drtravix

This has been bugging me - why do airlines post fares that are not even possible? For example, the following fare says 3 transfers inbound, 3 transfers outbound. The routing specifies a routing that is over 9 transfers.

Do humans create these fares, or do computers? If it's a human, shouldn't they be able to catch these problems? If it's a computer, shouldn't it know better as well? I know we have some airline folk on FT who are involved with fares... any comments?

==========================================

SEAFLL-US 16OCT04 *RULE DISPLAY* TARIFF 0011 RULE 2020
-FARE BASIS USD TAX TOTAL PTC FT
SROA7SN R 184.19 13.81 198.00 ADT NL
SROA7SN/IN00 R 0.00 0.00 0.00 INF NL
SROA7SN/INF50 R 92.09 6.91 99.00 INS NL
CH11 238.14 17.86 256.00 CNN NL
BOOKING CODES S
FIRST TRAVEL - 6OCT04 TRAVEL COMPLETE -16FEB05
SEASONS - NO RESTRICTION
...
STOPOVERS - NOT PERMITTED
TRANSFERS - 6 PERMITTED OUTBOUND 3 INBOUND 3
FLT APPLIC - NO RESTRICTION
...
INDUSTRY FARE TYPE - EIP - ECONOMY INSTANT PURCHASE
PFCS MAY VARY BY RTG
ROUTING 21 FROM SEA-US-PDX-US-LAX/SFO-US-DEN-
US-
VIA CHI-US-IND-US-CMH-US-
OR VIA MSP/STL/MKC-US-
TO PIT-US-PHL-US-WAS/BWI-US-CLT-
US-TLH/JAX-US-ORL/TPA-US-FLL*

Wheezer

The intermediate stops are not required.

channa

This is flyable.

You can omit as many cities as you'd like from the routing rules, to make your transfer(s).

There are some routing posts in the MR Tools Sticky at the top of this forum.

drtravix

Ah, I didn't realize this.

Just so I'm sure I understand, ANY of the cities can be omitted, except the first and last?

For example, in a fare that lists
FROM-TO 5 SEA-ORD-FLL*
you would be able to travel SEA-FLL unless other restrictions on the fare said otherwise?

Thanks for helping clear this up.

channa

Theoretically, yes. Practically, I don't think anybody flies direct or non-stop SEA-FLL, but if it did exist, it could be done on that fare, provided there's no statement such as "TRAVEL MUST NOT BE NONSTOP" that would preclude it.

RustyC

I think the real unflyable fares, at least from ATL, are when UA matches someone else's sale but has few or no sale-fare seats. This is especially true if a Jackson Hole or Montana deal comes up that requires flying from DEN on the last segment and no seats are given to that fare for weeks on end.

channa

Ahh, yes, the case of the missing inventory...

We had an unflyable one out of SFO on DL recently, and it wasn't inventory, but it was routing. It was SFO-OGG for $167+, and the routes they offered all didn't exist on DL:

- SFO-HNL-OGG (no HNL-OGG or codeshare)
- SFO-SLC-OGG (no SLC-OGG)
- SFO-LAX-OGG (no SFO-LAX)