This article from NYTimes.com has been sent to you by psa188@juno.com. /-------------------- advertisement -----------------------\ Enjoy new investment freedom! Get the tools you need to successfully manage your portfolio from Harrisdirect. Start with award-winning research. Then add access to round-the-clock customer service from Series-7 trained representatives. Open an account today and receive a $100 credit! http://www.harrisdirect.com/b4.htm?OINYT100C \----------------------------------------------------------/ Boston to Los Angeles: 800 Million Fare Choices April 21, 2002 By SARAH MILSTEIN AN air fare reflects a combination of things: airline, airport of origin, destination and applicable rules. In theory, there are immeasurable combinations, because a traveler could fly, say, from Boston to Los Angeles via London. To set fares that might interest an average traveler, however, it is usually enough for a computer to search for the 400 most direct round trips. Even finding those requires sifting through hundreds of millions of possibilities. Here are the choices for Boston-Los Angeles round trips as ITA software seeks fares for nonstop and one-stop flights, leaving May 16 and returning May 23, with a 24-hour window for departures both days: • The 400 possible outbound trips are multiplied by the 400 possible return trips , which equals 160,000 unique round-trip itineraries. • For each round trip, there may be up to four legs (Boston to connecting city, connecting city to Los Angeles, and the reverse), and each represents a flight. Once rules and classes (economy, business, first class) are applied, each flight has about 30 fares. The number of fare combinations is thus 30 times 30 times 30 times 30, which equals 810,000. • Of that 810,000, only about 5,000 typically pass the rules for a given route and passenger (special fares for the elderly, for example, or companion fares). • The final numbers, then, are: 160,000 itineraries times 5,000 fares - or 800 million possible fare combinations. The cheapest round-trip fare found by ITA's system early this month was $309.50 on United, with nonstops both ways. SARAH MILSTEIN http://www.nytimes.com/2002/04/21/business/yourmoney/21SROO.html?ex=1020400851&ei=1&en=ee74bbaf6ac9b34c HOW TO ADVERTISE --------------------------------- For information on advertising in e-mail newsletters or other creative advertising opportunities with The New York Times on the Web, please contact onlinesales@nytimes.com or visit our online media kit at http://www.nytimes.com/adinfo For general information about NYTimes.com, write to help@nytimes.com. Copyright 2002 The New York Times Company