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Judge Tosses United Airlines Lawsuit Over 'Hidden City' Tickets
An anonymous reader writes: United Airlines lost a legal round in its effort to stop a website that helps people find 'hidden city' ticket pairs. The airline, along with online travel site Orbitz, sued New York-based Skiplagged.com and its founder, Aktarer Zaman, in November seeking an injunction to stop the site from sending users to Orbitz to purchase United tickets. A federal judge ruled Thursday that Illinois isn't the proper venue for the carrier's claims.
Wouldn't have hurt to put this in the summary - who RTFA?
Say you want to fly from NY to Chicago, and that'd cost $300. You can also get a ticket from NY to LA, and that'd cost $250. The catch? That flight from NY to LA also lands in Chicago.
So if you wanted to go from NY to Chicago, you'd be better off buying the NY to LA ticket instead, saving $50.
The airlines don't like this, because if you book NY to LA, they can no longer sell the Chicago to LA seat (except at last minute rates or more often push standby passengers onto that flight) that might normally be $150. So not only are they out $50 on you, they're potentially out an additional $150 on the unsold seat.
( They save a few $ in fuel consumption, food and beverages, etc. )
Presumably the solution would be to not make part-flights more expensive than full-flights to begin with, but I'm sure the bean counters worked out that this is still the more profitable route for them.
As for headline - yeah, it's only tossed out because it's the wrong venue.. there's really no winner or loser, other than the courts who wasted time on a case that they apparently shouldn't have spent any time on at all.
I've never understood why they won't transfer me to an otherwise empty seat on an earlier flight when I happen to be early for a connection. It would seem to be in their best interest to fill up the planes and push the "empty seat" to a later flight when they have a chance of selling it, but they never do offer me a free change, they always want to charge me an extra $50, so I just get a soda and wait it out.
Nullius in verba
Then they shouldn't land the plane and make you switch planes. As soon as they land the plane and make you disembark whether you board the second flight is up to you. Otherwise that other plane better not take off without you, you think they would hold the second plane for you?
These fairs are cheaper with layovers are games the airlines play with fairs to maximize revenue. No one should be under any obligation to play along if they don't want to. Suing someone that facilitates exploiting this loophole in their system is nothing more than attacking free speech.
It's a standard legal practice by unscrupulous companies, make the small guy spend a lot of money to travel long distances in order to have his day in court.
That is why under 28 US Code 1391(b) the proper legal venue is where the defendant resides. The reason why you see a lot of patent suits filed in Texas is that for large corporations, where they reside is murky since they do business everywhere and are registered the Secretary of State in most/all of the states, including Texas, so they are considered "local" under these rules. The "small guy" however lives in a specific place, so that is where the proper venue would be.
The claim that the defendants don't have significant presence in Illinois for purposes of legal action, in the context of an Internet-based service, is just ridiculous. The judge is applying brick-and-mortar rules to a global network.
No, he is apply the law. Where to file is spelled out in 28 US Code 1391, and unless you can't for some reason, like you don't know where the defendant lives, the place to file is "a judicial district in which any defendant resides". The law is clear, and the judge has no choice but to follow it.