90+ percent of all airfares that are purchased each day are filed with a clearing house in Washington DC called ATPCO (Airline Tariff Publishing Company). This company was once a government agency but changed to private ownership (owned by 20+ airlines) after airline deregulation in 1978.

Hundreds of thousands of airfare price and rule changes flow continuously into ATPCO each day and in turn they distribute them at specified times later that day to a handful of subscribers worldwide that provide reservation systems including the airlines themselves (FareCompare.com is one of these handful of subscribers).

Savvy air travel shoppers should know these approximate delivery times to save both time and energy shopping …