Booking Air Tickets Through Orbitz
 

Apologies if there is a similar thread. I have tried searching but can't seem to find an answer to this question.

Found a cheap discounted business class fare on two separate airlines on Orbitz. Am wondering whether purchasing though Orbitz would trigger the 5 points per dollar spent with Amex. Has anyone tried booking on Orbitz with Amex Plat before? There seems to be conflicting replies online.

Would that purchase code as buying directly with an airline and trigger the 5 points per dollar spent? Thank you!

My experience has been that booking a single itinerary with multiple airlines doesn't always trigger the credit when using an Online Travel Agency (OTA) such as Orbitz. The reason for this is that in order to trigger the 5x credit, the purchase must appear on your card statement as if it came directly from the airline. For itineraries which involve a single airline, using an OTA generally works (see caveat below!) because the OTA tends to pass the payment information along directly to the airline for processing. When booking an itinerary with multiple airlines, OTAs may instead opt to collect the payment themselves, later distributing the collected payment to the airlines during a separate invoicing process. In this scenario your card statement will show a charge from the OTA, not from the airline, and the transaction will be ineligible for 5x points.

An important caveat to my earlier statement: even though I said itineraries on a single airline generally work due to how OTAs tend to forward payment information, this is by no means guaranteed. The OTA could at its discretion decide to collect payment itself even for these itineraries, which would cause the transaction to be ineligible for 5x points.

If you can get the fare codes of the itinerary you saw through Orbitz, try giving Amex Platinum Travel a call and seeing if they can price out the itinerary similarly. I've had success with this when trying to get specific fares that don't show up on Amex's own travel web site. There's a small booking fee for airline tickets done via phone, but you're guaranteed 5x points since you're going directly through Amex Platinum Travel.

If you are buying at Orbitz.com you have 24 hour cancellation. You can charge it on AMEX, see the pending charge as Orbitz or the airline and then keep or cancel.
95% of my OTA charges come through on the airline including the CX charges with Orbitz (last time I used them).

However as "weaseltown" states- AMEX Travel might match the rate if you tell them (but charge $39- I think).

Have you checked to see if the same fare is available on Amex Travel, inasmuch as it is operated by Orbitz?

yeah........its a ticket out of singapore so its not available on it.

So I found an alternative ticket out of KUL but the return flight is to SIN on the same airlines for both legs. Used the AMEX card to pay for it on Orbitz and and happy to report it coded as direct flight transaction from the airline so it should qualify for 5 points per dollar spent.

The 24hr cancellation policy also applies for my flight so it should apply for flights out of SIN.

I have had many airfares hit my account as 'Priceline' or other OTAs and they earned 5x no problem. IME, as long as there is an airline ticket # submitted with routing etc. ... it will trigger the 5x