Most people purchase airline tickets based on a combination of price, flight schedules and routing. I booked a trip to Seattle for my wife and I for this summer. Actually going to Juneau, Alaska, put will stay a couple days in Seattle. I purchased tickets on United back in February based on great price and great schedule. About a month after the purchase, United sent me a change notice and the schedule went from great to lousy. I spent a half hour on the phone and got a little better schedule at no additional cost.
Today, I received another change notice from United. Schedule changed to a very early departure and then a 5 hour layover in Denver. Any online change wanted to charge me significantly more money, so I phoned United and after another half hour or so was able to reduce the layover to 2 hours.
My trip is still several months off, so I am expecting United to make yet another change.