Availability on Expedia but not VS. Normal?

I have 2 friends coming over from the UK to visit in April, and in the week before they come over I plan on being in the UK, so we are trying to get the same flight back from LHR to NYC on the 6th April. Ideally we want VS17 (apart from the fact its a 343).

It showed as available on the main search page on the VS website, but when we click through to the next page it says the flight isn't available. It IS available on Expedia. So I called VS, and was told yes, economy is completely sold out on that flight, and Expedia must have bought their own seats if they are showing availability. I checked on Expertflyer with the below results. Forgive my ignorance, but I didn't realise it worked this way (Expedia buying seats to resell)?


VS 17 0 LHR
04/06/10 8:25 PM EWR
04/06/10 11:10 PM 343
Daily
77% / 36m J9 D9 R9 Z0 W9 S9 K9 Y9 B9 L9 M9 Q9 X3 N0 O0

I've never heard of Expedia 'buying' seats from VS.

However, I just tried to book on the VS Web site for 6 Apr on the VS018, and I could get through the booking process, so maybe you experienced a glitch or bug? Try again?

[Scrooge]

Major travel companies will buy seats in bulk, VS is one of the airlines that does sell bulk seats to these companies. A quick check on skyauction will normally turn up a whole bunch of these consolidated fares.

Thanks for replies.

It was VS17 leaving LHR going to EWR that we were unable to book on the VS site, and also over the phone, not the VS18. It still wasn't do-able, even with another phone call to double check, and my friends are now looking at a KLM flight into JFK which is a couple hundred pounds cheaper than what VS has left. I'll prob still take VS as they do have seats in PE.

Thanks also for clarifying that Expedia do buy their own seats - I had always figured that if there was a single seat left on a plane unsold, the one place you could be guaranteed to buy it would be through the airline themselves, but I guess I was wrong. I suppose this means when booking we really should check all the other travel sites in addition to the airlines own. What happens if the seats that Expedia et al. buy don't get sold, do they sell them back to the airlines, and at what point before the flight - a few days before, a week before?