[WASHINGTON] Three democratic senators asked Delta CEO Ed Bastian to set ticket prices and raise concerns about the impact on travelers when asked about the airline's planned use of artificial intelligence.
“Delta's current and planned individual pricing practices not only present data privacy concerns, but could mean wage increases in individual consumers' personal 'pain' at a time when American families are already struggling with rising costs.”
The senator cited a recent comment from Delta that the airline will partner with AI pricing company Fetcherr by the end of 2025 to deploy AI-based revenue management technology to 20% of its domestic network.
They said Delta executives previously told investors that technology could set fares based on forecasts of “an amount that people are willing to pay for premium products related to base fares.”
The airline said in a statement: “There are no freight products used by Delta. We have tested or used plans to target customers with individual offers based on personal information and more.”
Delta has used dynamic pricing for over 30 years, and pricing fluctuates based on a variety of factors, including overall customer demand, but not personal information for a particular consumer.
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According to Delta, dynamic pricing AI technology has been tested to eliminate manual processes while accelerating analytics and adjustments, highlighting that every customer sees the same exact fare and offers across all retail channels.
Delta said it is testing AI to predict demand for a particular route and flight, adapting to market conditions in real time, taking into account thousands of variables simultaneously, and learning from each pricing decision to improve future outcomes.
In January, Senators Blumenthal, Maggie Hassan and Josh Hawley revealed whether Frontier Airlines and Spirit Airlines were manipulating seating fees by using customer personal information to charge passengers on the same flight differently.
The senator said it appears that the airline will “charge passengers different seat fees for customer personal information on the same flight,” despite the airline having the same fare.
Frontiers and Spirit did not immediately respond to requests for comment on current practices on Tuesday. Reuters
