A group of U.S. Senators recently wrote Elaine Chao, secretary of Transportation, urging the Department of Transportation to demand transparency from airlines.
The agency suspended a request for information in March 2017 that was studying how airlines provide airline fare, schedule, and availability information to third-party comparison sites. The agency stated that the suspension was to allow presidential appointees the opportunity to review and consider the request.
The senators asserted that failure to re-instate the study causes potentially anti-competitive and anti-consumer behavior and that airlines might be suppressing consumers’ ability to price shop.
“Unfortunately, some airlines appear to be taking steps to restrict consumer access to fare and schedule information on such sites,” the letter said. “For example, Delta Airlines prohibits certain third-party price comparison travel websites, including online travel agents (OTAs) and metasearch websites, from fully accessing the airline’s flight data. A consumer wishing to see how Delta’s prices and schedules stack up against other carriers on the OTA TripAdvisor, or a metasearch site like Hipmunk, would be out of luck. Southwest Airlines withholds its information from travel sites entirely.”
The letter was signed by Sens. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Edward J. Markey (D-MA), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), and Ron Wyden (D-OR).