Skiplagging: Not Worth the Risk

Skiplagging
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Jenn: [00:00:00] Hey everyone and welcome back to Travel Tip Tuesday with the Travel Mug Podcast. I am Jenn joined, as always by my amazing partner in podcasting, Meggan. So this week, Meggan, I wanna talk about a trend that I've been seeing online, which is skip lagging. Have you ever heard of this term, Meggan?

Meggan: No, and like other trends, now that I know about it. I'm not a fan, so let's dive in though, uh,

Jenn: Let's.

Meggan: it.

Jenn: Do it. Okay, so Skip Lagging, also known as Hidden City Flying is when you book a flight with a connection, but instead of continuing on to the final destination, you stay in the layover city.

Meggan: Okay.

Jenn: the main reason people do this is of course to save money. So for example, you might find a flight that goes from New York to Orlando. It might be like $350. Let's just say for [00:01:00] example, but a similar flight goes, from New York to Dallas with a layover in Orlando might be $170. So like that's quite a bit different, right? So Skip laggers would book the cheaper flight, get off in Orlando, and uh, not go to Dallas. So, you know, obviously we all wanna save money. Sounds great. Right?

Meggan: Right, and I wanna sort of hear, I'm assuming you'll talk to us about as well, some ramifications about this. 'cause there's something that popped into mind immediately. So let's get into that.

Jenn: Yeah, obviously there are a couple problems with this method, obviously, or we would all be doing it, so you can't really book like a return flight, right? Because if you miss a leg of your flight, the rest of your itinerary gets canceled.

Meggan: was the first thing that came into my head. I'm like, how are you getting home to New York

Jenn: [00:02:00] Yeah. How? So obviously it only works for, uh, single, what is that word? Not one way, one way flights. Right? Like that's just, that's the only way that works. And then obviously you can't check a bag because it's gonna show up at your final destination. It's so, or actually.

Meggan: be in Dallas people.

Jenn: it won't because if you're not on the flight, they're not gonna put your bag on the flight.

So you're gonna delay that flight 'cause they're gonna have to pull your bag and they don't like that.

Meggan: yourself irritate you, other people will be irritated by you.

Jenn: True. And I mean, most importantly, really it violates the terms and conditions of most airlines. So you could, theoretically, get in trouble. Airlines could take away miles and frequent flyer benefits. They could ban you from future flights and they could charge you for the missed segment. So, you know it's not illegal, right?

Like [00:03:00] you're not gonna be thrown in jail. But, uh. There is a website that encourages people to book this. It's called skipla gged.com, and their CEO was quoted in Forbes saying that 298,967 people have skiplagged in the last year, and that figure is from November, 2024. So that's not a small number of people that are doing this.

bunch of skiplaggers I know, and like I said, I understand we wanna save money too, but for me it's not worth the risk. Like obviously it works for some people and like I'm not a like a big fan of airlines, like prices are obviously outrageous, especially in Canada, and, but we have so few airline options, like, can you imagine Meggan being banned from Air Canada?

Like, we'd never be able to go anywhere again.

Meggan: like, like 75% of your flight options out the window.

Jenn: So Meggan, what, uh, what are your thoughts?

Meggan: I mean, I think [00:04:00] my disdain throughout this entire thing is just, is pretty evident. I mean, I do, like I say that in jest, but also we all, it, it times are tough. People may need to get places, especially if it's an emergency, and see this as their only option. I, I don't, I don't live other people's lives. But if, if you're just doing it simply to be like, ha ha, follow the trend.

Look at me, I'm a skip lagger. I don't know. I don't think that's a flex in my opinion. . Yeah, like, it's not something I would do. I'm, I'm kind of risk averse when it comes to flights. , But I mean, it's something I've never heard of and obviously we're not gonna stop anyone from doing it, but I, it's not something I would do personally.

I,

Jenn: Correct.

Meggan: sure people may have different reasons out there that I can't even envision. Um, maybe other than just trying to stick it to the airlines, but I don't know what those would be. But if there are serious reasons, I mean, who am I? But not something I would do.

Jenn: No, same to me. It's not worth the risk. But, uh, let us know what you think. Find us on [00:05:00] social media at Travel Mug Podcast and on our website travel mug podcast.com. If you feel so inclined, you can support the show through Buy Me a Coffee, the link for that's in the show notes. Or you can leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, which is free, and we'll chat with you again next week.

Bye everyone.

Meggan: Bye.