In order to push e-ticket sales,
American Airlines
will charge $10
more for
paper tickets.

Would you like
to get personalised mortality
statistics for your
next flight?

At the beginning of 1999, the decision by Delta Airlines to charge $1 or $2 more for plane tickets that would not be purchased on its own website provoked a general outcry and the company had no choice but to back up under the pressure exerted by both consumers and the ASTA (American Society of Travel Agents).

This story makes us smile today as all US airline companies offer at least a five percent discount for each ticket that is bought online.

Therefore, American Airlines decided to adopt the same strategy as Delta, which consisted in charging an extra sum of money as a commercial incitement with the intention of pushing electronic tickets.

And this is a powerful incentive since, starting April 9, American Airlines will charge customers an extra $10 for each paper plane ticket compared to electronic ones.

According to an internal memo from the company, e-ticket would allow the company to save between $4 and $5 for each ticket issued under such form…

The unknown factor is how customers will react when they hear about the decision to charge them an extra $10 for each plane ticket. I think it would have been much more judicious to offer a discount on each ticket sold under its electronic form rather than "punishing" consumers that prefer to keep on buying paper tickets.

Behind this decision by AA, we should also try and find out what the consequences will be for traditional travel agencies.

Indeed, e-ticket appears to be nearly the easiest way to take over consumers "live" on airline companies websites.

Indeed, as long as consumers prefer to hold a paper ticket in their hands, these same consumers will always find it easier to buy their plane tickets in a traditional travel agency, as it will allow them to leave the agency with the plane ticket in their pocket.

There is no doubt that as soon as this "paper" need has vanished, the same need to go to a traditional travel agency to pick one's ticket will disappear alongside with it.

This proves that the stakes of e-ticket go much further than the simple notion of the processing cost for both types of tickets and I think that what American Airlines really aims for is to deal directly with its clients online, which would suppress intermediaries as much as possible.

You can now do it on AmIGoingDown, an English website that was launched last September and that proves able to instantly estimate your chances of …dying for any flight on any company you chose to fly with!

I did some little tests and I was told that I had a 1-in-646.979 chance of misfortune from Paris Charles de Gaulle to New York Kennedy Airport, taking all companies into account.

Along with the statistic result, the site was king enough to send a little message that said: "That's a little better than usual for this route". Thank God for that!

It appears to be much less risky to go from Paris Charles de Gaulle to Shannon Airport (Ireland), as my chances of dying on this trip were only 1-in-19.553.428. You want to know the remark I got? Well, it was a rather nice one: "That's really quite good for this route"!

Even though the site's creators say the data they use cover the last 20 years of mortality data that is available for airline disasters, it still seems that the results displayed do not counterbalance disasters quite enough as they do not take into account the fact that airline companies might have learnt from their past errors.

This site proves nevertheless that novelty can still be appropriate in the eTourism sector.