The "Bucket Bumping" problem of airline tickets, and how to minimise your fare

The problem You're booking your next holiday and while checking prices you key in the search for one passenger. When it comes time to make the actual booking, you select the required four passengers for your family, but suddenly the price per ticket rises from $250 to $400! Why it happens Airline booking systems (aka Global Distribution Systems / GDS) cannot split a single booking across "buckets"…