jagmeets

(I might have missed a discussion on this - apologies if thats the case).

Wow- we seem to have started emerging from the dark ages into the internet era!

Just trolling for some fares, came across this on the booking page::

"If you would like to hold this seat now, please select Pay Later on the payment page. Be sure to make payment within 24 hours, by XXX"

CrazyJ82

Great news if so. Although ironically, when I just went to have a look myself, I couldn't get the site to load at all!

I've used AA's 24-hour hold facility on their website before and found it enormously helpful. I could do the leg work involved in assembling an itinerary when I had time, lock in a fare, and then confirm plans with the people I was meeting, without having to set aside a second block of time to re-select all the flights.

CanucksHKG

Just gave it a try - it's more of a 25 hr hold

CX828

This is great news! Well done CX!

I always use this function with AA to secure fares whilst confirming plans/dates in the mean time. It is very useful function and much appreciated by customers.

Psychiatrist

Funnily enough, when I tried to do a booking last night, an error message would show up before the payment page - something about not being able to calculate the fare (which was calculated after the flights were shown!) .... ended up having to call e-Service center to book the ticket.

jona970318

Does that only work with the US site or accross the board?

Moscowflyer

It worked for me earlier today to hold a TPE-HKG-JFK return business class ticket at US$4,000. That's the good news. The bad news is that I was only holding the ticket so that I could ask CX to change the final HKG-TPE flight to early on the day after my JFK-HKG arrival so that I had 12 hours overnight in HKG (still a transit, not a stopover). If you do that after they issue the ticket, they charge around US$40 to do it if I remember. But CX in Taipei can't make the change, the MPC seem to think they can't make the change and everyone suggests that I just have to call the eservice centre. That used to be a really good service, but now the message says they're receiving more calls than usual and there could be a wait. After 30 minutes on hold (despite putting in my diamond card number) I realised they were serious about the fact that there could be a wait and I gave up.
So I'm on Delta one-stop via Narita both ways, business class for $4,200 - sometimes the fare's more expensive than this but when it's not and I've done 240,000 (earning) miles in the last six months on Cathay I tend to think I should go with the airline that makes my life easy, which in this instance Cathay seemed determined not to do.

midlevels

I used the Pay Later feature to book an ex-PVG ticket earlier today, and when completing the payment later in the day (via Alipay since it was ex-China), everything worked fine. ^

Definitely a very welcome addition to the CX website.

I also note that the online upgrade using Asia Miles feature is now working too. Another welcome addition. Finally the website is becoming a really useful tool for interfacing with CX.

Now, if only CX would give allow choosing something other than the default 4 flight options per sector that would be really great.

jona970318

Great to hear all the great website features being added. Does anyone know if they fixed the online change function? I recall that function working for a short period a year or two ago priory to the website upgrade

ernestnywang

Why not just call TPECX (+886227152333) and make the booking. The fare won't be any different. As a DM you can probably hold it for as long as you like, too (without guaranteeing the fare, but it honestly rarely changes).

Moscowflyer

A sensible suggestion given my experience this time :-) I think that's what I'm going to do next time, the only slightly time consuming thing (I think) is having to give all the passenger information rather than just type it in the online form. CX TPE are generally very helpful I have to say (although 'computer says no' this time meant that they couldn't be!). I didn't realise I might be able to hold a ticket for a while because occasionally the cheapest I fares on this route disappear while I'm planning, thanks for the suggestion :-)

alphaod

I tried to book a flght out of Shanghai, logged in, but didn't book. They wanted me to use the Chinese Alipay system and that accepts only Visa and Mastercard. I wanted to pay via Amex.

Called their customer care number (in HK), they pulled up the hold immediately and paid the fare with my Amex.

midlevels

I shall have to keep this in mind. I wanted to pay via Amex too but couldn't because it never occurred to me to phone in and try with HK. There's always a next time...