Often1

You are 100% correct. But, that is only one-half of the equation. The other half is what is the appropriate fare for the ticket you contract for.

Nobody has suggested that one must fly any or all segments. The sole question is what one must pay. If one's new routing costs more and there is a fee to change the routing as is fairly common, one is then obligated to pay that fare difference plus change fee (presuming that the carrier has written its contract properly).

The examples here are of passengers who have changed their routing by skipping the last segment of a ticket.

AJO

That's very interesting; wonder how a court would interpret these terms against the Council Directive 93/13/EEC on unfair terms in consumer contracts (https://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ...3L0013:en:HTML), which states in its annex that the following shall be regarded as unfair vis-a-vis the consumer: "(...) requiring any consumer who fails to fulfil his obligation to pay a disproportionately high sum in compensation;".

A Dutch consumer rights organisation is currently suing KLM for their T&Cs, specifically on the issue of auto-cancellation if one does not use flight coupons in their sequence as booked (https://nltimes.nl/2018/12/10/consum...m-show-policy; this has meanwhile been taken to court, but I cannot find an English-language source for that).

cauchy

I guess a common scenario at CDG is that someone has booked ZYR-CDG-XXX, with ZYR being Bruxelles-Midi/Brussel-Zuid train station, thinking they can get away with not going to Brussels to get on the train, and then arriving at CDG to a very nasty surprise.

There have also been UK court cases on auto-cancellation - not sure how this one ended:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/n...ght-cancelled/

KARFA

adrianlondon

If Lufthansa win the case, which I'm pretty sure they won't, wouldn't it set a huge precedent?

As an example: A 2 litre carton of milk costs £1. A 1 litre carton costs 70p and a 500ml carton costs 50p. I want 1.5 litres so buy the 2 litre bottle and throw the rest away. The precedent would imply I'm breaking the law in doing so. Sure, Tesco isn't going to take me to court for 20p but then unlike the airlines they can't grab the 500ml I didn't use and resell it, either.

I'm (obviously) no lawyer, but what makes airlines such a special case here? Is it the amount of savings?

KARFA

adrianlondon

Ah, so that's the issue. By simply saying "you have to fly all the flights" they can legally recharge?

memesweeper

Often1

The CJEU, in the context of applying EC 261/2004 to connections has recently ruled in favor of a passenger, holding that connections are merely an administrative or logistical aspect of a "single unit." What is good for the goose, is good for the gander. One who purchases a ticket from A to C with a connection at B cannot later argue that he really wanted a ticket from A to B but ought to be permitted to pay the, presumably lesser, fare for A to C.

Nobody suggests that one must fly all segments, only that one pay for the routing one chooses to fly. If one changes the routing and it costs more, so be it.

People who salivate for a court to upend the "all segments must be flown in the order ticketed"" rules, ought to be careful what they wish for. Germany did this some time ago, Accordingly tickets from Germany which do not have such a provision are available. But, they are extraordinarily expensive. Better not to skip a segment than pay multiples of a standard penalty fare.

Globaliser

First, airlines are not a special case as such. Remember, railways have the same problem. I believe that in the UK, the problem has been dealt with by specific legislation that enforces the provisions that prevent the misuse of lower fares for higher-value travel.

The problem arises because of two basic things:-

1. [*]

The conundrum for airlines since time immemorial (remember, this isn't a new phenomenon for airlines or other transport companies) is how in these circumstances to stop the person who's using the more valuable and higher priced product from doing so when they have only bought a ticket for the less valuable and lower priced product.

That's why (as Often1 says) your cheap ticket isn't just an option to fly whatever bits you choose. Like in any physical shop, if you pay for a cheaper product but decide to take a more expensive product, the shopkeeper would like to charge you the extra. The physical side of air transport, though, makes all of this much more problematic.

seat1C

Just a quick thought, but a number of people have described the ticket in question in this case as being "exEU". It isn't - it's from Norway, which is in the EEA but not the EU. I think it would be illegal totally within the EU to try to claim the differential cost (or alleged differential cost) from someone if the ticket was for a journey entirely within the EU - though who knows what the ECJ might say?! I'm on an "ex OSL" just now (in South America) and have booked the last leg back from LHR to OSL some months after my arrival in LHR so I can either use it as the positioning flight to start another trip, or for a weekend away in Oslo (where I've only been in the city centre for a few wintry hours and never in the summer).

(Edit: The article about this on the Flyertalk homepage is a bit misleading I thought, as it read to me that someone had bought a ticket from OSL (which they called OSO!) to SEA, via FRA, and stopped their journey in FRA).

NickB

It is not that simple. Certainly the judgments from the German courts are rather more nuanced on this and accept that it is in principle legitimate for airlines to protect their pricing/fare structures. The question is more one of how far you can go without upsetting the balance too unfairly to the detriment of the consumer rather than considering the system as fundamentally flawed.

NickB

I believe that the difference is immaterial. The issue is essentially a consumer protection issue that applies in the same way regardless of the destination. It does not make a difference either that the trip originates in the EEA as the EU rules on fairness in consumer contracts apply across the whole of the EEA.

Often1

Everybody wants dirt cheap airfares, full flexibility in all respects, and all of the trappings of F.

Can't blame them. But, it comes at a cost and there is a push and pull.

As German passengers found when they "won" the right to fly segments out of order, it is entirely doable, but expensive.

So, perhaps that is a good business model to adopt, even where not required by law. Offer a standard ticket for EUR 100 and one permitting what some here want for EUR 750 and let those people pay that.

seat1C

I don't disagree, but if it was entirely within the EU there would be other reasons to attack why they airline couldn't do what they're trying to do. That was my point. (And also, Norway isn't in the EU...which is why the description that some people were using is wrong - sorry to be so pedantic)!