Very frustrating that on a WT+ T fare itinerary to Dalian (DLC) in China, the BA agent can’t find availability in the same L fare class on a CA DLC-PEK flight as ba.com. EF shows L class availability, as does ITA for my MAD-LHR-HKG HKG-DLC DLC-PEK-LHR itinerary. ba.com can’t cope with anything more complicated than an LHR-DLC return, but does quote the L class connecting flight on the return.

But two agents have both said there is only Y availability on CA DLC-PEK on 2nd March. They did find L availability DLC-PEK on an earlier CZ flight with a terminal change in PEK, which is probably what I will have to do, as I have not found any other booking engines that can combine long haul WT+ with short haul Y.

The BA agent said that she had to specify itineraries with non-OW flights as separate segments, and DLC-PEK was only available in Y.

Even worse another BA agent I spoke to insisted that a T fare was not valid for this itinerary and even after she spoke to a supervisor could only quote a price in W ! So there must be different ways that agents can construct itineraries. Does anyone know what options they have? Maybe a smart agent could get the same availability as ba.com?

I will try again tomorrow in case this is a temporary glitch, but the moral is, if in doubt, don’t assume the agent has got it right.