When is a ‘travel hack’ unethical?
washingtonpost.com
When is a ‘travel hack’ unethical?
1–10 of 89 posts
Re: When is a ‘travel hack’ unethical?
#2Of course it's ethical...It's unethical by airlines trying to trick the user, in my opinion
Re: When is a ‘travel hack’ unethical?
#3I disagree with everything in this article. The assumption is that Americans should be scalped for airline tickets because, they're American and rich and deserve it. To take cheap tickets away from people in poorer countries by paying in Rupees or whatever is 'unethical'.
Well, airlines are a for-profit business. They don't choose their rates out of some public-service motivation. They charge what they think they can get away with. To re-cast that as some charity program that Americans shouldn't participate in, is pure fantasy.
Get the cheapest ticket you can, from whatever carrier you can find it from, with a clear conscience. Its business.
Re: When is a ‘travel hack’ unethical?
#4The author must be trolling.
I always get the cheapest price and do not care about the other nonsense.
Re: When is a ‘travel hack’ unethical?
#5As long as airlines set prices in an unethical way (e.g. increase price the longer you look at an offer), there is no discussion to be had about the behavior of the buyers.
(Funny, so similar to the ad company / adblocking situation.)
Re: When is a ‘travel hack’ unethical?
#6I'm not sure why it would be ethical for a company to charge different for "location of purchaser's computer", but unethical of me to say "I am coming from a computer in a different location", particularly if I do it via legal means.
Would it also be unethical of me to call a (to use an example discussed in the article) Chilean travel agent to arrange the cheaper ticket for me? In that case, there would still be the implication that my location when purchasing is in Chile.
What if it's me having my Chilean business partner, or the travel pool in my company's Santiago office do the booking, since that is where I'll be traveling from on that leg?
Re: When is a ‘travel hack’ unethical?
#7I tried, I really tried, but I failed to be persuaded by an article shaming consumers for acting unethically towards shamelessly amoral corporations. Treat people the way you want to be treated, I suppose.
Re: When is a ‘travel hack’ unethical?
#8I disagree with everything in this article. The assumption is that Americans should be scalped for airline tickets because, they're American and rich and deserve it. To take cheap tickets away from people in poorer countries by paying in Rupees or whatever is 'unethical'. Well, airlines are a for-profit business. They don't choose their rates out of some public-service motivation. They charge what they think they can…
I agree 100%. I'm certain that the airlines have never considered the 'ethics of ticket pricing' when setting prices.
Is haggling unethical? Is using coupons unethical? This article is nonsense.
Re: When is a ‘travel hack’ unethical?
#9Let's compromise. I promise to be totally clear, transparent, and straightforward in my ticket purchases as long as the airlines are totally clear, transparent, and straightforward in their ticket pricing.
Any takers? ...No?
Re: When is a ‘travel hack’ unethical?
#10Looking at the reactions of people to this topic, I come to believe there are two general approaches to life. Some people try to look at the whole game and want everyone to win, so they play by the rules. In terms of prisoner's dilemma, they choose to cooperate. Others notice that the market economy is designed around people being selfish, so they use it to justify defecting - minding only their own short-term interest.
As for ethics of this topic, I think the quoted government response about one such case is spot on - this is people acting in bad faith. Whether or not you think it's fine to act in bad faith depends on to which group you subscribe - defectors, or cooperators.
--
EDIT: The article would make a much stronger point if it focused on the problem of "hidden city" tickets, where people choosing to reduce their travel costs are not just haggling over price, but breaking a deal and wasting airline's fuel.
--
EDIT2: Took a shower, thought about it some more.
My initial paragraph isn't about airlines really, it's an observation made after seeing a stream of comments arguing for general selfishness.
As for problems with some of the travel "hacks", I have issues with two of those in particular. "Hidden city" flying is one, and using golden-card-carrying third party to buy you tickets is the second. Both of them introduce waste - the more people do that, the more often a plane flies with seats empty, wasting fuel that could otherwise provide utility by carrying other passengers. And speaking of other passengers, this is another thing to consider - if you use a travel "hack" that leaves an airplane with an empty seat, you're taking away the seat from another traveler, who could have used it. Or, given the discriminatory pricing, who could have paid less for it. So by using those kinds of tricks, people are not only hurting the airline, they're also hurting each other.