American Airlines Sues Orbitz

The spat between American Airlines and online travel site Orbitz is heating up. The airline has filed suit in Texas, accusing Orbitz and Travelport LP of anti-competitive business practices.

Travelport is the entity that provides information about flights to online travel sites, as well as travel agents nationwide. American would like to provide the data about its flights directly, without having to pay fees to Travelport.

In the complaint, American charged that Travelport and Orbitz had entered into agreements with one another and with others "to exclude competition and maintain Travelport's monopoly power."

Travelport said it has done nothing wrong and called a suit an attempt to gain bargaining power through litigation. Orbitz also called the charges baseless, and accused the airline of trying to limit consumer choice.

"It is important to keep the facts straight," Orbitz said in a statement. "American Airlines made the decision to play the role of the marketplace bully and pull its fares from Orbitz.  Having failed to force Orbitz to adopt unproven technology that does not meet the needs of our customers, American Airlines is now resorting to groundless litigation in a desperate attempt to revive an unsuccessful strategy."

Back in December, American ended its relationship with Orbitz, saying it would no longer sell its tickets through the site. At issue, it said, was the fees paid to Travelport, which amounted to $300 million last year. While American said the move would lower costs for consumers, Orbitz says the reverse is true.

"The unfortunate truth is that American Airlines is attempting to deprive consumers of the ability to compare prices across competing airlines," the company said.