Do you ever wonder how many seats qualify for the low fares?Earlier this year in Denver, during a notorious airfare-war shootout,the question was asked by the state's attorney general.
At one point, Frontier Airlines lowered its fare between Denverand Colorado Springs to $9, between Denver and Albuquerque to $19,between Denver and Los Angeles to $39. Of course, the seats at thisfare were "limited."
The fare war drove travel agents, and competing airlines, alittle crazy. Donald Burr, chairman of People Express, later labeledthe war "a spasm of competitive excess."
Lots of folks in Denver tried to get seats at these fares, onlyto be told the seats had been sold. Some complained to the state'sattorney general. "We got lots of complaints about the unavailabilityof advertised fares," said Garth Lucero, Colorado's assistantattorney general. "Even people working here at the state capitol haddifficulty getting those seats."
State investigators started clipping ads. They called theairlines. Sure enough, the seats had been sold out at the low fares.The next day, they bought the newspapers as soon as they wereprinted and immediately called the airlines.
"It was incredible," said Lucero. "The airlines told us thefares were already sold out, even though the newspapers had beencirculated for only an hour. We decided to intervene because it wasa matter of significant public interest."
Attorney General Duane Woodward sent letters to 14 airlinesserving Denver, questioning the appearance of a potentialbait-and-switch situation - the possible deliberate attempt toadvertise a fare that doesn't exist in order to get passengers tocall and make a reservation for a higher fare.
The state wanted to know if these fares actually existed. Ifso, it wanted the exact number of seats available at those fares.The airlines balked at the request.
The reason: It's all part of something the airlines call"capacity control" - their ability to raise or lower the number ofdiscount seats on each flight on a daily, and sometimes even anhourly, basis.
"How can we list the number of available discount seats on everyflight?" asked Chuck Novak, United Airlines spokesman. "It's animpossibility for us. The numbers change all the time. Besides,nobody requires a theater to show how many discount tickets they soldto groups or up in the second balcony."
Airlines study projections of reservations by time of day, dayof week and time of year. "As a result," said Novak, "it's no greatsecret that we have more discount seats on Tuesdays and Wednesdaysthan we do on Fridays at 5 p.m."
"The key for us has always been full disclosure," said PaulJasinski, chief counsel for Republic Airlines. "You can only offerwhat you have to sell, and on the buying side, the passenger is onlyreally interested in the one seat he'll occupy. We're trying to keepour airplanes full, and so we manage our inventory in off-peakperiods to fill seats. No one is out to fool anyone on this."
In the hot Denver-Los Angeles market, Bruce Hicks of ContinentalAirlines said that during peak travel periods, between 10 and 25percent of all coach seats are offered on deeply discounted "Q"fares. During off-peak periods, according to Hicks, the discountedratio can jump as high as 60 percent of all coach seats.
"Everyone tries to control their capacity," said David Palmer,Alaska Airline's assistant vice-president of marketing. "Thisfloating inventory becomes a crap shoot for the passengers - and forus. However, if people are the least bit flexible in their travelplans, they can usually get the discount seats."
In the Colorado case, many airlines have agreed to change theiradvertising tactics. "And," said Lucero, "our preliminary conclusionis that it seems the airlines have allocated a significant number ofdiscount seats for their flights."
When it comes to the art of buying a discount seat, the onlyrule is that there may be no rules at all. Since the level ofavailable discount seats on each flight rises and falls based ondemand reflected in an airline's computers, don't just take "I'msorry, that fare is sold out" as the final answer. It's verypossible that the "Q" fare you wanted for the flight next month thatwasn't available yesterday may be available today or tomorrow.
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