How reliable is data in the OAG database?

[papabravowhiskey]

I've been looking at the OAG online flight database. I was under the impression that it was supposed to be quite reliable. However, to give specific examples, OAG shows there being FR LPL-FNI and MAN-MRS flights in December, when neither is showing up on Ryanair's booking engine and both FNI and MRS say that Ryanair is not flying the routes this winter. Does this mean that OAG is wrong or that Ryanair has booked the slots but has just either not yet made the tickets available or hasn't decided whether or not to do the routes? Where does OAG get its info from?

TIA
PBW

[papabravowhiskey]

Thanks for the speedy response ... it had never even crossed my mind that OAG might be getting their info via screen-scraping - I thought that they were using more "official" or authoritative sources. You learn something new every day.

PBW

[Globaliser]

it had never even crossed my mind that OAG might be getting their info via screen-scrapingI'd be absolutely astonished if they did. OAG is a well-respected subscription service, and it wouldn't take long for them to be found out (and to lose all of their business) if they were cheating like that. OAG has lots of information that you can't get from screenscraping.

[Hartington]

For "conventional" airlines OAG gets the data direct. By that I mean the airline taps straight into OAG and enters the data itself. The data is then distributed electronically to the GDSs who then use it to display on screens and websites.

Ryanair - who knows.

[G&T ice n slice]

Unless it has changed drastically here’s how the OAG works

each week all the contributing airlines send their schedules for the next 52 weeks to the OAG
The OAG then process all this into their systems.

Some airlines only do this monthly (and some only do this at random intervals (like changes of schedule winter/summer etc)

In many cases the contributing airlines are using the returned data (which is every other airline’s schedules) in their own systems to enable through-bookings on other airlines.

Some airlines are only using the OAG to flag their services to the travelling public. These are the ones that are usually not updating their data in the OAG very often. From (ancient) memory this is usually the LoCos (who are not involved in interline traffic).

Hence the reason why Ryanair may be showing flights in the OAG that will not exist in the next season’s schedule; and conversely may not yet be showing flights in the OAG that WILL exist.


By the way, this may well be 110% wrong and completely inutile, but I’ve been out of that loop for a few years...

[papabravowhiskey]

Thanks everyone for your views and ideas. It is entirely possible that what I have seen is the result of infrequent input from Ryanair, and they just haven't bothered to update it.

Regards
PBW