Why are there price differences between country sites on flight search engines?
Why can prices vary wildly between two country versions of the same engine (for example, Expedia US vs JP, or Kayak US vs SG)? I sometimes even find that not all the airlines available in one are available in the other.
Best Answer
Both fare tariffs and flight availability (how busy a flight appears) vary based on the city in which a travel agent is based. This is called the “sales city” or the “point of sale”. This is simple revenue management practice; for instance a customer living in New York may be willing and able to pay more for a flight than a customer living in Santiago de Chile. Hence the airline must find a way to charge these two groups of customers different amounts.
The system was devised in the 1960s and 1970s when flights were almost always bought through a local sales office.
Many flight search engines and online travel agents base their sales city location on which country website was selected. For instance expedia.de uses a sales city in Germany whereas expedia.co.uk uses London. Other sites always use the origin city as the sales city.
This practice is illegal within the European Union under EC Regulation 1008/2008 Article 23 but it nonetheless continues there.
Pictures about "Why are there price differences between country sites on flight search engines?"
Why are tickets different prices on different websites?
Ticket prices are often governed by fuel prices, seat supply, competition, seat demand and the distance of the route, according to FareCompare.com.Why are flights more expensive on airline websites?
Typically, people who are not price conscious ( business class, first class passengers) will tend to book from the airlines website as it is direct and they don't have time to shop around. The rates are higher keeping in mind the type of clientele they get and they know that this crowd is elite.Do flight prices change based on web browser?
Surprisingly, there is very little evidence that online travel sites are raising prices the more that you search for a specific trip. In fact, they tend to show lower prices to logged-in users.Why do airlines have different prices?
But the most likeliest reason fares fluctuate is simply due to supply and demand, and the few seats left in each class of service selling the closer you get to departure. Having said all of that, airlines and travel providers, like Flight Centre, can put flights on sale at any time, and do.Best Cheap Flights Websites NOBODY is Talking About | How to Find Cheap Flights 2022
Sources: Stack Exchange - This article follows the attribution requirements of Stack Exchange and is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
Images: Nothing Ahead, Monstera, Monstera, Monstera