Ibsenfan

Hi All, this is my first post here so I apologize in advance if this is posted in the wrong section or if there is a very obvious answer to my question, but...

I was browsing Korean Air's reward bookings as I'm planning on traveling around Thanksgiving time this year. We are thinking about visiting Taiwan as part of the trip, but are still on the fence about this. I went to view Korean Air's reward bookings to see the difference in price.

A round trip F class booking LAX-ICN is 160,000 miles + $244.55 USD. No surprises there. I then went to check a multi-destination roundtrip flight from LAX-ICN-TPE-ICN-LAX. The total came out to be 160,000 miles + $161.10 USD.

The LAX-ICN and ICN-LAX flights on the second itinerary are identical to the one on the first itinerary. So I am confused as to why it is cheaper overall to book extra flights? Would it be better to just book the extra flights and not take them? I can post screenshots if that would be helpful, but I was wondering if this is something that is common? Thanks all in advance!

NewbieRunner

Welcome to FT, Ibsenfan!

I am moving this thread to the Korean Air forum. I cannot answer your question about cash payments but if you book a multiple stop itinerary and don't fly one segment the rest of the ticket is usually cancelled.

NewbieRunner
Co-moderator, CommunityBuzz

Ibsenfan

Thank you! I called Korean Air to inquiry about this and they were pretty unhelpful and seemed fairly confused about it as well. I have heard that skipping one leg would result in my whole trip being cancelled . I guess I'll just bite the bullet and pay the extra money although I still don't understand it.

mikesaidyes

LAX-ICN is, presumably, their most popular route. The most Koreans in America right to the source haha. So, it might just be their pricing algorithm and miles scheme for these routes. Technology fail? Intentional? Either way, I don't think there's much you can do about it. Here in Korea, we always joke that "that's just how it is. Stir the pot and you make it worse, so it's better just to take it as it is and keep going."

And yes, if you don't take the ICN-TPE flight, it will be cancelled. Korean Air also charges a no show fee for tickets purchased from October 1. https://www.japantoday.com/category/...e-no-show-fees

Ibsenfan

Thanks for the input, I went ahead and just booked the higher priced ticket. Rather than giving myself a headache trying to figure out why this is how it is, I did the Korean thing and just accepted it for what it is .

But on the plus side, if we do decide to change our itinerary to include the Taiwan trip, the customer service rep told me we would get a refund in the difference of price. So essentially KE would pay us $80 per person to fly to Taiwan first class, not a bad deal.

Aragorn7

I remember hearing/reading somewhere that fuel surcharges are different depending on the origin of the flight.

As an example, I did a mock search for LAX<->ICN R/T economy award booking for 9/21/16-10/5/16, and compared it to award booking LAX->ICN one-way economy + ICN->LAX one-way economy for the same dates. The R/T cost $244.32 in fees. The two one-way flights cost $104.30 USD for LAX->ICN and 46700 KRW(~$42 USD) for ICN->LAX, totaling $146.30. For both, miles needed were the same (70K miles total).

So it seems that while supply/demand may be a big part of the fee structure, there must be some additional factors that are also factored into the fee pricing algorithm.

Ducati

Um, no. It has nothing to do with whatever nonsense you're referring to; it clearly has to do with the destination. In this case, a final destination of Taiwan will avoid high Korean surcharges and taxes, even though you're transiting through it.

If you're interested in the fees and taxes associated with a ticket, go here to check.

s0ssos

This is common. Called "hidden-city ticketing". Airlines don't price fares depending on the routing as much as destination. And usually non-stop is more expensive (so their fare will be cheaper than Eva or China Airlines non-stop to TPE)