mgcsinc

There is some cross-site conversion targeting, etc. It's a good or bad thing depending on whether you mind a minimal privacy invasion in exchange for receiving ads related to your interests rather than four diapers for the child you don't have.

Has nothing to do with setting prices. Prices are determined based on the transparent published fares and availability numbers.

remphish1

Doesn't it make sense logistically for the airlines to raise the prices on a flight that gets many hits? I really think it does come into play even if the passenger load doesn't change.

xliioper

No, very unlikely this is a factor (and I don't think they have full visibility into "hits" on all the third party booking systems anyway due to the way the GDS system works). Historical loads, current seat purchases, and competitor fares are likely largely driving it.

remphish1

To me flight prices have always been one of the biggest mysteries second only to medical pricing!

mgcsinc

They may make adjustments based on interest, but they're not customizing for individual users.

It's funny that people say this, since the reality is that airline prices are some if the most transparent that I know of. When you go to Wal-Mart, wanting to buy a widget, it's just sitting there with a price on it. No one but Wal-Mart knows how that price was determined. With airfares, if you have a basic understanding of how fares work, you can easily figure out how a fare was calculated. That's pretty remarkable, actually. I think a lot of the conspiracy theories develop because people don't realize that airfares are calculated using published fares and availabilities, and airline websites generally act as mere search engines that display these in a useful manner.

The most simple thing to remember about airline pricing, and one that makes theories like this unlikely, is that airlines almost never arbitrarily set a particular price for a particular flight in a vacuum.

bajrbajr

I still see prices higher on the weekends and then lower Tues-Wed-Thurs for many markets I travel. All are domestic routes however, such as LAS, LAX, SFO.

I have never noticed any pricing difference due to repeated searches on UA.com.
This, however, is very common with DL.com award travel searches!

valor155

I don't think it is based locally on previous searches at all, via cookies etc.
ONE interesting case I noted, and only one, is that I was checking prices on UA.com, and I called my company's travel agency to hold the reservation, but not pay for it. It then shows up in my UA.com profile, but nothing's been paid for.
Within an hour, I went on UA.com again to look at the price, and it had gone up. The "hold" may have had impact on the price. Not sure. Not scientific at all. Just one experience where I was surprised by the result.

mgcsinc

The hold takes the inventory.

My holds often cause prices to go up.

mahasamatman

The single biggest mystery of airline travel is how Revenue Management works. Fare can change daily or even more often. Buckets get opened and closed, new fares pop in for hours at a time, driving 20 miles can change your fare by hundreds of dollars, ...

FLYDCA

This should not be a mystery. Revenue Management software sets prices based on demand forecasting. The airlines have massive amounts of data on what to expect to build a forecast and this is based both on historical demand and then they add recent booking trends to this. With good demand forecasting in place they know when to adjust prices up or down. Further to this it's possible to fill the aircraft at a low price but you don't need to fill the aircraft to 100% to make the highest amount of revenue. Sometimes it can be better to fly the plane half empty with higher priced passengers that to fly the place full with very low fares.

remphish1

It seems arbitrary to me that's what I mean more so.

mahasamatman

But it is because it's opaque. Nobody (except RM) knows why they make the changes they do, particularly at the rate they often do.

Saying it's not a mystery because they do something "logical" with the data is like saying there are no mysteries in life because all the data is there and you just need to know how to interpret it.

remphish1

Ha it's now $704

Zappity

They are not looking at your past searches

They cannot adjust fares for just one passenger

RM does not look at web data for searches. They only care about what has been booked/ticketed.

letsgook

I've a personal trip to China coming up in late August and have been looking at fares in J - SFO to PEK and HKG to SFO. It has been suggested that purchasing about 2-3 months out might provide the best fares. There are only 2 flights I'm considering - both on United - one non stop each way and the other a 2 hr transfer stop in NRT coming home. A third option is on return using ANA for overwater...same price as the NRT stopover. The non-stop on United is about $600 more presently - all expensive! Wondered if frequent checking on United's website and Google Flights affects the price...up? I almost purchased one of the flights yesterday on the airline website but at seat selection on both to PEK and from HKG - all seats were available - don't know if site was accurate, but each seat I tried it let me reserve. So...thought I'd wait to see if prices go down. Any thoughts?