This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
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You know how when you book a plane ticket, you have to provide your personal information. You might think, well, of course, that's normal. That's for security, right? I gotta be safe. So that's why I need to provide all this detailed information about myself.
And then when I go through the TSA checkpoint, at least in the United States, it's called TSA, but in most parts of the world, you have to go through a checkpoint. They usually match your ID with your boarding pass. Okay, and you think, well, of course that makes sense because again, security. Well, here's the thing. Maybe some of that process is for security, like actual security, but a lot of it is just to enable airlines to make more money.
Because if everyone could trade their plane tickets or use somebody else's plane ticket, then of course airlines would make less money. And until 1996, there was no ID check with boarding passes in the U.S. The requirement came about when President Clinton at the time wanted something to announce after the crash of TW-8 flight 800. In case you're wondering where this is going, this is in fact relevant to an actual listener question. This listener has an idea.
They wanna know, is there a way to trade plane tickets for profit? This is a big problem they see. They see a problem. So they think they have a solution or at least they have an idea. They have a creative idea, but also some sky high problems to solve.
As always, whenever there is a problem, there is at least some potential or there might be an opportunity. So is it possible to trade unused plane tickets between passengers with different names, somehow create a market and make money from it? That's the topic I'm gonna address in this episode. Stay tuned. [Music]
Hi Chris, this is Jazlyn from Baltimore, Maryland.
And I've been following your work since the art of nonconformity. And I have a travel related question. When you fly in the US, the TSA checks your ID with your boarding pass so that no one else can fly with your ticket. But after the security check, you put your ID away and don't need it to board. A couple of years ago, I was in Australia and noticed that there's no ID check at all to get through security there, at least on domestic flights.
You scan your boarding pass and you put your bags through the X-ray machine, but there's no identity verification. So whether here or there, is it possible to have some kind of side hustle that puts people's unused plane tickets to good use? The airlines must be making a lot of money on those since they don't allow you to change the name on a ticket after a reservation has been made. Thanks and looking forward to hearing from you. - Jazlyn, thank you for the call.
Good to hear from you. And I love the creativity. The problem is we're going up against a really big industry here, both the airline industry and the security theater industry, which is a lot of what the TSA process is. It's not so much about actual security. It's about making people think that they're doing something about security.
So the reason why your name is matched to your boarding pass is just like Jazlyn says, it's so the airlines can make more money because they didn't use to do this. And in some places like Australia, they don't actually do that at the security checkpoint. So it has very little to do with actually keeping people safe. And there are a lot of unused plane tickets that just go unused because well, somebody can't take the trip or whatever and maybe they bought a non-refundable, non-changeable ticket. So, you know, what do they do?
In some cases, maybe they bought a pretty cheap ticket and to change the ticket costs more than the actual ticket costs. And they just lose that money. Now that said, as much of an injustice as this is, the airlines kind of have the upper hand, right? Because they have made this happen through their lobbying and, you know, working with the government and all that. So even though this idea meets a few characteristics of a good opportunity, a clear problem, specific market and so on, there's not really an easy way to solve the problem, at least not as an individual.
So I would say this idea probably isn't gonna work. What might you be able to do instead if we're thinking along these same lines? Well, a travel concierge to manage bookings. I think we have featured a couple of people doing that. Somebody who's handling the process of looking for flight changes and, you know, being available if something goes wrong.
We talked recently about being an actual travel agent, which is different. So it's possible to do that. But I was thinking about travel concierge and maybe travel education in general. So helping people understand how to get better deals and avoid issues such as having plane tickets that go unused in the first place. Now, last but not least, there is some good news on this topic because even though it's not gonna be possible to change your name on a plane ticket anytime soon, these days, far fewer tickets are truly non-refundable and non-changeable.
We can thank, of course, the global pandemic for that. This is one of those positive secondary consequences. So if you have a plane ticket that's not gonna be used, don't let it go to waste, at least not without checking with the airline to see what your options are. 'Cause as I said, a lot of those fees have now been drastically reduced or even completely removed. So, Jazlyn's idea, I don't think it's gonna work, at least in this form, but better news for everybody who's flying, it's much less risky to buy plane tickets now because far fewer of them are truly non-changeable.
All right, that's it for today. Listeners, if you have a question, sidehustleschool.com/questions. Let's talk about your ideas, what you're working on, what you're struggling with, what's going well, all the things. We will continue to feature them throughout the year, along with updates from listeners as they launch their projects. Thank you so much for tuning in today.
I hope you will subscribe or follow Come Back Tomorrow. My name is Chris Guillebeau. You are listening to Side Hustle School. [Music]
From the Onward Project.
