Wow I didn't know about the 2 hours. It doesn't sound like they are very competent at their jobs it seems.

Pointedly, this is essentially what the check-in agent decided - and precisely why this situation was such a massive customer service failure on the part of AA.


It was more than incompetence - which raises the bar as far as AA's obligation to compensate for OP's damages.

I had a similar situation exiting PVG to LAX...denied boarding and they wanted 5000USD for a one way ticket. After 45 minutes I could see no resolution so went over to T2 and bought a China Eastern ticket and got into LAX before the JAL flight they
denied me boarding arrived.

Received a check in a few days and 50K miles bonus. Airlines don't need to make a big deal from an error and they sure don't need to insult a paying customer and claim they are trying to "game the system". Rudeness on top of stupidity is a good way to lose customers.

Brazil brings up another example of improper denied boarding. During the period before, during and till slightly after the Olympics visa requirements were dropped for a number of countries, US included. TIMATIC had the exception loaded with effective dates and countries effected. Didn't stop AA from trying to deny boarding. Agent wouldn't even look in the system. I know the rules and Brazil requires a visa, full stop. Finally took getting a manager to say, hey look it up. Bam, it was right there. No apology or anything. Just here's your BP.

Part of the issue could be what they look up in TIMATIC. The relevant information only shows up when "China" is entered in the transit field - even if "China" is also entered in the destination field.

Ive read most of this thread....very interesting... but I'm still mystified as to how you can argue that when a pax is travelling AAA-BBB(2 days- passing through immigration)-CCC(2 hours AIRSIDE)-AAA that CCC is the destination and BBB is a transit point....

Makes no sense at all.....

Yes yes.. China may accept it... but where else on this board can you find those terms used in that way? Can you get award flights with such "definitions" of transit and stopover?? Be awfully handy!

That's the way China chooses to operate it, and they don't refer to 'destination', just onward to a third country.

Airline staff can refer to TIMATIC and if still unclear can call Shanghai or Beijing immigration (the numbers are readily available), or ask the passenger to sign an indemnity covering costs if they are refused entry.

I suspect that if you fly on Chinese carriers such as MU and CZ, there are lots of fares to various places in Asia with connections through CAN, PVG, or PEK. For example, if you want to fly on MU, LAX-PVG-TYO would be a reasonable/logical routing. I'm not sure the extent to which you can now easily integrate these intraAsia flights using partner Chinese carriers with TPAC flights on USA legacy carriers to get a ticket to Japan, Korea, etc. that connects through mainland China.

This thread must be setting a record for incorrect information. The mindset of American walls and border patrol being applied to countries that actually want to encourage visitors....

And the American mindset of applying ticketing terms (destination, transit) to immigration policy on the other side of the ocean.

Well, it can't be both a transit point and a destination in a single query; you need to pick one.

And, it doesn't take a genius to understand why putting China in the transit field is necessary in order to pull up clauses relevant to TWOV.

Not surprising at all. My experience with TWOV is painful at best with AA. I done it at both DFW and ORD, and its ugly. All 4 times involved assuring the agents to check Timatic and put China as the "transit" point. Mine were even clear as day with open Jaw (USA - PEK / HKG - USA) with a separate PNR on CX for PEK-HKG. Even then every single time it was an argument to get it done. The shortest was 15-20 minutes, the longest close to an hour of demanding a higher supervisor that would look in the damn computer.

I started to check in the DAY BEFORE at the airport in ORD or DFW to invariably account for the screwups by AA agents. And it never failed.

In large part to that, I decided to just get a Visa. The last 2 trips on the Visa has been so much damn easier. AA shouldnt make it so hard, but their employees are so adamant even when they know absolutely nothing about the subject

Well if Timatic says "Visa required, except for Nationals of <visa exempt nation> holding
confirmed onward airline tickets to a third country, if arriving in and departing from the same city" isn't the concern here with Timatic, not AA.

Seems to me that the OP did not hold onward airline tickets to a third country ... he apparently had a flight to a third country with a connection back to the US, but the ticket is to the US, not to a third country.

Obviously, the appropriate governmental agency in China could create a 144 hour tourist visa but they didn't. Instead, they created one for someone who was going to spend a couple of days in Shanghai and then head to another country for some period of time. On top of that, they used the word "transit" which has a common understanding in the aviation world. If it was so simple, wouldn't Timatic have caught this? And, if this is a known issue, then isn't someone choosing to connect back through NRT because approach often works vs seeking a 10 year visa for $140 just making their own risk assessment? Lets be real, there are people who will be flagged by Chinese immigration and subjected to additional scrutiny.

So perhaps OP's story to AA should be ---

I saw there was a possible exception to the Chinese visa requirement and for whatever reason, I didn't want to get a Chinese visa, so I contacted a low level person at the Chinese consulate who told me my itinerary was OK. I obviously knew there might be an issue because I printed out this email. The folks at the AA counter took a strict interpretation of the Timatic rules which say I needed a ticketed flight to a third country. We disagreed whether my ticket back to the US that connected through Narita was an airline ticket to Japan as opposed to an airline ticket to the US with a connection in Japan. It took them two hours to figure this out so I missed the flight and had to book at hotel by the airport overnight and pay an extra day parking. They might have thought that I recognized this could be an issue since I brought them an email from the Chinese consulate. I don't really understand why they didn't accept my views that a lot of people on Flyertalk find Chinese immigration officials don't really care about this issue so long as there is a flight out of China that goes somewhere other than the US. I don't really think someone at the check in desk should really worry about getting in trouble since this has worked for a lot of people posting about it.

If you don't want to take the risk, get a visa, right? Then no problems with AA, UA, DL or any other airline using Timatic and interpreting the language in Timatic strictly and applying the ordinary meaning of the word "transit."

Except, where in the world is "transit" 144 hours (6 full days)?
The ordinary aviation meaning of "transit" is typically <24 hours, so as to not incur a "stopover," on the ticket/fare.

If we are arguing semantics, an allowance of six days is a really long time for transit. Does that imply that the onward destination stay must be greater than the transit period? That opens up a whole can of unverifiable worms.

-TIMATIC does NOT spit out that language when China is input as the transit country

-The OP had a ticket, leaving Shanghai, on Japan Airlines 784. That flight goes from China to Japan, thereby fulfilling the third country requirement