American Airlines sues Kayak over fare displays
Here’s the latest twist in the American Airlines vs. Kayak dispute, in case you’re following this soap opera. Our friends over at the Dallas Morning News Airline Biz blog reported late yesterday that American is suing the meta-search site.
The airline argues that it owns its fares and should control how its product is displayed.
American believes that it is the owner of its fares, flight schedules, seat inventory, and trademarks. Intellectual property ownership underlies American’s ability to structure where, how, and under which economic terms its products may be displayed and sold.
On first blush, that makes sense. Why shouldn’t an airline own its fares?
But a deeper analysis of this argument suggests it’s deeply flawed and, indeed, that this is probably a nuisance lawsuit that will be settled soon.
What’s so flawed about it? Well, imagine if American were selling widgets. What if it sued a hardware store because it refused to stock American widgets on the wrong shelf or because it discounted its widgets in a way it didn’t approve?
An airline — really, any company — loses some control of its product when it is sold. And meta-search sites like Kayak are just another way of selling tickets.
Ironically, airlines like American try to impose the same terms on their customers. How so? They insist that they use the entire ticket as booked, otherwise they’ll cancel the ticket or penalize the passenger or travel agent for a fare differential (the dreaded debit memo).
Although airlines call these ticketing practices “illegal” there is no court I’m aware of that has sided with the air carriers.
I think Kayak should go to court to fight this instead of rolling over. It would almost certainly set an important precedent for online travel agencies and ultimately, would benefit consumers.
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2 Responses to “American Airlines sues Kayak over fare displays”
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I don’t know if your argument exactly holds water. Kayak doesn’t buy American’s tickets in order to resell them like a regular retailer does. Kayak is listing the tickets for sale, but American is ultimately the one selling them. You may be right about this, but I’m just sayin’…
I don’t know, either. You compared it to a store discounting widgets. Some designer brands don’t allow retailers to discount their branded merchandise for any reason. So there is some precedence for keeping control of the merchandise.