yeah - I think of myself as a savvy flyer and I always preach the mantra to less-experienced friends 'always book directly with the airline operating the flight'
and yet I got sucked into a fare that was great and I booked with JustFly.com thinking that I'm savvy enough to know the rules and can navigate any ticketing issue should they arise...
big mistake - for the first time in my life I ended up having to purchase a whole new ticket and losing the any residual value of the original ticket
my daughter was born unexpectedly early and i needed to change my return by 1 day - so I called the operating airline, InterJet, who stated they are willing to make the change, but only the booking service can authorize the change (oops - forgot I booked via a booking service, breaking my own rule)
So I called JustFly.com customer service to explain (already knew and had come to terms with the no-exceptions $250 change fee
) and they flatly refused to do anything about it - even saying 'the airline won't allow it' - which was actually an untruth, because I had a supervisor from the airline's reservations dept on Skype at the same time, who said there is inventory in the original fare class and seats available for my new flight.
The customer service person became borderline belligerent when I explained the inconsistency and asked to speak to her supervisor - she stated 'my supervisor has exactly the same information as me and will tell you the same thing: we can't make any change'.
What's weird is that they wouldn't even process a change even if I paid the fee - completely unheard of... Especially as the 'Optima' fare class on InterJet allows for 1 flight change included as part of the fare provisions!
So I lost any residual value of the ticket and had to purchase a new ticket - this time directly with the airline. Lesson learned.