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It's not about how many were bumped. It's about over selling seats so that when people on refundable tickets don't show the plane doesn't leave with more empty seats.

Margins in air travel are small, an extra seat sold on every flight is a huge difference, this will definitely affect revenues and profits, and will likely lead to slightly higher ticket prices. Until the race to the bottom returns and they start overbooking again.




My gut feeling is that refundable tickets are less of a cause of empty seats than missed connections.


According to the Economist, profits per passenger are $22.40 in North America, compared to less than $8 per passenger in Europe.

April 22, 2017, page 11




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