American Airlines Pulls Out of Orbitz

American Airlines has decided that it no longer wants to be in a partnership with Orbitz. Orbitz is a third party online website that allows you to book travel arrangements, including airline tickets.

The way it works is that an airline will pay this third party (in this case, American Airlines pays Orbitz) for the flights that passengers book on its site. Apparently this arrangement has become too costly for American Airlines and that they were not able to come to terms on a new agreement. This seems more of a blow to Orbitz than to American Airlines actually. Because what if more airlines pull out? The airlines will continue to exist, but the third party website will begin to struggle because it’s inventory is decreasing.

As airlines continue to look for ways to cut costs, I wonder if airlines pulling flights out of third party websites is going to be a trend. I am a fan of cost cutting measures, so long as it means that they will at least maintain or lower the cost of tickets for passengers. I will be watching American Airlines very closely.