Airline mergers: Do they really benefit passengers?

Apr 09 2025 Travel trends

When airlines decide to merge, it’s really supposed to be for the greater good of their customer, but is it really that? Now for a moment just imagine the merge like one giant wedding between to big corporations that want to join their forces for something much better. Then again history has taught us many lessons before and in history one thing is for sure, us customers always pull the short end of the stick.

Fewer airlines, fewer choices

Now let’s imagine we are in a store for mini airplanes, and we want to choose the perfect one for our shelf collection, but instead of having hundreds of choices we are down to only ten choices. The same goes for airline merges. More and more airlines join together and that means less competition, less flight options and us passengers are stuck with picking the leftovers.

Let’s take American Airlines and US Airways merging as an example. The number of routes got shuffled around and some smaller cities ended up losing services altogether. This means long layovers, less direct flights and more chances of missing a connection flight. Now, let’s be honest here, there’s not a single person that would like to spend hours on end at the airport waiting for their flight and spending money on overpriced food.

Higher prices, because why not?

In theory airline merges should also make things run smoother and cut costs. But what is the reality? That’s not really it. With less airlines on the field the big ones can hike up their prices whenever they want to, for one reason or another. Research shows that ticket prices often jump by another 15% after big airline merge. This is great for them, but it’s not great for their customers. And the baggage fees get even higher. With less options airlines don’t have to really keep their fees low, because we always end up paying more for stuff that in the past used to be free, like choosing the seat or bringing a carry-on. In reality we pay to even breathe the air in that plane. Those fees for choosing your seat have turned into a big goldmine for the airlines and we don’t have much choice but to pay for that.

Service? What service?

Usually before merging airlines always say that combining power will improve the customer service. But what do they really mean? They straight up tell us that we will be on hold for three hours because there was a staff cut.

United Airlines and Continental Airlines are the prime example for this. After they joined forces, they struggled a lot with flight delays and lost luggage. They even experienced a serious decline in overall customer service rating. Employees had to get used to completely new systems and passengers had to pay the hefty price in the big chaos and confusion.

With that merge even the frequent flyer programs took the hit very often. The rewards people once collected like pros, suddenly got worth less or got way harder to redeem. Merge often means devaluation of miles, higher redemption rated and new restrictions that make those hard-earned rewards much less valuable than they actually are.

Here comes the big question, what about passenger rights in this situation? This means if you knew your rights on one airline and what you can get for any possible inconvenience, now you have to relearn the rules of the merger. Refund policies, compensation for flight delay and cancellation, lost luggage and even how they handle the overbooking change get less friendly for passengers.

For instance, airlines have been known to quietly update their terms and conditions which makes it harder for us to get compensated for delays or cancellations. Well, in that case, we will be lucky to get help when the customer service is also overwhelmed and trying to figure it out among the merge chaos.

The ripple effect on employees and passengers

But here it’s not only about us passengers, what about the employees? Those merges often result in staff layoff, staffing shortages and many confused workers asking, “what do we do now?” They have to adjust to the new systems and policies. This can lead to many unsatisfied employees and even more frustrated passengers. Nobody wins here, only the shareholders.

So, what can you do?

Now guess what? Passengers are not actually completely powerless. If you feel like the combined forces has left you with bad service, absolutely insane fees or cancelled flight with no compensation, worry not MYFLYRIGHT is here to save the day! We can make sure that airlines won’t get away with what they owe you under the EC261. If your flight gets cancelled, delayed, overbooked or luggage is lost under mysterious circumstances, we’ll be always here behind your back to help you claim the compensation you deserve. Our legal team knows the rules way too well and we make sure that airlines also follow them properly.

At the end of the day, airlines combining forces is great for business, but not so much for passengers. The best way to fight back is to know your rights and hold them accountable. This is why we fly for your right!