It's well established that a return flight e.g. LAX-SYD-LAX via Qantas is usually significantly cheaper than SYD-LAX-SYD. It's complex but the all-in costs at the US-end are considerably cheaper than here. What's more, the websites are designed with a so-called "geo-block" which detects your IP address as Australia and hence the default re-direction. AND we seem to be prepared to pay more because often our choices are somewhat limited compared to markets like the USA.
As soon as your IP address says Australia many o'seas online websites produce inflated A$ prices. I've checked this out many times on the phone with my brother who settled in the US some years ago and my daughter living in London...we log onto the same website and the prices I see are usually way above what they see!!!
another example is/was software form Apple, Oracle, Microsoft etc. iTune cards bought here for example usually provided a lot less song etc for the same $ value than those bought in the USA...
Some of the big names fronted a parliamentary committee a couple of years ago and under sustained questioning finally admitted that they loaded the Australian prices, sometimes up to five times the US prices...because they could. Then they tried to make saints of themselves by publicly announcing later how they were reducing prices to Australian customers. The Adobe suite of software programmes was a prime example.
Don't expect any relief soon!
MY99 RR P38 HSE 4.6 (Thor) gone (to Tasmania)
2020 Subaru Impreza S ('SWMBO's Express' )
2023 Ineos Grenadier Trialmaster (diesel)
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