Originally Posted by
sinoflyer
This is an extraordinary situation where you are asking a regular US-based UA agent to process a "domestic" intra-EU infant ticket on a different airline. It's a once-in-a-lifetime scenario that a regular agent will likely never encounter again. The agents you talked to probably assumed automatically that the infant ticket falls under international rules because it involves OS. To save the misery of wasted time, tell the next agent right off the bat that you need them to look up the procedures for processing an intra-EU infant ticket. If that still fails, and considering the time already wasted in this matter, you might be better just getting the ticket at the OS counter.
What do you mean, the OS counter? The day of flight? Is that possible? I called Austrian and they said they wouldn't touch it on the phone today, it was United's problem, my concern was if I get to the airport with a surprise infant on an award ticket...
I wish I had your other advice before I got myself in this mess, I thought as they answer thousands of calls they have seen it all, I have kids on dozens of flights, award and regular, usually not a problem.
Originally Posted by
WineCountryUA
UA'sTwitter does tend to have better agents. But what OS charges does not matter, UA will us the IATA 10% of fare available today international lap child fare rule. But as you say, $90 is still greater than that.
Sounds like you may have pushed a bit too hard with the first agent and they made a note in the PNR. Best to break off a discussion versus pushing back too many times. Because once the agent decides to document the discussion, it becomes very hard to get the next agent to override. This is true with UA, this is true with many other organizations. If the discussion is not going well, break off and get a fresh start with a new agent. You will see this advice across many FT forums.
Yeah it was probably dumb to argue with them, I was furious that I had already invested 2.5hrs between two calls and they still couldn't figure this out.
Where do I find the IATA price? Matrix? What's the ticket code? What should United be charging in this case if its not an international flight but an intra-europe price? They literally can charge anything they want, right? What does OS charge them? I know I've had to pony up on tickets that were $1000, $2000, etc, but this is insane here. They are clearly charging me the full fare. Business class Flex isn't even $400, much less $900!