4 ms·
Flexible fares matter a lot, both to customers (mostly business travellers with uncertain schedules) and airline economics. They don't screw up the business mo
by tomhoward 8y ago
Flexible fares matter a lot, both to customers (mostly business travellers with uncertain schedules) and airline economics.
They don't screw up the business model, the business model relies on it. Without these fares, everyone would be paying more and flexible passengers would be inconvenienced.
But the presence or absence of flexible fares doesn't change the fact that the precise number of passengers trying to board is uncertain, and that will always create a complex optimization problem if you care about both efficiency and customer satisfaction.
- lisper 8y agoNo, it's not complicated at all. Just sell "standby" tickets and "guaranteed seat" tickets. The problem is that right now every ticket is effectively a standby ticket, and this is buried in the fine print.
- tomhoward 8y agoI keep explaining to you, in good faith, based on 10+ years in this industry, why things aren't all they seem, and you keep inventing new reasons why it really should be that simple but that you seem to think nobody has thought of yet. A lot of people have thought a lot about these problems for a long time now. Many of them are both clever and well-intentioned. I understand that last sentence is where we differ. So I guess we're done here.
- lisper 8y ago> I guess we're done here. You've chosen to invoke an Argument By Authority, so I guess you're right.