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Show HN: Book and change flights with one email

bonbook.co

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Re: Show HN: Book and change flights with one email

#41

Post by themagyar »

matt3D wrote: post #34
themagyar wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Different mindset. BonBook is targeted at travelers solving logistics problems who make lots of repeatable decisions and fly often (eg. need to be in X at Y). No saying what can be done with time.

While that's a good point, I think it would be wise for them to incorporate budget airlines if they are looking at the European market. There are so many routes that are served exclusively by budget airlines.

Noted re the EU. Though there's another side to it as well.

BonBook does more than just booking (eg. one-email changes) and many budget airlines make this difficult with their restrictive fare rules.

Re: Show HN: Book and change flights with one email

#42

Post by ipdashc »

themagyar wrote: post #39
ipdashc wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting, the last one is pretty surprising. I kind of just assumed all airline booking systems (Expedia, Google Flights, Kayak, whatever) all used the same underlying service - maybe SABRE or something, but that's a total shot in the dark. Would love to hear what the difference is, assuming you're comfortable with sharing!

Can share a bit of background: (TLDR; airlines want to keep more profit so are witholding some fares.) A system called GDS (Global Distribution System) was built in the 60s as a data transmission standard. Was used by airlines to publish fares (among other things). But it was complicated so aggregators (Sabre, Amadeus, Travelport) were born to ingest all this published data and make it easily searchable. When travel…

Super cool stuff. Thanks for the info.

Re: Show HN: Book and change flights with one email

#43

Post by ragazzina »

themagyar wrote: post #28
dankwizard wrote: post #25

Is this US only? Nothing is working for me in Australia

The email sim doesn't allow booking but should still work to demo functionality. And it's not geo-limited. What are you seeing?

I personally see "Hi there, it looks like the internet dropped the ball somewhere. Please try your request again.".

Re: Show HN: Book and change flights with one email

#44

Post by maeil »

themagyar wrote: post #37
zacmps wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me the demo pulled up flights, but in USD, I'd need it to be localised to be useful. Airlines also tend to present different prices for different locations/currencies so I doubt this would be as simple as a UI change (though that would still go a long way!).

Yes, the demo doesn't localize results. And Beta doesn't have currency support just yet but it's on the list. Beyond the price differences, airlines also grant scoped 'ticketing authority' in jurisdictions (eg. can only sell these tickets in EU or US+Canada etc).

How is this enforced? Purely IP-based? Sounds like we now need a VPN when buying tickets.

Re: Show HN: Book and change flights with one email

#45

Post by Ylpertnodi »

maeil wrote: post #44
themagyar wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the demo doesn't localize results. And Beta doesn't have currency support just yet but it's on the list. Beyond the price differences, airlines also grant scoped 'ticketing authority' in jurisdictions (eg. can only sell these tickets in EU or US+Canada etc).

How is this enforced? Purely IP-based? Sounds like we now need a VPN when buying tickets.

>Sounds like we now need a VPN when buying tickets.

Frame 6: You guys are buying tickets without a vpn?

Re: Show HN: Book and change flights with one email

#46

Post by r0fl »

drewrbaker wrote: post #32

Would love to be able to have this buy my the flight at an optimal purchase time. Like I say “LAX to JFK for Jan 10th to Jan 15th, between $400 and $600” and it will wait until that is seen and then buy for me. That would be a real new feature.

You can set up alerts using Google flights that will email you when prices change

I save thousands using this feature each year

Re: Show HN: Book and change flights with one email

#47

Post by lastofthemojito »

Seems like a neat idea but I just tried 4 times and got the same response every time:

> Hi there, I couldn't find any flights for your request. Please try again.

> -BonBook

I was trying input like "Find me a flight from BWI to PWM December 27 to January 1".

Re: Show HN: Book and change flights with one email

#48

Post by bux93 »

padolsey wrote: post #38

I imagine this is a much harder problem than meets the eye. Even for my own travel, there are like a dozen things I'm trying to optimize for. Time, money, seat, travel to/from airport (traffic, train cost, taxi pickup/dropoff ease), lounge quality, layover length or complexity vs cost calculus, loyalty program, airport navigation, airport amenities, flight hospitality quality etc. etc. When an AI can take into accoun…

Not to mention cabin luggage allowances (as well as the likelihood they will be honored and you won't be checking your cabin luggage at the gate, or stowing your bag in row 45 when you're in row 9). Even finding the (cabin/checked) luggage allowances on an airline's website can be a task for AI.

Re: Show HN: Book and change flights with one email

#49

Post by theqwxas »

I am not sure about the US market, but Skyscanner [1] works great in Europe, I wonder how this is different. Besides from being structured as an email, it offers quite similar functionality of finding optimal flights (in some sense of optimal). It may just be me, but I am definitely misunderstanding the inbox metaphor. Why is it an inbox? Why is there emphasis on _one email_? I don't book flights through email -- I go on an airline's website to book.

For now it seems to be always responding with "Hi there, I couldn't find any flights for your request. Please try again.", I could not test it out. Unless this is a demo version, and is working as expected.

[1] https://www.skyscanner.net/

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