Asiana Club - Astonishing fare difference?

Traveling back to LAX from ICN today and I switched my flight to the 3 class 747. I was thinking that I might upgrade the return leg to first, as I am on a full D ticket (or whatever Asiana jargon is for full fare business). Looking on Expedia earlier, the fare difference between a one way business and a one way first was about $1100- so a I thought i might splurge and get some needed rest (was on the phone till 4am last night on conference calls)

At the airport ticket counter, the fare difference for the one way was just under $5000. Considering that I could have bought a one-way F fare on on the internet earlier in the morning for $3500 (and kept my D leg for using later) I admit that I was pretty astonished

She explained that they only sell full fare F at the airport, but even so, that implies a full $10,000 difference between an RT D and and FT F. I guess those fares do exist, but OZ could have made some more money today and truly chose not to with that crazy policy

Full fare Business Return is $7074++ and First is $9224++.

Did you really have a full fare business ticket? This would be a C class ticket. D are usually quite discounted Business Tickets.

I still don't get however how they could have demanded close to $5000. It seems to me that this amount is the entire fare plus taxes for a one way ticket in First and not just the fare difference. Maybe they quoted you the price because they assumed you would return your original ticket?

She explained that they only sell full fare F at the airport, but even so, that implies a full $10,000 difference between an RT D and and FT F. I guess those fares do exist, but OZ could have made some more money today and truly chose not to with that crazy policy

I've been in similar situations where I needed to purchase a ticket at ICN. Once I arrived at ICN on a Saturday but got an urgent call from a customer and had to get right back on a plane. Asiana refused to sell anything but full-fare tickets at their ticket counter. I then went to the airport internet cafe, looked up on the Asiana website their discounted fares, went back to the Asiana counter and asked if they could sell me that fare. They still refused. I'm fairly sure their reason is they don't want to upset their travel agents, and may even have contracts with them where they agree not to sell discounted tickets directly at their ticket offices. In the end, I went to the building across the road, in the ATX train terminal building where there are a few travel agents. I tried a few of them, but they only wanted to sell me slightly discounted booking classes and claimed they knew nothing about the heavily discounted business class tickets I was accustomed to. Finally I ended up in Top Travel and they gladly sold me the discounted ticket along with I think a 7% discount on top of the published discount fare. The real nice thing was that this was on a Saturday when many Korean travel agents are closed and the ones open cannot even issue a ticket for the same day being the ticket brokers or whoever they deal with are closed on Saturdays. No problems though at this travel agent at ICN, I got my ticket and back on a plane in short order. Anyone in a similar situation and needing to purchase a last minute ticket while at ICN, I highly recommend a visit to Top Travel.

In thinking about this, I'm a bit confused. The prices quoted by DownUnderFlyer don't seem right. Checking OZ's site and other sites, the first thing to notice is that prices ex-ICN are quoted in Korean Won, not US Dollars, and the prices for full fare F are currently in the 4,000,000+ KRW range. Which would translate roughly to the $3,500 mentioned. R/T is double that, so about 8,000,000 KRW or roughly $7,000. I don't see any F for $9224, assuming that's US Dollars.

So it's very strange that $5,000 was quoted for an upgrade. I wonder if it was some mistake, perhaps in converting from KRW to USD the wrong rate was used resulting in a misquoted price. Or maybe the agent calculated a R/T upgrade instead of a O/W.

In thinking about this, I'm a bit confused. The prices quoted by DownUnderFlyer don't seem right. Checking OZ's site and other sites, the first thing to notice is that prices ex-ICN are quoted in Korean Won, not US Dollars,....

The fares I quoted were the ex LAX fares which seem to be the ones used by the OP. I took the fares straight from Sabre.

ICN-LAX return in F is $6660++. But if you take this fare then what was quoted by OZ doesn't make even less sense if this is possible at all.

I guess OZ used the ex LAX fares since the OP had a ticket originating in the US. But none of this makes real sense.

Glad to see I'm not the only one confused

She definitely knew i was only looking to upgrade the one way - after all, i had already used the first half of the ticket and I don;t exactly look like somebody returning home to Korea. Her response was that Asiana's policy was to only sell full fare F at the airport

The only thing i can figure is that she was quoting me the full fare one way and not accounting the value of the remaining D against the total

And yes, it was D, not C. However, the ticket said were no restrictions on changes or cancellations and it specifically said that no advance purchase was necessary. My confusion thinking that was full fare.

I think what happened was that when the OP tried "upgrading" at ICN, the agent re-priced the flown segment from LAX-ICN from ""D" to "C".

(Because they do not sell anything by "F, C, or Y" at the airport)

Using the hypothetical example below (ASSUMING THE FIRST SEGMENT HAS BEEN FLOWN), the OP's original ticket would have been:

The letter (C, D, F etc.) to the right of the flight number is the "booking class".



PQ 1 SLAX¥TLAX

BASE FARE TAXES TOTAL
USD4438.00 81.20XT USD4519.20ADT
XT 32.20US 5.50YC 7.00XY 5.00XA
2.50AY 22.70BP 1.80YQ 4.50XF
ADT-01 C1
LAX OZ SEL Q75.00 2144.00C1 OZ LAX Q75.00 2144.00C1 NUC4438.
00END ROE1.00 XFLAX4.5
VALIDATING CARRIER - OZ
01 O LAX OZ 203D 30SEP 1220A C1 **FLOWN**
02 O ICN OZ 202D 02OCT 430P C1 30SEP
LAX



For ticket exchange purposes, the above ticket converted to Korean Won would have been:



PQ 2 SLAX¥TLAX¥MKRW

BASE FARE EQUIV AMT TAXES TOTAL
USD4438.00 KRW5473700 100151XT KRW5573851ADT
XT 39714US 6783YC 8634XY 6167XA
3083AY 28000BP 2220YQ 5550XF
ADT-01 C1
LAX OZ SEL Q75.00 2144.00C1 OZ LAX Q75.00 2144.00C1 NUC4438.
00END ROE1.00 XFLAX4.5
VALIDATING CARRIER - OZ
01 O LAX OZ 203D 30SEP 1220A C1 **FLOWN*
02 O ICN OZ 202D 02OCT 430P C1 30SEP
LAX



When the OP asked to have the ticket "upgraded" at the airport, the agent re-priced the OP's ticket from the point of origin using "full fares" (C, and F).

When re-pricing, the already flown LAX-ICN segment is also repriced (from D to C).



PQ 3 SICN¥TICN

BASE FARE EQUIV AMT TAXES TOTAL
USD8299.00 KRW10344800 101500XT KRW10446300ADT
XT 28000BP 40200US 6900YC 8800XY
6300XA 3200AY 2400YQ 5700XF
ADT-01 C F
LAX OZ SEL Q75.00 3537.00C OZ LAX Q75.00 4612.00F NUC8299.00
END ROE1.00 XFLAX4.5
VALIDATING CARRIER - OZ
01 O LAX OZ 203C 30SEP 1220A C **FLOWN**
02 O ICN OZ 202F 02OCT 430P F 30SEP
LAX



New Ticket (with flown segments repriced as well): KRW 10,446,300
Old Ticket (converted to KRW): KRW 5,573,851
Difference = KRW 4,872,449

(Note: In the mind of a Korean person, they would usually think that 1.00 USD = 1,000 KRW so they would have told the OP that the upgrade costs about "$5,000")

Note: Using a foreign exchange calculator, KRW 4,872,449 = USD 3,992

IMHO, I think the OP would have been better off if he had contacted his original travel agent in the US to get the ticket re-issued.

New ticket if OP went to US agent:



PQ 4 SLAX¥TLAX¥RQ

BASE FARE TAXES TOTAL
USD6906.00 81.20XT USD6987.20ADT
XT 32.20US 5.50YC 7.00XY 5.00XA
2.50AY 22.70BP 1.80YQ 4.50XF
ADT-01 C1 F
LAX OZ SEL Q75.00 2144.00C1 OZ LAX Q75.00 4612.00F NUC6906.0
0END ROE1.00 XFLAX4.5
VALIDATING CARRIER - OZ
01 O LAX OZ 203D 30SEP 1220A C1 **FLOWN**
02 O ICN OZ 202F 02OCT 430P F 30SEP
LAX
VALIDATING CARRIER-OZ



New ticket (if original agent did the reissue): USD 6,987.20
Old ticket: USD 4,519.20
Difference: USD 2,468