Globaliser

Airlines don't routinely "come running after these people" for commercial reasons. There is no point chasing for money from a person who's genuinely suffered an accident or misfortune, or whose circumstances have genuinely changed. In addition, there is little point in an airline chasing after a small amount of money because the costs of doing so are completely disproportinate to the amount that might be recovered from someone who only does it once and whose future behaviour doesn't need to be managed/deterred by legal action.

In practice, airlines tend to focus on those who do it repeatedly, perhaps because the total revenue lost (including future revenue, if the behaviour is not managed/deterred) is more significant and therefore the exercise is more worthwhile; because those who do it repeatedly cannot plausibly claim to have suffered misfortunes so many times (remember the AA escorts at DFW to ensure that passengers didn't get lost and become unable to find their onward gate for the umpteenth dozen time?); and because those who do it repeatedly are clearly doing it with intent and therefore have no sympathy card to play for breaking the rules.

alexwuk

Yes. And hence governments frequently impose sanctions when Monopoly profit-maximization starts having adverse societal costs: hence most Natural Monopolies (ie Industries where it is acknowledged that it is difficult for competition to happy) have a regulator with the power to regulate prices.

That's the crux of this thread: Airlines set rules which defy common sense and are most likely not lawful. Are flyers happy to break a rule which is not a law/legally enforceable? (Your point is a variant of Dura lex, sed lex)

Yes. And a substantial fall in the price of point-to-point Business class fares to a price level somewhere between their current level and the ex-EU level.

When buying a non-refundable plane ticket the purchasers don't contract that they will fly at all. The airline's position will be as you described (ie that they contracted to get your to the final fare destination), but it isn't legally valid. The airline preferred a specific combination of flights for a price (legally: "An invitation to Treat"). The passenger then contracts that specific offer of flightS by providing payment. That the airline used a specific fare to proffer those flights is irrelevant: if the Buyer had wanted a different transit point or no transit point, they would have bought that. Airlines do NOT make it clear at the point of contracting/in the invitation to treat that the intermediary point is subject to change at the airline's discretion - and even if they did it would be very hard to convince a UK Judge that should be the case.

snaxmuppet

I would agree with that but the most important point there is that the choice of transit points may change... not the destination. To not take the last flight results in a change of destination not covered by the purchased ticket.

Tafflyer

No it doesn't. The choice of transit points might change if the airline suggests it and the passenger accepts, but in my experience whenever I have been rerouted it has either been me suggesting a convenient alternative route or me accepting a routing proposal from the airline. Not taking the last flight results in no material loss for the airline. The opportunity to further sell that particular seat for the final leg was waived by the airline when they sold it to the original passenger. Indeed they might get lucky and sell it to a standby passenger and make further income from it instead of the fictive loss of income you continue to mention.

alexwuk

"Transit point" is an airline faring terminology that has no bearing in law. How an airline's internal system calculate the price they offer flights at is irrelevant in law: it makes no difference if an airline uses one fare for all the flights and calculates "transit points" or if it uses a (much more rational) per-segment calculation. In law: the airline offers certain flights (an invitation to treat) and the buyer can decide to attempt to enter a contract to purchase those flights or not.

At issue here: if the airline includes a term in the contract specifying that the price offers requires all the flights offered to be flown, rather than just some of them - is this legally enforceable? My instinct is that Lufthansa have a better shot of winning than BA for two reasons: Civil Law vs Common Law and also the Lufthansa booking page has for quite a few years included a checkbox saying "I want to use all my flights in order to get he lowest price".

snaxmuppet

I believe you have completely misunderstood my post

You still haven't got the point I was making, and have been making all along.

It isn't anything to do with reselling the last flight... it is about having the opportunity to sell a direct flight to the intermediate airport.

If I buy a cheap ticket from JFK - AMS and chose to route JFK-LHR-AMS then I am taking a seat on the JFK-LHR flight on a cheap ticket but had I actually bought a ticket JFK-LHR direct then being a direct flight it would probably be more expensive. So by buying a cheap JFK-AMS I have prevented the airline selling a more lucrative JFK-LHR direct.

So it is about conning the airline into letting you have a ticket on the direct flight to LHR as part of your cheap, non-direct flight, to AMS. Basically, you would have taken a seat on the JFK-LHR on a cheap ticket that the airline could have sold on a more expensive, direct, ticket for someone who wanted a JFK-LHR flight... LIKE YOU!!!! I can understand you would want the cheap flight to LHR but if you buy a ticket to AMS to get a cheap ticket to LHR then in my book that is buying a ticket deceptively.

It is true that the airline is happy to sell you the JFK-LHR cheaply... but only as part of a JFK-AMS routing.

That might not make any sense to us as a passenger but that is how it is.

You do seem to have a blind spot over this point.

Krisz

I think the biggest problem here is not about an airline can or not going after you but what is the loss? If I book EU-LHR-US and I won't use the last leg it is very hard to argue that this ticket should be equal to an LHR-US ticket as I started my journey in the EU. The contract with the airline also doesn't specify anything about this so it is the airline needs to prove here what was the loss and how much. Also as airlines overbook flights it is even harder for them to argue that they could get more money on the last leg. I think this is the main reason why airlines doesn't really want to go after passengers as they won't able to prove the loss especially on non flexible, non refundable tickets.

snaxmuppet

So when you buy an airline ticket are you saying that for the fare offered you are buying a ticket to the final ticketed destination OR to any transit airport in between? I think not.

If this were the case the airlines could not offer cheap, indirect, flights that transit expensive destinations such as JFK, LHR etc because everyone would simply buy a cheap, multi-leg, flight to somewhere else and skip that last flight. They would never be able to sell direct flights for more money. I think we all agree that direct flights should command a premium as it is often much quicker and easier but they wouldn't be able to do it. For this reason alone it makes sense for the airlines to be able to reprice to the actual destination or to have some sanction to repeat offenders.

As has been said... one-offs can probably be ignored as can genuine hardship/illness etc and that can easily be determined after the event. It is the repeat offender that needs to be stopped IMO.

snaxmuppet

I would argue that in that case it is equivalent to EU-LHR as your actual destination is LHR... not US. This is the key point people seem not to be getting

adrianlondon

If we buy A-C then the airline has to fly us direct A-C. If we buy A-C via a transit then we could, as the flights that show in the booking are A-B-C-B-A, arrange to meet someone in B to hand over a letter, say, or grab something that only the duty free shops in B sell. In that case, the airline has to fly us via B as that's the ticket I bought and I potentially had a reason (apart from it being cheaper) to do so.

I understand that this has nothing to do with dropping the last leg, which I don't do, but is just a come-back to your comment that the airline could remove B from the equation without comeback.

etiene

Firstly: that this is about the last leg is probably a red-herring - the same argument would likely apply to the first leg. If the airlines cannot be allowed to stop that abuse then the whole pricing model goes - that is what they're arguing about [and another reason why they are not hot on occasional offenders].

Secondly: they are not arguing they can get more money on the last leg - they are arguing that you have used the convenient, direct service and should have paid for it. The hypothetical standby/oversell was only denied a seat by you taking a discount for saying you would take an inconvenient, indirect routing to what you falsely claimed was your final destination and would otherwise have paid the same* either way.

*or less if you forced them up a fare bucket.

Krisz

sorry I wasn't clear with my routing.... let say AMS-LHR-JFK-LHR-AMS is the ticket I buy and I only fly AMS-LHR-JFK-LHR and dropping the last leg of the LHR-AMS... and here is the trouble as a, an airline might not sell an AMS-LHR-JFK-LHR ticket at all or b. it does sell but it doesn't use the same fare class and I guess this is the root cause in german case as well. Lufthansa might try to compare an apple with an orange. So my point is I don't think with the current hectic, completely non transparent ticketing system any airline can come up with a fair and proper calculation of loss. and lets not start with if your ticket contains other airlines or the sales channel was a 3rd party, etc.
I don't really get what Lufthansa goal is here with a court case as even if they win are they going to take everyone into court? Or just a select of people? If they want to punish those who "abusing" this they already have the tools and means to punish those. Let say cancel their frequent flyer account. (of course after a warning). much easier for the airline no court case, etc. Would it be moral I don't think so but it could be an option.

Globaliser

The airline's loss is very easy to work out. To take simplified round numbers: Suppose that a LHR-JFK-LHR ticket costs £4,000. Suppose that you can instead buy a FRA-JFK-FRA ticket for the equivalent of £2,000, with a routing that connects through LHR in both directions. In those circumstances it is likely that a FRA-JFK-LHR ticket (with an outbound connection at LHR) would cost £3,000.

So if you buy the less expensive FRA-JFK-FRA ticket but take advantage of the physical opportunity that you have of not flying the last FRA-LHR sector, you have taken travel worth £3,000 but only paid £2,000 for it.

And airline CoCs do often (usually?) have a provision that allows them to collect from you the fare for the travel you have actually taken.

The problem is about enforcement. It's very easy to enforce the outbound half of the FRA-JFK-FRA ticket, and nobody seems to claim that it's a clearly unfair term that one can only fly LHR-JFK after actually flying FRA-LHR. If it were truly the case that the airline suffers no loss from you not flying the short-haul, it wouldn't have a leg to stand on if you were simply to turn up at LHR for your LHR-JFK flight and demand to be allowed to take it on your £2,000 ticket even though you hadn't flown FRA-LHR.

adrianlondon

To be fair, the contract clauses have to work both ways I believe. So if I didn't fly at all then I've taken travel worth £0 and paid £2000 for it. If the ticket is non changeable regardless of whether I fly or not then it can't be repriced either way. What am I missing? I'm obviously missing something as the train companies are legally allowed to add the clause to their tickets about getting off prior to the ticketed destination.

Globaliser

That in agreeing to the £2,000 fare, you have traded your flexibility options for a lower price. You had the choice, and you chose to pay a low price.