SaluteScoutMilitary Discount Flights Cost Worksheet: Sources and Audit
This record supports a same-trip comparison method. It contains no live airline quotes, no claimed cheapest carrier, and no universal savings percentage.
Research date: September 27, 2026. Official airline pages were opened and their visible body text was read using the configured Playwright MCP. The Playwright page snapshot does not expose HTTP response codes, so this record does not invent them. No fare was booked, and no traveler's eligibility was verified.
Scope and comparison method
This page answers a different question from the main airline comparison: how to compare quotes for the same trip without combining a ticket fare, baggage waiver, or a third-party percentage into one unsupported figure. It records the route, dates, traveler group, fare conditions, booking channel, taxes, and only those fees or waivers that apply to the exact traveler.
The comparison formula is editorial recordkeeping guidance, not a fare quote: quoted traveler-specific fare total, plus applicable required charges, minus only fee waivers confirmed for that traveler and trip. A missing amount or rule remains Unknown rather than zero.
Official airline pages
| Official page | Visible page body read | What it supports here | Boundary |
|---|---|---|---|
| American Airlines — Military benefits | Opened and read on September 27, 2026. | The page says government or military fares are offered in some markets and directs customers to Reservations. It gives different checked-bag allowances for travel on orders and personal travel. | No universal ticket percentage or route quote is stated. American's free-bag wording limits the benefit to American-marketed and American-operated itineraries and notes destination conditions; a partner-operated codeshare is outside that described rule. |
| Southwest — Military Travel and Benefits | Opened and read on September 27, 2026; the military-fare and baggage FAQ answers were expanded in the page. | The fare answer says eligible military fares are unavailable on Southwest.com, gives phone and ticket-counter paths, lists eligible groups, check-in ID requirements, and the restriction on using Rapid Rewards points. The separate baggage answer lists active-duty fee exemptions and size, weight, and piece limits. | The fare eligibility rule is not the same as the baggage exemption. The FAQ says dependents traveling without the active-duty member pay normal excess, oversize, and overweight charges. No universal fare percentage or ticket-price base is given. |
| United — Government or military flight search | Opened and read on September 27, 2026. The visible page heading says “Book a government or military flight”; a complete policy body was not exposed in the readable view. | The page identifies a dedicated government-or-military fare search route. | Public price, fare base, full eligibility, restrictions, and baggage allowance remain Unknown from the page body read. An incomplete search form is not proof of a discount amount or a denial. |
Third-party pages and claims
No third-party price, savings percentage, or eligibility claim is used to calculate a trip total in this worksheet. The shared main-query source audit separately records the observed MilitaryFares, GOVX/MilitaryFares, and WeSalute pages and the limits of what their bodies support. Those offers are not treated as airline policy.
Historical sources
No past-year promotion or archived offer is used as current fare evidence. The page does not carry forward a historical ticket price.
Unreadable pages and Unknown fields
No claim on the comparison worksheet relies on an unreadable source. United's current search page was visible, but its rate and full policy fields were not exposed in the body read; those fields are Unknown. That is a limit of the page evidence, not a conclusion that United has no qualifying fare or baggage benefit. No cache or archived copy was substituted for a live official page.
Google natural-result audit
The same query, military discount flights, has a shared page-body audit at the main guide's source record. That audit preserves the observed order of standard web links, excludes ads, videos, Q&A blocks, and AI features, and records nine visible web links plus a DMCA-removal notice. The September 27 targeted check found the same nine links; there was no tenth URL to invent. See that record for the observed entries and individual read states.
The fixed comparison set for the current 28-day cycle remains American Forces Travel, MilitaryFares, and GOVX. Their third-party or portal claims are not substituted for airline fare terms, and competitor copy was not reused.
Originality and limits
The new material is the same-trip worksheet, traveler-by-traveler normalization sequence, quote script, and stop rule for incomplete comparisons. Carrier facts above are paraphrased from the linked official pages. No competitor wording was copied, no numeric airfare savings were inferred, and the page does not claim to satisfy any airline's eligibility check.
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