Originally Posted by
jeremywight
Hi all,
I have a one way J class UA award flight terminating in Budapest on Turkish Air (CLT-IAD-IST-BUD) that I booked months ago for my wife and I for our honeymoon. Our flight to IST arrives at 9:45am and departs to BUD at 12:45pm. At the time this was the only direct option. Now they have a flight that departs at 6:45pm and has Saver Award space. We’d like to have the half day to visit Istanbul but I’ve tried calling and the agent couldn’t change that last leg. I was going to try calling again but after reading the forum it sounds like you shouldn’t ever change a single leg on partner booking unless all segments are still available (which the IAD-IST is not).
So this brings me to my question, assuming they won’t be able to properly change that flight what would happen if we were to accidentally spend to much time at the lounge and miss our connection. Is it likely they would rebook us on that next outbound flight at 6:45pm?
It’s a risk. They might, if there are seats available. On the other hand, you might end up spending a good chunk of your honeymoon in the IST airport and/or shelling out a lot of money to get to your final destination. Also if you are a US citizen, which I’m assuming is the case, you need a tourist Visa for Turkey. Not to mention it’s going to look a bit suspect when you show up to the counter at 5:00 and say “Oops we just realized that we missed our flight that was 4 hours ago.” You seem to be operating from the assumption that airline employees are stupid. They’re not.
My advice - don’t play this game. Minimal potential reward (half a day in another city), but big potential risk (having your honeymoon ruined).