There was a similar article in the L.A. Times last Friday:
More mergers may be on industry's radar
One comment really stood out:
"Customers will lose because they always lose in a merger," said Joe Brancatelli, who runs a website for business travelers, joesentme.com. "I don't care what they say; mergers have been bad for customers."
This is not a merger thing, but I'm flying to D.C. in March, using Alaska Air miles. It's one of those partnership/codeshare deals, so I'll actually be on American. With American jacking up its fuel surcharge (noted in the Times article), I'm wondering if I'll get hit with it after the fact. "They can't do that," you might say. But the Times Sunday travel section has already printed 3 letters from readers who got nailed for fuel surcharges even though they had booked months earlier, before any surcharge was in effect. Of course they all paid, but were not happy about it, and I wouldn't be either. And if the Times printed 3 letters about this practice, you just KNOW it has happened to many others.
My r/t travel was booked last Rocktober - almost 6 months in advance. There was in fact a fuel surcharge at the time of booking, but I don't wanna get hit with double. Not my fault that American, unlike Southwest, didn't lock in a lower priced, long term contract before jet fuel skyrocketed. I mean, why should we, the customers, have to pay for such shortsightedness?