Its really quite complicated - but trang.neoguri's friend would need to liase entirely with TA and not with CX. CX will not touch ticket when ticket has not been used and besides, the fare is only available from Finland so CX in HK won't /can't do anything.
AY is on as codeshare as CX flight number. So the info must be on the CX reservation. But even if the agency puts in a OSI message on the reservation to say that due to typo, it may be ok for CX, but AY may very well refuse passage to passenger ex-HEL and back.
Its not just a misspelling of the last name. Its entirely wrong. So there really is not way to just reissue the ticket with a change of name. That is only possible with first names with misspellings or titles. It cannot be done to last names.
Example : GUY PACIFICA
Booked as : GUY BO
trang.neoguri needs to get TA to liase with their GSA in Finland to get special authorisation to reissue the ticket to a different surname. The ticket is also in S class , which probably means non refundable. But sales agency / GSAs outside USA/Canada may not be as kind or helpful especially if the TA is not a large CX sales agency. So any sort of support is iffy at best.
Change fee might apply to the tune of around EUR 250 or thereabouts or more - if a reissue is possible. I explained to trang.neoguri that his friend should have double checked the name before she pressed enter.. and to also have considered getting travel insurance, or even had considered walking into a travel agency to book the ticket. Sure most of the time people think they don't need the extra cost but when something like that happens, that is when a good TA can make the difference between not taking your calls and going the extra mile to sort things out.
Otherwise it might be a very expensive 700 euros lesson.
Sorry to have to break the news to trang.neoguri.
I understand his problem but I can also understand the travel agency's dilemma. As if they do anything wrong, CX will come back to them with a debit memo and ask them to foot the cost of ticket. So they need to first understand the problem and how they can fix it for the passenger and also protecting themselves. But as it is also an online agency - and many of us have experienced that, chance are that the person on the phone probably has ZERO experience in dealing with things like this.
PS - a creditcard charge back isn't going to work either.
Last edited by Guy Betsy; Dec 22, 2014 at 5:04 pm