I am looking to book a one way ticket, but the ticket itself no matter how far in advance I book it costs about triple of what an el cheapo fair would cost.
Is there any penalty to booking a round trip ticket with no plans to use the other half of the ticket?
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If you plan on throwing away the return, the return doesn't have to be to the same city. Make the return to some cheaper city (open jaw) or open jaw it the other way, make the return from some cheaper city.
I am looking to book a one way ticket, but the ticket itself no matter how far in advance I book it costs about triple of what an el cheapo fair would cost.
Is there any penalty to booking a round trip ticket with no plans to use the other half of the ticket?
According to the contract of carriage document, it's prohibited. See page 11 for the possible penalties.
I've done this a few times with other airlines, and nothing has ever happened to me. I wouldn't do it on my primary carrier though.
Last edited by poisondarts; Oct 25, 04 at 3:08 pm..
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Quote:
Originally Posted by eduboys
Is there any penalty to booking a round trip ticket with no plans to use the other half of the ticket?
In theory, yes. They could charge you the difference between the one way fare and the roundtrip fare.
In practice, no, as long as you don't make this a habit and don't disclose your intent to throwaway your return segment(s). If you want to be extremely cautious, don't enter your frequent flier number on the reservation.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by poisondarts
I've done this a few times with other airlines, and nothing has ever happened to me. I wouldn't do it on my primary carrier though.
All carriers prohibit this, but there is nothing that they can do to force you onto the plane. If you *did* intend to take the return flight on the discounted ticket but somehow couldn't mke the flight the airline would tell you your ticket was worthless. They would force you to purchase a new high-priced one-way ticket home.
If you make a point of doing this often, the airline might have a leg to stand on in trying to charge you a one-way fare. But if you just miss an occasional last segment of your itinerary there is nothing that they can or will do.
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Make the return for some date WAY in the future. CO will have a sched. change that might not work with your plans. They may even have to give you a refund....
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Buy RT
Here is my advice:
Buy the RT with the first leg with the segment you will ACTUALLY use. (You'll laugh, other people have done it the other way because the fare was lower, but then CO cancelled the return because they were a no-show for the first leg).
Don't disclose anything to anybody and then just don't fly the return. Not your fault if you get food poising the day before.
I have done this several times and have given them my FF# to get the miles. Never had a problem.
Airlines have started to crack down on this. There may even be a court case pending I think wuth NW on this issue.
I've done once or twice. Including cobbling togeher some roundtrips to make a multi-city trip cheaper. Anyway, I also think it depends on your cities. For example, if it's say EWR to BOS. You might argue, if they asked, that it was cheaper to buy a train ticket than absorb the cost of the ticket change.
Did it twice last year, first time because my plans changed due to circumstances beyond my control, second time to get back home a couple of months later.
Actually did fly the second trip, so I ended up booking a third trip to get back, but did not complete the return leg of that trip. As it turned out, while I knew that there was very slim chance to use the return portion of the ticket, I ended up on a business trip for almost the same date.
Does that make sense?
Three trips to almost the same destination but only one of them complete (actually four if you include the one a few weeks before that was purchased under compassionate fare). At any rate, got miles and segments for all flights flown.
Understand that if a travel agency does this knowingly CO will charge them the difference.
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If you plan on throwing away the return, the return doesn't have to be to the same city. Make the return to some cheaper city (open jaw) or open jaw it the other way, make the return from some cheaper city.
