I went to work on figuring out air fares to travel from Dallas to Chicago as well as from Norfolk, VA to Chicago today and made a startling discovery.

The air fares got a bit more confusing all of the sudden.

Why?  Because American Airlines is no longer being listed (or emphasized at the least) on my 3 favorite travel websites.  And it looks as if the other airlines might just be tweaking their availability on AA routes to take advantage. 

How would they do that?  By offering flights that are connections because suddenly it appears as if they are the only available game on those routes.  I’ve never seen so many different Delta connections at what is a pretty good price between Dallas and Chicago and let me remind you that Delta has no hubs in either city.

I found great fares and, no surprise here, they were on Southwest instead of the others.  In addition, I did check AA fares on their website because despite my strong desire to avoid AA, I may have to fly into O’Hare airport instead.  Their fares are exceptionally low compared to previous times that I’ve checked them.  Off the top of my head, I’d say they’re lower between DFW and ORD than I’ve seen them in 3+ years. 

Also interesting, to me, is that United (with a hub in Chicago) is *not* the cheapest fare between DFW and ORD.  Not by a long distance.  It’s Delta and Frontier leading that pack on online travel agency sites. 

US Air gets the nod now between Richmond, VA (alternate for Norfolk in the case of my other traveling partner) instead of American Airlines. 

American Airlines might say they’re doing fine but I suspect they may not being doing as fine as they say.  The picture presented out there suddenly is a very different landscape and to the traveling consumer who isn’t an airline fanboy or an AA enthusiast, the choices being presented are very much new and different and even attractive.

Filed under: Airline News by ajax