Originally Posted by UAL_Rulez
Is there something unique about CO that attracts Phantoms? Other airlines I fly don't seem to have this problem.
Unsure as to Continental being "unique", but it's been confirmed straight from Larry himself that Phantoms were a large enough problem to warrant the implementation of the 72-hour rule. As for other airlines, I do not know if they have the same phenomenon.
Originally Posted by UAL_Rulez
CO has among, if not THE, best customer web sites and their other IT stuff seems top-class as well. Surely it wouldn't be that hard to program a solution to the phantom bookings, if they indeed exist?
There is a program called something like "super-dupe-snooper" (yes, I'm completely serious -- that's what they named it
) which is designed to target and remove duplicate bookings. If you want to see it in action, make two reservations on the same flight. But, for the Phantom issue, what would CO do? The base they occur is do to refundable fares - should CO simply not sell refundable J?
As far as being able to detect Phantoms, the super-dupe-snooper using some kind of name regontion to detect duplicactes. So, while J.Edward may be booked waitliseted for BF on a flight, if he were to create a Phantom he'd do his best to differintiate it as much as possible from himself (diffrent name/phone number/email/credit card/etc.)