Southwest Airlines slashes booking friction with direct connect NDC API and new Extra Legroom upgrades. Nov 11, 2026 6 mins to read Southwest Airlines is fast-tracking its repositioning of the corporate travel product, combining an overhaul of the passenger proposition and brand, new booking technology, new priority offerings and plans for a network of premium airport lounges. The move is a notable evolution of the US carrier's strategy as it tries to deepen engagement with corporate travel managers and, crucially, make its products more available via the well-established corporate travel ecosystem. The latest announcements are expected to include an in-house NDC direct connection, which will offer a new Southwest direct connection on existing distribution channels, rolled out to partners by the end of 2026, and a Business Priority product by the beginning of 2027, with the airline also choosing Amadeus' Altéa NDC technology for a later phase of distribution expansion in 2027. Southwest has also been rolling out assigned seating, access to Extra Legroom seats and changes to its Rapid Rewards programme. Travelguides NDC connectivity to expand corporate booking options. A major element of Southwest's corporate travel strategy is the development of additional distribution channels. Discover more Travel guides Tour packages The airline is evolving its existing in-house application programming interface (API) into an NDC direct-connect option. The new connection is expected to be available to partners by the end of 2026. NDC is an industry technology standard developed by the International Air Transport Association (IATA). It allows airlines to distribute richer product information and offers through connected booking platforms, travel agencies and other distribution partners. Travelguides For Southwest, the development is intended to improve access to its fare products and seating-related ancillary services through the channels corporate customers and travel management companies already use. Travelguides The airline currently provides Southwest Partner Services (SPS), its API and direct-connect technology, which integrates with corporate booking tools. Its existing capabilities include access to flight inventory and functions for booking, modifying and cancelling reservations, although available functionality can vary by partner. Discover more Travel insurance Airline tickets Hotel bookings The planned NDC development represents an expansion of this distribution approach rather than the introduction of direct connectivity from scratch. Southwest has also selected Amadeus' Altéa NDC solution. This will support personalised and enriched offers through third-party platforms, including the Amadeus Travel Platform. That integration is expected to become available later in 2027. Travelguides The staged approach gives Southwest two distribution development paths: an in-house API direct connection first, followed by broader access through the Amadeus NDC solution. Business Priority to launch in early 2027. Alongside the technology changes, Southwest is preparing to introduce Business Priority, a product designed specifically for eligible corporate customers. Expected to launch in early 2027, the offering will be an optional feature within corporate travel agreements for qualifying organisations. Its planned benefits include day-of-travel assistance, preferred re-accommodation, standby privileges and boarding benefits. These services are intended to provide additional support when business travellers encounter operational disruptions or need to change their travel arrangements. Preferred re-accommodation is particularly relevant for corporate passengers who need to reach meetings, conferences or other business commitments within specific timeframes. The product is also intended to make Southwest more competitive among companies that value priority treatment and greater assistance during irregular operations. Business Priority builds on the airline's wider investment in Southwest Business, including improvements to booking tools, reporting capabilities and corporate account management. However, eligibility will depend on participating corporate agreements. The airline has not indicated that these benefits will automatically be available to every passenger or every business account. Assigned seating and premium options support the strategy. Southwest's distribution and corporate service developments follow a major change to its traditional passenger experience. On January 27, 2026, the airline introduced assigned seating, replacing its longstanding open-seating model. Passengers can now select seats according to their fare, loyalty status and eligible card benefits. Extra Legroom seats offer additional space, while Preferred seating provides standard legroom in more favourable locations, generally closer to the front of the aircraft. These options give corporate travellers greater control over their journeys and allow businesses to consider different seating preferences when arranging employee travel. Southwest is also expanding the benefits available through Rapid Rewards. Its announced 2027 programme changes include additional loyalty tiers and the ability for members to use points for seat upgrades, subject to availability, later in the year. Airport lounges add a premium dimension. Southwest's first airport lounge network is another significant part of its transformation. Announced in September 2026, the project is being developed in partnership with Chase. The first four Southwest lounges are planned for Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport, Daniel K. Inouye International Airport in Honolulu and Nashville International Airport. Construction has begun, with the first locations expected to welcome passengers in late 2027. The airline has also outlined plans for at least seven additional lounges over the following years. The facilities are expected to feature locally inspired dining, comfortable workspaces and amenities designed to allow passengers to relax or work before departure. Access is planned through a new premium Southwest Rapid Rewards credit card issued by Chase, scheduled to launch in 2027. For corporate travellers, the lounge network could provide another reason to consider Southwest, particularly at airports where employees frequently travel for business. Corporate travel ratings reflect progress. Southwest's strategy is already receiving positive attention from corporate travel buyers. Southwest achieved its strongest rating in its relationship with account managers and sales representatives, scoring 4.42. It also received 4.32 for flexibility in pricing and contract negotiations. The airline's vice president of sales, Aileen Furlong, said the improvement reflected the delivery of changes that had previously been discussed as plans. She also highlighted enhancements to Southwest Business, including seat maps, self-service seat assignments for meeting customers, prepaid baggage options and reporting. A broader corporate travel proposition. The following stage for Southwest will rely on its ability to deliver its technology and service commitments. The end-2026 direct-connect deadline, early-2027 Business Priority launch and later Amadeus integration are all different technological milestones. They will establish whether and how well corporate clients will be able to access Southwest's wider range of products through their systems of record and travel management tools. Along with the related seat selection, premium and lounge product offers, these represent the airline's overall commercial strategic directions. Southwest wants to maintain its lower-value positioning while delivering the distribution, flexibility and premium levels that managed corporate travel programmes have come to expect. It now needs to deliver these to travel managers and business passengers.

US airlines sued for price-coordinating in 2 class-action antitrust lawsuits. Nov 10, 2026, 21:25 PM The largest U.S. airlines are facing two separate federal antitrust and price-fixing lawsuits alleging the carriers share real-time pricing data in order to inflate dynamic airfares. Key facts. * The first lawsuit, filed on Nov. 3 in Virginia, accuses five airlines - American, Delta, Southwest, Alaska and JetBlue - of conspiring to raise and stabilize the price of domestic air travel in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act, which prohibits anticompetitive agreements. * A separate but similar action, filed on Nov. 4 in Washington state, accuses seven airlines - American, Delta, United, Southwest, JetBlue and Alaska Air Group, which owns Alaska Airlines and Hawaiian Airlines - of violating antitrust laws by exchanging competitively sensitive pricing information to keep dynamic airfares artificially high. * Both lawsuits also name as a defendant the Airline Tariff Publishing Company (ATPCO), a Herndon, Va.-based private company that distributes airfare information for the airline and travel industry. The company you've never heard of at the heart of the lawsuits. ATPCO is wholly owned by the three largest U.S. airlines - American, Delta and United - along with Air Canada, Air France, All Nippon Airways, British Airways, KLM, LATAM and Lufthansa. ATPCO operates as an enormous airfare clearinghouse; hundreds of global airlines electronically file fares into ATPCO's database, and in turn ATPCO transmits that information to global airfare distribution systems such as Amadeus, Sabre and Travelport. These reservations systems are used by travel agencies all over the world when they search for flights for their clients. Airlines can also see each other's fare information. "If every airline is reading the same dashboard, the outcome can look a lot like coordination," John Gradek, who teaches aviation management at McGill University, told Forbes. What the plaintiffs say. The plaintiffs in both lawsuits allege that major airlines monitor each other's prices through ATPCO, using a shared database to effectively suppress competition and drive up the cost of domestic air travel. In 2023, ATPCO acquired a company called 3Victors, whose suite of AI-driven tools allegedly operate on a "give-to-get basis," where the more data an airline contributes, the more it receives. "The need for airlines to be able to dynamically bundle and price is crystal clear," ATPCO CEO Alex Zoghlin said at the time, hailing new "industry tools that support the future of modern airline retailing." These tools, the lawsuits allege, allow airlines to see competitors' pricing and demand so they can match discounts quickly and keep fares high. Steve Berman, an attorney with the Seattle-based Hagens Berman law firm, which filed the litigation in Washington state, told the Seattle Times the participating airlines can see "in real time what everyone is charging for any route in the U.S." Crucial quote. "It's not as if airline CEOs are sitting in a room smoking cigars and talking about price fixing," Gradek told Forbes. "This is being done electronically, with tools provided by ATPCO, the fare aggregator. Since the airlines are seeing the same picture, they know the fares being offered. But they don't know what's being bought - that's not allowed, that would be price fixing. And yet to Joe Consumer it can look like de facto price coordination." What the airlines say. "We operate in a highly competitive industry that has delivered tremendous value to consumers, and we take compliance with antitrust laws very seriously," American Airlines said in a statement shared with Forbes. "We develop and price our products independently, compete every day to win customers and categorically reject any suggestion that our prices are anything other than independent and competitive." A spokesperson for Delta Air Lines declined to comment on the pending litigation. Neither ATPCO nor the remaining airlines named in the lawsuits responded to Forbes' requests for comment. Contra. "Publishing fares is how the industry has always worked," Gradek, who worked for years in pricing and revenue management for Air Canada, told Forbes. "The big change with what ATPCO is doing with its newer tools is now airlines can see what customers are searching for before anyone buys. So airlines can match a fare in minutes and there's no incentive to cut fares. But - and this is important - there's nothing illegal about price matching." Henry Harteveldt, president of Atmosphere Research Group, a travel industry research firm, likened it to a supermarket telling customers if they see a better price for the same item at a competitor's store, it'll match the price. "If you gave polygraph tests to the heads of pricing and revenue management at the U.S. airlines and asked them about collusion, I think they would all pass the test because the one thing they know is what the boundaries are for how you use publicly available price information and what you do not do," he told Forbes.

Lawsuits accuse 7 US airlines of colluding to raise fares by sharing pricing data. 7 November 2026, 17:38 published 3min, 41sc Seven major US airlines - including the 'Big Four' American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Southwest Airlines and United Airlines - have been accused of sharing confidential pricing data to avoid undercutting each other. Two proposed class action lawsuits claim the arrangement has helped keep domestic ticket prices artificially high, in violation of federal antitrust laws. At the center of the allegations is an industry database that lets airlines track rivals' fares and quickly match price cuts, potentially removing the incentive for airlines to offer cheaper tickets in the first place. The lawsuits come amid growing scrutiny of airline pricing practices, with carriers facing questions over how exactly they determine their fares. The larger of the two lawsuits was filed on November 4 in the US District Court for the Western District of Washington in Seattle. Along with American, Delta, Southwest and United, it named Alaska Airlines, Hawaiian Airlines and JetBlue as defendants, alongside the industry-owned organization Airline Tariff Publishing Company (ATPCO) and its subsidiary, 3Victors. The suit describes ATPCO as "a highly sophisticated information exchange" that allows airlines to track one another's pricing and "artificially inflate the cost of air travel." The alleged information sharing takes place through two products developed by 3Victors - Iris, which collects airline shopping and pricing data; and PriceEye, which allows airlines to compare prices and track competitors. According to Courthouse News, airlines share their own 'shopping data' - including what routes and dates people searched for, and the fares offered - to Iris in exchange for access to PriceEye, which shows information on competitors' pricing. This effectively allows airlines to see when competitors are offering cheaper fares and respond quickly, preventing rivals from gaining an advantage by undercutting them. Seattle-based law firm Hagens Berman said that the airlines using 3Victors' pricing tools account for around 80% of US domestic passengers. Speaking to The Seattle Times, the firm's managing partner, Steve Berman, explained that the tools let airlines see "in real time what everyone is charging for any route in the US." Berman said: "They're basically eliminating independent competition." In 1992, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) sued ATPCO and eight major airlines, alleging that the platform was used to coordinate price increases and limit discounts. The DOJ estimated that this cost travelers up to $1.9 billion between 1988 and 1992. While they paid no fines, all eight airlines and ATPCO ultimately agreed to restrictions on sharing future information. This required airlines to make filed fares available for immediate purchase, while preventing them from using advance fare announcements to signal planned price increases to competitors. Those restrictions have since expired, and the plaintiffs now allege that ATPCO's pricing tools have created a new way for airlines to monitor one another and avoid competing on price. According to the lawsuit, the new arrangement can be traced to a working group established by ATPCO in 2016 to study dynamic pricing. ATPCO subsequently launched a program in 2023 that allowed airlines to analyze shared shopping data. The only airline to publicly comment so far is American Airlines, which told The Seattle Times that it develops and prices its products independently. Simple Flying has contacted all other airlines involved and will update its story accordingly. As Iran war tensions escalate, US airfares soar 20.7% in latest government inflation figures, with warnings prices could climb further. The Bureau of Labor Statistics' data shows that ticket prices have gone up by more than 22% year-on-year, although airlines have largely attributed this to rising fuel costs. US carriers spent nearly $43 billion on fuel in the first eight months of 2026, which was $13.2 billion more than in the same period of 2025. Airlines are also increasingly using AI to optimize their pricing strategies, with newer systems able to analyze demand and adjust fares in real time. As Simple Flying analyzed recently, this could make it harder for passengers to find cheaper tickets as airlines can respond more quickly to price cuts, closing gaps before rivals have much chance to attract customers. Airlines have also been accused of using 'surveillance pricing' - a practice involving the use of customer data to potentially personalize fares - including a federal lawsuit against JetBlue lodged in April. Additionally, in October, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ordered Delta, United and JetBlue to explain how they use customers' personal data to set fares, giving them 45 days to lay out their pricing methods.