3-On Your Side: Wanna Get Away?
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Does the recent bad weather have you dreaming of getting away?
Well there are plenty of destinations to choose from, but getting a good deal on an airline flight has recently gotten a bit more complicated.
Whether it's a beach vacation or a business trip, searching for flights online has become automatic for many travelers.
But a disagreement between American Airlines and two of the largest online travel sites, Orbitz and Expedia, has ended with both sites dropping American from its listings.
"It doesn't bode well for the consumer," said Anne Banas with SmarterTravel.com
Banas says American wants to avoid the fees it has to pay the travel sites for selling its tickets.
"An airline like American, which is the third largest carrier in the United States, if they can get people to book to their sites, that's going to save them money," said Banas.
Delta has also pulled out of a number of smaller online agencies.
Southwest Airlines has always sold its seats exclusively on its own website. Now if you take American and Delta out of the picture, many of these online sites won't be able to promise to find you the best deal.
"It really makes it more complex to do a comprehensive search and in the end that's going to cost more time for the consumer and more effort," said Banas.
Banas suggests trying sites like Kayak or Bing travel. They don't sell tickets, just compile fares.
Their results should include American and Delta. You can also try a site like Airfarewatchdog, which uses actual people to search for good deals.
For international flights, try Momondo.
"They seem to be able to find stuff that some of the other searches can't," said Banas.
Even the experts can't predict how this experiment will work out.
"I think this is going to go on for quite a while and you might even see other airlines hopping on the bandwagon if this seems to be profitable for American," said Banas.
Critics suggest American's aim is to steer more people directly to its website and make it more difficult for consumers to compare it's prices with other airlines.
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Reported By Jim Donovan, CBS 3
