This is the Business English Podcast, Episode 264.
What is skip lagging and why you should avoid it?
Welcome to the Business English podcast from All Ears English.
Get the English skills you need to achieve your dreams in global business.
For a presentation, a meeting, or your office party, this is Real Business English with your favorite American hosts, Lindsay and Aubrey, coming to you from Arizona and Colorado, USA.
Still translating in your head when you speak English?
It's time to change that. The Connected Communicator course from All Ears English helps you train your ear, speak naturally, and finally connect with real people.
In our tailored study plan, you'll hear unscripted interviews from tattoo artists to entrepreneurs from all across America.
And you'll use new AI tools to practice speaking anytime you want.
No more stiff, scripted English. Build confidence, fluency, and cultural insight all in one course.
Plus, get real-life speaking experience at our Open Conversation Club every single week and build community with All Ears English teachers and students.
Go to allearsenglish.com slash connection to save $50 this week only.
Offer ends August 10th. allearsenglish.com slash connection.
Hey there, Aubrey. How's it going today?
I'm great, Lindsay. What's going on in Colorado today?
In California or Colorado? It's Colorado.
What? Colorado. There's sunshine. The sun is shining today.
It is summer, Aubrey. I'm excited to be out in the world.
I know my parents are in Wyoming. They sent me photos.
It snowed there this morning. Meanwhile, it's almost 100 degrees here.
So it's crazy, the extremes. Yeah, I'm really ready just to be out in nature and be in Colorado this summer, not be flying around because I feel like I've been on planes so much this year, you know?
Yes, you have taken a lot of flights, which is related to what we're talking about today.
Have you ever skiplagged, Lindsay? I actually have not done that.
I didn't even know about this concept until I saw a couple of articles.
And I wonder if our listeners know about it.
Same. I know we're going to dive into this because it is very common with business trips.
Like someone's having to take a quick business trip.
For some time, this has been popular since the earliest I saw was like in the 2000s.
So it's been happening for a long time. I also was surprised that it was kind of new to me and that I never thought of doing it because I think I could have saved some money.
Right. For sure. So tell us, first of all, what is it?
What does it mean? Skip lagging. Yeah. So skip lagging is booking a cheaper ticket that has a layover at the real destination and skipping the second leg.
So you're avoiding the higher cost of a direct flight by purchasing these cheaper flights that have layovers and then just staying where the layover is.
It sounds really genius when you first hear about it.
I was like, that's quite the smart money-saving travel hack.
Right. But now airlines are cracking down on this, so we're definitely not recommending this.
This is something that we'll talk about that in just a minute, but it is definitely a cultural trend.
I think it goes along with thought leaders, bloggers out in the world writing about how to use airline miles.
There's been a whole trend in the 2010s, I guess, about how to travel cheaper, how to make it work, how to be a digital nomad too, that sort of thing.
Right. So many websites were popping up where you could book cheaper flights, you could find deals, and one of them was about skiplagging.
Skiplag.com built a whole business around this concept, helping find cheap flights with layovers that you could book.
But it's great. It's so interesting how something like this could be pretty trendy and popular in certain circles.
And then some of us never hear about it.
It was kept, I think, on the down low a little bit.
A little bit hush hush. Yeah, I wasn't having the right conversations with the right people, I guess.
Are there any other terms for this concept?
Yes. Right. It's also called hidden city ticketing or throwaway ticketing.
So maybe now you're like, oh, I've heard of that.
Maybe you've done this. Maybe you thought of doing this or use skip flagged dot com.
So maybe you're familiar with what this is, but you might not realize.
I just saw an article a couple of days ago about how much airlines are upset about it and are cracking down on it.
So like we said, we're going to share with you why it might not be the best thing to do these days.
Yeah, definitely not something we recommend these days, you know, because lots of new regulations are being put into place.
Right, Aubrey? So why should we? Well, first, we're going to take a quick break and then we'll talk about why we should maybe not do this.
Abercrombie's viral denim sale is back and Spotify listeners get an extra 15 percent off with code Spotify AF. abercrombie is known for their denim with 30 to 50 off all jeans find out how denim should feel shop the viral denim sale in the abercrombie app online or in stores valid in stores and online through august 11 2025 in u.s and canada excludes clearance price reflects discount code valid in u.s and canada through august 11 2025 exclusions apply see details online okay aubrey so where do we go from here Yeah.
So let's dive into a little bit of why this is maybe not recommended, which is interesting.
I was going to kind of share a little bit more about why it would be so useful, like why I can imagine people would do it, whether it's business flights or personal flights.
I don't know if you've noticed, Lindsay, how much more direct flights are.
I've been really upset about it a few times.
I'll be like, oh, this direct flight is $2,000.
And then there's one that's maybe $300 that has like a full night layover or is like a red eye plus a layover.
And so it makes sense why this started originally because it's crazy how much more a direct flight is.
Wow. I haven't noticed that actually. Yeah.
But I, obviously I prefer direct flights, you know, uh, you're not even looking at all of those options that are cheaper probably because you don't want to waste a day or two days.
Yeah, layovers are tough. It's hard to avoid them, but they're tough.
Definitely. Spend a lot of time in another city and another airport.
Then you might be exhausted before you even get to your destination because you've been in an airport or just like killing time somewhere in a layover city.
Yeah, for sure. Okay, so where do we go from here?
OK, so because of, you know, airlines have expressed clear disapproval about this.
They're losing money. Right. So the practice is really a risk for passengers because airlines are trying to discourage it in lots of different ways.
So let's share some of the reasons that you should just consider these things before you do this.
Right. Because there can be negative consequences for sure.
Yeah, for sure. So number one is that obviously you can't check your baggage, right?
So airlines are going to tag you through to your final destination.
So that's not going to work. Exactly. The only way this works is with a carry on.
And so if I think it's less likely for long trips for international flights, like a couple of day business trip or maybe a short weekend, that I think is when it was probably the most likely to be an option for people.
Yeah. And so you end up in Chicago, but your bags continue on to New York, right?
Yeah. Not a good idea. Yeah. Not the best thing.
Have you ever lost your luggage, Lindsay, when you're flying somewhere?
Shockingly, it's never happened. I remember once during that total craziness in the Christmas time of 2022, 23, when Southwest Airlines had that big issue, my bags ended up just sitting in like a pile of other bags, not on the belt, but that's the worst thing that's ever happened.
I fly it all the time, so I don't know why that's never happened to me.
That's lucky. That's very lucky. I haven't flown nearly as much as you and my bags were lost.
On the way to Paris, we had a layover in Belgium and we got to Paris. no bags.
And I think it was three or four days before they located them, like the day before we were leaving.
So we had to go and buy all new clothes.
And it was hard to find. I'm kind of a discount shopper.
I don't want to be, you know, buying high fashion in Paris.
So it was a little tricky. Yeah, sure, sure, sure.
That makes sense. Wow. That is stressful.
Yeah. Yeah. I've been lucky, I think. What would be another reason why we might not want to do this, Aubrey?
Yeah. So the second thing is, Anymore, you can only book one way because airlines have started canceling the return flight to discourage this practice.
And then the cost savings is gone because usually two one-way flights are more expensive than the round trip in the first place.
So this is an interesting thing that airlines started doing, which can really, it feels so aggressive to me.
Like if I were to book a round trip ticket, and then stay in the layover city, not take that extra leg, and then find out the airline canceled my return flight.
They're like, you're stranded here. You can see, like, if they're going to do something, you can see how upset they are about this practice if they're going to resort to these measures.
That is quite aggressive, for sure. You don't want to get stranded and then have to buy a whole new ticket, and then obviously you haven't saved anything, right?
Right. So I saw that skiplagged.com website because they were actually sued by American Airlines and Orbitz in 2014, but it was dismissed.
It sounded like it was sort of on technicalities, but they started sort of changing things so that they can still run their business and they now only offer one way flights because this was happening so often that the return ticket was canceled by the airline.
Oh wow. Okay. Interesting. Interesting. And number three, what would be the next reason why airlines have started to add written protections against skip lagging in contracts of carriage.
So this you might not even be aware of. You'd have to really read the fine print ticket. to recognize they could take away loyalty miles or elite status or ban passengers even from booking with the airline again.
So it clearly is causing enough negative consequences for them that they're very motivated and they're willing to take these measures which are very inconvenient or harmful for passengers.
Yeah, and most people don't read that fine print.
When you book a ticket, you just look at the price, make sure the dates are right because they've done that too, right?
And book it and then you've got your confirmation code and you move fast through the airport, then you don't know what's in the fine print, right?
I'm sort of curious how you would eventually find out about this if you go to book another flight later and somehow find out you're banned.
Who knows? I don't know. It's got to be kind of a crazy situation, but definitely, as you can see, better to avoid the situation in the first place where airlines are really cracking down on creating all of this inconvenience for passengers intentionally, because they can't, until it's illegal, they can't prevent someone from doing it, but they can have these repercussions.
For sure. Yeah, you definitely want to make sure that you don't lose.
People definitely don't want to lose their miles or their elite status.
I know that people really get into their status.
People accumulate, move up, bump up. This has happened to us traveling a few times because my partner travels for work.
So I end up sometimes getting bumped up as well.
And there's a big thing about status. Oh, yeah.
People who fly a lot really, it matters to them a lot, right?
They are loyal to one airline because they have the points, they have the status.
Right. And comfort if they're flying a lot, especially for work.
And if you lose all that, it's definitely a disappointment.
It was sort of a fascinating experience to be reading this article where skip lagging was new to me.
So when I first was like, introduced to the idea.
I was like, genius. I should try this. I'm so excited.
And then within a few paragraphs, I'm like, oh no, actually this is a terrible idea.
We're going to dig away from it. I don't think I'm going to do that.
Interesting. Today's kind of a what not to do episode, right?
It's tempting to save money on flights for sure, especially when you travel a lot for work, but maybe look for other ways to save money, right?
There's other things we could do, yeah? Right, exactly.
And I mean, it's interesting to think about with COVID, with lots of flights that were canceled, it was a struggle for airlines.
Like we need airlines to be able to stay in business.
So as much as we would like to save some money, they have to be profitable as well.
Or I certainly don't want airline travel to no longer be as accessible as it is.
So we have to recognize like, it's gotta be profitable for them as well.
Yes, 100%. All right, Aubrey, thanks for being on the show today.
I'll talk to you soon. Awesome. See you next time.
Bye. Bye. thank you for listening to business english a podcast just for you the high achieving global professional want more from all ears english don't miss our biggest and best podcast with 8 million monthly downloads just search for the all ears english podcast and hit follow to get four new episodes per week on fluency american culture grammar and so much more or Tap the link in the show notes.
Remember, we believe in connection, not perfection when it comes to learning English.
Follow the All Ears English podcast now.
