Originally Posted by
geeljire
After 6/7 long calls with AA in both the US and UK, and a visit to the BA LHR counter, it is very clear that there are indeed no viable alternatives (the most inexpensive are $3000+). In fact, I found a RJ LHR-JED flight on July 9 that costs $750 online and told AA hoping that they'd accommodate us there since RJ is part of their alliance, but AA (after a long hold of course) asked for $4,000 to make the change!
At this point, we're pondering just purchasing the RJ ticket online and cancelling the original segment. Do you guys foresee any issues with that in completing the trip? Might we have to pay to cancel or do we only pay if we decide to use it later? Of course, we'll ascertain the changeability of the visa dates first.
The fare rules on the ticket may not allow travel RJ, so trying to change that segment to RJ may well mean the whole ticket is repriced.
Even if RJ is valid on the ticket, they may not have availability in the required fare class.
Just because there is an economy seat available, it may not be in the correct fare code, or may not be able to be included in the ticket already purchased.
As said, skipping a segment will mean the remaining segments will be cancelled.
I think once the first segment is flown, the ticket is under airline control (whoever the ticketing airline was) and not the TA's. If the e-ticket number begins 001 it is AA.
I guess you have three options:
1. Sort out the visa issues and travel as ticketed
2. Change ticket through AA (who I assume is the ticketing airline) to earlier travel dates on BA or RJ at whatever cost
3. Remove the segment(s) to/from JED and book separate tickets to suit, this may be more expensive than #2 as the ticket may be repriced
With so little availability to JED, I would not delay in doing options #2 or #3, as prices will only go up and planes will sell out.