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Get away with Google Flights

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Re: Get away with Google Flights

#141

Post by ThatAdamGuy »

low_battery wrote: post #135
ThatAdamGuy wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assuming you're on google.com/flights, I'm fairly sure that using a VPN, changing your IP, flushing your cookies... none of that should change the availability and pricing you see on Flights. And no, don't bother trying to time your bookings. It's kinda like the stock market; trying to beat the market, er, optimize your flights purchase time is likely to lead to sorrow and regret. From the research our Google Flights…

Actually If you save your itineraries you can see daily price change graph in saved flights view (star icon). A recent feature, small but interesting.

ah, good point, low_battery; I like that feature, too!

Re: Get away with Google Flights

#142

Post by peteretep »

toyg wrote: post #104
dingaling wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Airlines are not one of them, afaik Oh the big consolidated IATA airlines are raking it in, don't worry about them "On a per passenger basis, [IATA] airlines will make a net profit of $7.08 in 2015. That is up on the $6.02 earned in 2014 and more than double the $3.38 earnings per passenger achieved in 2013." http://www.iata.org/pressroom/pr/Pages/2014-12-10-01.aspx Incidentally, Ryanair are frequently not the chea…

$7 on a ticket costing hundreds is hardly "raking it in".

Thin margins don't mean thin profits. See: Walmart.

Re: Get away with Google Flights

#143

Post by NamTaf »

Two complaints:

1) When I go to the front page (https://www.google.com/flights/), everything from and including the 'return/one way/multi stop' row down is fixed-width at about 650px even when my window is far larger. This sort of fixes itself once I start selecting cities, but is randomly narrower than the auto-sizing search bar + other stuff above it. I'm on Win7 x64 / FF 36.0.

2) Please localise currencies. You auto-detect me in Brisbane, Australia. If I pick a flight to Sydney on AU carriers, I don't care about prices in USD. You either convert it to USD in the first place (or just assume 1AUD=1USD) but don't when you display it to me.

Re: Get away with Google Flights

#144

Post by Marazan »

deathanatos wrote: post #140
Marazan wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A firehose of updates? Updates to what? There are basically an unlimited number of world wide routes - a mind blowingly dizzying number of permutations to get from A to B. Before you try to say "well travellers won't want routes with feature X" to cut down on the volume of data travellers want all sorts of contradictory things. Some a vastly price sensitive, some hate a particular airline, some love that same airline…

> a mind blowingly dizzying number of permutations to get from A to B. Yes, but I don't think that's what most people desire to enumerate (or what the parent of your post had in mind). A simple enumeration of the flights available and their one-way prices would be a start. My understanding (from a link in another post) is that this would be ~(1 flight) * (average number of changes to a flight's data between birth and…

There's all kinds of reasons that this isn't sufficient, return based pricing, multiple seat pricing bands for a single flight (for some airlines this is dynamically calculated on a moment-by-moment basis), airline and airports rules covering transfers for whether a given pair of flights connect or not, etc... the list is basically unlimited.

Re: Get away with Google Flights

#147

Post by rivo »

jxf wrote: post #68

I've been using Google Flights since the middle of last year and love it. However, as a frequent traveler for business/conferences, I think there are some things people should be aware of: * Google's data seems to be not as fresh as Kayak or Hipmunk's is. There have been multiple times when I've tried to book a flight via GF only to be told that there were no seats left when I arrive on the airline's page. I suspect…

The big trend in the airline industry is to customize prices and availabilities to each individual request. Your location (IP address), your frequent flyer status (if logged in), the competitor's current prices, the distribution channel (e.g. web or travel agent, GDS) will all have an influence on what is presented to you. Meta search engines have had a difficult time reporting accurate fares even in the past when it was much simpler. In the future, it'll be almost impossible.

Re: Get away with Google Flights

#148

Post by CardenB »

ThatAdamGuy wrote: post #131

Hey everyone, just spotted this thread and was really happy to see all the comments about Google Flights. Though I've been at Google for nearly 9 years, I'm pretty new to the Flights team, so there's still a lot I'm learning... but I'll try to tackle at least few questions below :) (I'm also both an oldtimer and newtimer to HN; long time lurker, and I opened an account ages ago, but sorry I've not been active here be…

Hey Adam,

I'm joining the flights team this summer. Could I maybe talk to you a bit to get some perspective?

Feel free to email me: cardenbag@gmail.com

Re: Get away with Google Flights

#149

Post by ThatAdamGuy »

yekim wrote: post #98
Bedon292 wrote: post #6

Not sure why they are just posting this now, it has existed for quite a while. It also has hotel searching. Not all companies have prices displayed on the site, but it links directly to the companies rather than paying additional fees through a third party.

I wasn't even aware of Google Flights until I saw the article posted on HN. Go figure... For some of us, the constant deluge of info, along with work and family life, makes it tough to stay on top of all the latest developments. Glad this service was "re-announced".

yekim, we (working on Google Flights) hear this again and again. AAAAAAAGH! :o

I hope you're enjoying the service, and we'll see what we can do about getting out the word a bit better ;).

P.S. -- You'll be amused to know that -- seriously, just today -- I was telling a colleague about this cool thread on HN, and he said, "Wait... hackers? Wha... huh?" I guess he also has work and a family life :p

Re: Get away with Google Flights

#150

Post by ThatAdamGuy »

CardenB wrote: post #148
ThatAdamGuy wrote: post #131

Hey everyone, just spotted this thread and was really happy to see all the comments about Google Flights. Though I've been at Google for nearly 9 years, I'm pretty new to the Flights team, so there's still a lot I'm learning... but I'll try to tackle at least few questions below :) (I'm also both an oldtimer and newtimer to HN; long time lurker, and I opened an account ages ago, but sorry I've not been active here be…

Hey Adam, I'm joining the flights team this summer. Could I maybe talk to you a bit to get some perspective? Feel free to email me: cardenbag@gmail.com

Congrats... and done! Looking forward to having you onboard!
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