much different- they do not have the on-demand release capability of domestic fares. It also can take CRS' several hours to load international fares, sometimes even weeks to load changes to rule provisions.

Now inventory is constantly changing, and AFAIK tickets that are reserved but not ticketed cancel at midnight, freeing up inventory.


[This message has been edited by whlinder (edited Nov 25, 2003).]