How Delta Is Experimenting With AI to Establish Pricing

While AI may be a dreaded form of technology in some quarters, Delta Airlines has begun making the most of its potential.

The airline's executives spoke at a recent investor conference about implementing AI to help develop ticket pricing, as well as to streamline the work of reservation agents, according to Forbes. The airline’s utilization of AI for these two purposes began over the past month.

“I think the initial foray into AI is on the customer service side,” Delta CEO Ed Bastian said at the conference. “We're working with our reservations team to try to help our reservations agents parse the historical policies and questions and things that you may you may call into a real agent.”

Delta’s Chief Executive Officer Ed Bastian at Delta's 2018 profit sharing event. (Courtesy Delta Airlines)

When it comes to helping reservation agents, AI is being used to provide quick answers that may arise during an agent’s interactions with consumers calling to make reservations. Bastien said the use of AI could help cut down the amount of time people spend on hold when reservation agents are looking for answers to questions.

“That's what AI can do, and that's one of the first applications that we're deploying,” Bastien explained.

Looking into the future, Bastien suggested that AI could be used in even more ways to help Delta Airlines, which has $40 billion in assets, solve complex issues involving large quantities of data.

Before doing that, however, he said Delta must first make sure it has its “house in order” so that policy questions can be streamlined and the airline’s data is cleaned and ready to have networks built.

“We're being very disciplined about how we roll it out. But I think the opportunity is enormous,” Bastien said.

Another Delta executive, Delta President Glen Hauenstein, also said the carrier is experimenting with the application of AI in pricing. Hauenstein explained that AI can be used to help identify “the amount people are willing to pay for the premium products related to the base fares.”

The airline’s price analysts are then able to review what AI recommends on pricing, accelerating the airline’s ability to move faster.

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