Website problem with date change
 

Trying to a HKG-KIX-HKG roundtrip from August to July. Can't believe I am encountering problems with something as simple as date changes. Current booked flights are CX506 HKG-KIX and CX507 KIX-HKG which I am trying to change the dates for while remaining on the same flights.

There were no problems with selecting CX506 HKG-KIX on the new date. However when I tried changing the return CX507 KIX-HKG leg as well, CX's website automatically helped me select CX597 instead. Naturally I tried changing the selected flight to CX507 instead as I want an afternoon departure ex-KIX. This is where CX's website failed me. When I clicked the "change flight" button, the website got stuck with the loading symbol and stayed that way ever since. In other words I had no way of selecting CX507 on the new date.

Tried repeating the above steps a few times but ended up with the same outcome. And I am already doing this on a PC as recommended by peers and even CX's own staff (lol!) to avoid website glitches.

Ended up having to call CX centre for a date change. In the end I was able to change the whole itinerary the exact way I wanted to but I was irritated with the fact that I was unable to do it online which only would have taken a few minutes whereas calling MPC to fix the situation took almost half an hour. Frustrating the website can't be relied upon for something as simple as a date change.

Not to mention due to change fees and fare differences, I now have to await a payment link to be sent by CX to fully finalize the change. Fingers crossed it comes. There has been issues in the past which I failed to receive the link and had to call CX to follow up. Fingers crossed I don't need to invest any additional time on this. The entire ordeal with changing these dates would have taken 15 minutes tops had CX's website worked the way it was supposed to.

Edit: this time the payment link did come shortly after hanging up the call with CX. Glad I'm home free...

It's almost shocking how few airlines can master this very basic and straightforward change feature online... Of the airlines I have the misfortune of having to change something, only Alaska (another shocker I know) allows me to make a change reliably online. UA/AA/DL works for domestic one-ways but at most 50-50 when the flight is international. BA/IB is even worse.

For CX, since they have the concept of a 'revalidation', it should, in theory, be very easy to implement as there can be no change in fare and only taxes need to be re-calibrated. But maybe I don't know enough about CX IT

I Believe a issue exists for multi-sector itineraries, for cities with multiple daily frequencies. (at least, I think my issue sounds somewhat related to the OP's)

We recently bought a ticket SIN-TPE, cash J, SIN-HKG on day 1, HKG for two days of business and then TPE on day 3. I believe the underlying ticket was SIN-TPE with a "stopover" in HKG, and the website showed it as "flex" which I think was either J or C. As everyone knows, there are many flights HKG-TPE. But when my my colleague was selecting my Taipei flight, the choice given to her were the first 4 or so early morning flights. Nothing midday, afternoon or evening was displaying; yet that's the schedule I wanted, and obviously CX still has many flights after the morning. I thought that was odd considering we were on a flex ticket and assumed it was some tech bug. Sure enough, upon calling CX every flight in the pm was available for my booking class, just the website couldn't process it for some reason. So it required a phone call to get me on an afternoon flight.

I have just gone through exactly the same process. What I found was: 1. change the RETURN DATE before changing the outbound date - that at least allowed me to select a new outbound date, to start with it had refused to allow me to select a date other than the few days before the return date 2. When it refuses to allow you to select a sensible timed flight (the spinning loading ball) (and if you have a FLEX ticket which I did), then select the crap flight and book it. THEN GO BACK and just change that flight, at which point it allowed me (after twice getting the spinning loading ball) to select the flight I wanted. I would also add that I had to log back into my account between every step - incredibly frustrating - and that I tried to book a new flight using Business Plus account and found it was more than 10 percent more expensive. SO I won't make that mistake again! Cathay's website is a heap of ..... Absolute .....

Same problem
 

I too have been unable to change my flight - what is worse is that when I called the call centre the cost of the change had increased by A$1000. I Tried for three days which included 3 phone calls (over 5 hours) and I still can't change my flight. I need to change it due to family illness - sadly I have had to do this before with Singapore and they couldn't have been more helpful.
I think that Cathy provide great service on the plane but this will be my first and last trip with them because of the difficulty in changing tickets

Next time try whatsapping them. Can sometimes be easier than waiting on the phone.

There was a post in HKADB FB Group expressing frustration how Whatsapp chat agents try to cut chats if you don't respond to them within 3 minutes (in contrast, they might not get back to you within 24 hours) and force you to start again.

I call. I've had decades of experience waiting for agents.
I was talking to a colleague about mine in the lift about how important it is to still have wired headsets.

Edit 2 Sep: Got a nice surprise with Firefly (MH's LCC https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/mala...l on their live chat)

Thanks for the suggestion - I have not tried that yet - still no luck on the website - I am getting a bit frantic