I think the example in your OP is needlessly confusing, involving both 1) A round trip and 2) such drastically different leg lengths, with one flight being an international flight to the other side of the world.
Here’s a simpler example. Suppose I want to fly from Philadelphia to Charlotte. Right now, there’s a 6:34 AM flight on American from PHL to CLT for $343 one-way.
But I can also book an itinerary from Philadelphia to Charleston that uses the above flight as its first leg, then another flight from CLT to CHS. To book that itinerary costs only $158.
So I book the 2nd itinerary, but don’t get on the 2nd flight in CLT. I just stay in Charlotte and go about my business. That’s skiplagging.
Yes. In each case the key thing is that this situation arises when your goal is to fly to or from a hub. So the one-way outbound is hub-spoke or spoke-hub. Not spoke-hub-spoke. And the return would be the opposite.
Customers will pay extra for nonstops, most of which are hub-spoke or spoke-hub or hub-hub. So those prices have a premium attached which many customers will happily pay. Or grudgingly pay, but pay they will.
The issue from the airline POV is a little more subtle. At most hubs, about 80% of the people arriving there are connecting to leave again promptly. So you can look at it as, say 1000 seats coming in from [everywhere] with 1000 people in them, and a bit later those same 1000 seats going out to [everywhere]. 800 people will flow from the inbound bank to the outbound bank, 200 will get off at the hub, and ideally another 200 will get on from the hub. That way the planes that arrived full leave full also.
If too many people buy the hub-[someplace] outbound, that will prevent the airline from selling a corresponding seat on the [someplace]-inbound since they have no room to carry that passenger onwards. And that passenger has no interest in being in that hub at all; for them it’s just a means to get from spoke to spoke.
Selling a non-stop out of a hub runs the risk of forcing another seat on an unrelated inbound to remain unsold. That gets expensive.
The point is they will “balance their books” so the number of people doing [inbound to hub & stay] matches the number of [leave from hub & go elsewhere]. The way they make those headcounts match is to drive the prices up or down until the buying balances out. Depending on the time of day, inbound-to-hub nonstops can be rather cheap while outbound-from-hub at the same time from the same hub will be dear. And vice versa at other times of day.
I should also point out that thanks to bin Laden, the airline has a lot more detail to work with than 25 years ago, when some of these tricks worked well. They can now compare your full personal information based on your necessary ID, and determine if you are using tricks that violate the terms of their service, such as booking coplementary round trips to avoid staying over a weekend. (Not even sure if that matters any more with most fares). I wonder if airlines do database dives to look for this stuff?
Nested ticketing is no longer a thing in North America since 2x one way and a return are the same price.
The airlines have good analytics and periodically go on campaigns looking for violations .The people usually impacted are frequent flyers who have their accounts cancelled with the loss of all their points. A one off won’t cause problems but a pattern of violating the contract of carriage will.
In relative terms (relative to the differential in airfare), yes, it is. Especially when it’s my wife and me traveling together, and the total savings for the two of us is closer to $7,000. Between Ann Arbor and Lansing (60 miles away), there’s an intercity bus service, there’s Uber, and there’s also one-way car rental. The latter would be about $100, but that doesn’t peel much off of the $7K in savings.
The reality is that my wife and I wouldn’t look at this as “saving $7K” because I can’t see us paying $8500 each for a round trip to Japan, even in first class. But the price for a round trip originating from LAN in Delta One ends up being about the same as what we paid for Premium Select originating from DTW on our previous trip - so if we were willing to put up with a little bit more logistical hassle than usual, we could afford to fly Delta One on our next trip.
Not sure why the leg lengths matter, but whether it’s confusing or not, it’s a real-world example of pricing disparity that I’ve found. I have no interest in skiplagging, but the pricing disparity was so massive - skiplagging articles talk about saving maybe a couple hundred bucks, but this disparity is several thousand dollars - that I had to ask here why the disparity (which is what makes skiplagging work) exists in the first place. Thanks to all who responded and helped clarify the airlines’ rational for these kinds of pricing arrangements.
While living in Colorado Springs, my son and I had the same flight from Denver to LA. Because of when I bought my tickets it was cheaper to fly COS-DEN-LAX and when he bought his tickets it was cheaper to fly DEN-LAX by hundreds of dollars so I flew into DEN and met him after his mom drove him to Denver.
But here is my question: suppose the OP buys the LAN-DTW-HDN option; given the overbooking that airlines do, won’t they just cancel the rest of his ticket to HDN when he doesn’t get on the plane in Lancing assuming he is missing his entire flight?
So then what about the question in general? If you check-in but miss the first leg do they cancel your whole flight outbound or would they assume in the OP’s case (for example) that they would figure out how to get to Detroit to pick up that leg? Maybe more importantly, would they cancel your return ticket too?
These days, yes, if you skip an earlier leg, most (all?) airlines will cancel the remainder of your itinerary, including any return legs. You won’t be able to pick up a leg later by somehow getting to the correct airport in time.
You’ve got to be careful with this. It’s only legal if the train in question stops at the intermediate station. Otherwise, they can force you to buy a new full-price ticket or pay a fine. Similarly, ‘sliplagging’ is not allowed; if you get off the train at a earlier station than the destination on your ticket (which can often be cheaper) and the gates are closed, you’ll be charged for a whole new ticket.
Eurostar used to do something similar with the channel tunnel: a day ticket to France and back was vastly cheaper than a single, or an ordinary return - but they had cameras on the loading area, and if your car did not return the same day, you’d be charged the higher price. Don’t know if they still do this. It would be pretty easy for airlines in the US to bring in a similar restriction, if skiplagging becomes too common.
Based on the article, it seems the answer to the OP is - a flight from Florida to NYC is cheap because they have competition. I’m guessing Florida to Charlotte, less or no competition. I presume, too, that the fact the gate people stopped the passenger based on his driver’s license home address, they were aware that this was an opportunity ripe for exploiting and/or it had been exploited frequently.
The article makes an interesting point - this was a contract violation (terms and conditions) not criminal, so there was no right to detain the passenger. I guess the other questions woul be - can they arbitrarily cancel your ticket if they think you may be cheating? Can they stop you from getting off the aircraft at the waystop, or is that also kidnapping?
This whole thing just strikes me as sooo weird. Where else are consumers not allowed to take advantage of a company’s strange pricing practices?
The last time I went into a Dunkin Donut, it cost about a buck for a donut. And ten dollars for a dozen. But absolutely nobody thinks I’m being deceitful or abusing the company or whatever if I buy the dozen bpx while holding in my heart the evil intention of only eating 11 of them.
Do they even still have the old-fashioned stops where people stay on the plane? (Maybe on Southwest?) This is mostly connections where everyone is getting off the plane and dissolving into the throngs in the terminal.
I was at a friend’s brewery one night when a new bartender was working solo. Two guys came in and ordered a growler of beer. She filled it and took their money. Then she asked if they wanted glasses. They looked at each other and said sure!
I got her attention and told her that growlers were for off-site consumption. She disagreed!!
I called the owner and told him what was going on. He rushed down and explained to her how things worked.
Reminds of when McDonalds sold chicken nuggets at 4 for $1.00, or 6 for $1.99. I went in and started to order two packs of 6, but then did the math and ordered 3 packs of 4.
I didn’t stay on the plane - but last year , I took a flight from A to C that stopped in B. It was the same plane but pretty much everyone got off in B as we had time to use the restrooms, buy a snack etc. and then those of us going to C got back on the plane. I don’t see how they could prevent you from getting off in that case , because it would be kidnapping or unlawful imprisonment or something. I suppose they might be able to prevent it if they don’t allow anyone off the plane and just add people at the in-between city , but I don’t know if that ever happens.
I didn’t notice/don’t recall - but of course everyone took their personal item with them and plenty of people only have that if it’s a short trip. I can pack for at least 2-3 days in mine.