Airlines make all kinds of interesting pricing decisions to maximize profits in an industry, where it is very difficult to earn money from flight.

Charging more for final-minute booking and dynamically pricing seats based on demand are among many ways airlines price flights … and squeeze more money from consumers.

Historically, Airlines also often charge more for rent, which did not include weekends or at least Saturday’s stopover. That trend has been reduced over the years, but when it comes to prices, the target for the airlines remains the same: try to write more money from trading passengers who often have deep pockets (or, at least, expenditure accounts).

Airlines are becoming more sophisticated in withdrawing money from holiday passengers. Consumers are more inclined to spend more in recent years, especially on premium products such as additional-lgroom or first class seats. Finally, Delta Air Lines said it is selling More than three-fourths of your first class seats.

Now, at the forefront there is a new trend: some airlines are charging more for single travelers than booking many seats. This is a trend Frugal passenger It was first discovered last month. We get the same example Your reporting At the beginning of this month, during which we saw that one -way flights were higher than multisenger booking for single travelers.

But is this on the board?

With the help of team Numeral pathA free web browser extension that reflects points and miles prize prices in Google flights, with cash fare, we decided to dig a slightly deep into points path data, so that to understand how currently airlines flights are. What data is shown here.

Connected: How to use numeral path expansion to compare cash and prize rates in Google flights

TPG and Number Path

Number path and TPG analyzed more than 3,800 individual flights for a day selected on random (18 July) to study the difference of pricing. We chose the most popular domestic routes in the US, including a busy transcontinental route from New York to Los Angeles and San Francisco. We also saw small, popular flights like Las Angeles like Las Angeles. In our discoveries, we considered flights from Southwest Airlines, American Airlines, Alaska Airlines, United Airlines and Delta Air Lines.

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You can see a small snapshot of the searching run in the screenshot below.

In defense of airlines, we really found very few flights that charge more for single travelers.

Of the 3,817 root combinations, we found only 271, where there was a value discrepancy resulting in more paid to single travelers.

An example is a flight on American Airlines from Austin-Bergstrom International Airport (AUS) to Charlotte Douglas International Airport (CLT), where a ticket vs. $ 338 (each) costs a ticket vs for a ticket booked with another person. This is a difference of $ 135.

However, in some of our discoveries (235, to be accurate), we really found that single travelers would pay less than two passengers.

Here is a good example: American Airlines is charging about $ 68 more for a couple (per ticket per ticket) than a single passenger on a flight from Philadelphia International Airport (PHL) to Orlando International Airport (MCO).

And the vast majority of our discoveries found that the fares were similar for single travelers and couples.

For example, a single traveler will pay $ 216 on a visit from Seattle-Tacoma International Airport (SEA) to Denver International Airport (DEN) … and therefore there will be a doubles for each seat booked.

Delta told TPG Senior Aviation Reporter Sean Kudahi earlier this month that such a pricing strategy is not new to the airline or industry, but the airline refused to comment further.

We reached the American and United to whether they want to comment, and we will update this post if those carriers weigh.

Ground level

While we got some data to support the idea that airlines sometimes charge more for some flights to some flights than couples, the data also shows that sometimes the opposite is: Sometimes, the joints have to pay more than single travelers.

In most cases, the price of a seat booked by a single traveler is the same as each seat booked by a pair. I feel quite confident that I am not bursting as a single traveler, but the data shows that it may be worth checking the price for one and two passengers when you search. In many cases, it would be understood to book two separate reservation for two parties to get cheap price.

If you find that you only have a lot of price for the journey of booking for yourself, then you can try to ask the airline whether it will give you a lower price while booking two seats. U never know; The carrier may be open to sell you at a lower price, so it may not hurt to ask.

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