I inadvertently booked a ticket earlier with only the 1st initial of my travelling companion. It was one of those United *fire sale* business class deals to AKL.

When the sched changed the ticket had to be re-issued as our original flights no longer existed. Now UA is saying that to re-issue the ticket with the new flights that his full name needs to be there and oops to do that we need to cancel the ticket and then rebook it

Although the ticket did not have a stopover in SYD, we would like to add that. We don't need visa's for AKL but he would for SYD (I already have a current ETA)... will this initial only be a problem for us?

One agent at UA said to change the name was only $100, not a re-issue - unfortunately I can't get anyone to agree with this (yes I have been doing the call, call again).

Any experience with this?

Merci.