Expedia will claim 90 mins is the MCT in PEK, his scheduled time was 92 min.

There was a loyaltylobby piece on PEK transfers recently, but their beef was with the lack of transfer immigration desks even if there was no IRROPs on the connecting carriers http://loyaltylobby.com/2016/01/12/b...nnection-time/

I agree with moyeung at #49 and Andre on #50. By CoC and also by convention, the misconnecting carrier rebooks the connection. Air China appears to committed a contract breach by not doing so.

But OP does not have a direct contractual relationship with CA so it will appear to me he should pursue AA in the Bahamas for CA's default.

(Not that I'd really want to pursue CA directly anyway...with whom do I do that?)

Funny how the immigration office lady over the phone failed to mention that. She asked if my motive was whether I didn't want to pay the fine. I mentioned that it was because I wanted to follow the rules and do things properly which she then mentioned with paying the fine as you exit is the proper thing to do.

Also remember that it is not a 72-hour visa-free transit but should be stated as "up to 72-hour visa-free transit depending on your next flight" In my case, I was only give 24hrs but since I stayed 48hrs, I was in breach of the law. When I asked about the 72hr rule, they went on a tangent about how everyone would come here and visit for 72hrs if that was the case.

Update

Jan9th
I called Expedia to see if they could help me in any way since they were the ones that help me negotiate the additional $2400 change in fare rate. They got through to someone at AA which then instructed me to submit a refund claim on AA website. They also provided me with different ticket numbers than the ones originally issued by Expedia.

Went on AA's website and submitted my claim. It pulled up my itinerary. Upon submitting, I received a confirmation number and a note that said

"What to Expect - Our records indicate that the coupons on this ticket are not eligible for refund"

Jan 12th
No response yet from AA so I filed my credit card dispute claim

Jan 14th
Got a call from Chase CC Services and they stated that AA is still following the policy that my case is not entitled to a refund, even though they have not made a decision. If they fail to do so within 2 weeks, then a credit will be forcibly taken in which they will then have 45days to respond. Said they have a whole team of experts that will monitor this and a few people have already looked over my case and it is a good case as I have done everything properly.

@CHUD - I am very sorry to read your post here about your problems with TWOV at Beijing. For the immigration issue it certainly does seem that you received unusually hard treatment, and sad to say it is quite possible that this was because someone didn't like your, or your wife's, passport.

You also received some bad advice here regarding the overstay of the TWOV stamp in your passport. As a general point it is worth noting for anyone else that comes across this thread, that if you think you will overstay your permit/visa in China, the golden rule is report to a police station, or better still a PSB office *before* the overstay. In your case, given that you were entitled to the 72 hour TWOV allowance, I am fairly confident this could have been resolved before reaching the airport, or at least you could have been given some paperwork that would have made things smoother at the airport.

Regarding the underlying transfer between flights, it does seem that this kind of thing falls between the cracks in the system. You arrived on time, but didn't make it to the front of the queue at the transfer desk in time for the check-in cut-off. In this case though I really would expect AA to have stepped up and sorted flights for you.

From what you say you made every effort to head to the transfer counter as quickly as possible (delayed by the bus gate arrival and slow deplaning), supported by the fact that there were other people in the same situation as you (though it is not clear from your first post if they were also transferring to the same AA flight). The fact that they did not offer to rebook you for free on another flight even departing a day later is a total fail in my book for AA, so I think you should indeed start with them in trying to reclaim some of your losses.

However, just to complicate things, I am not 100% sure that your ticket was in fact MCT-compliant ... I am not fully confident about how to interpret the "exceptions" in the MCT output below, but my reading of the text is that although the default MCT for international-international connections at T3 is 60 minutes (which, as others have said is something of a joke), for any connection at T3 to an AA flight the MCT is given as 120 minutes. I am not sure also though how binding this information is also compared to the standard MCT numbers.

If so, and if Expedia sold you a ticket that does not conform to this, then maybe that could be another avenue to pursue to recover some of the costs, though personally I think I would start with AA, not least as Expedia seem to have been helpful so far. If AA also decide that the ticket was not MCT-compliant (based on the exception above) then talking with Expedia could be the next step.

KVS Tool 7.9.8 - Reference: Minimum Connection Time [MCT]: PEK/CA-AA]

GinFizz - Thank you for your valuable feedback. This is an interesting take. I see the exception is for AA 120mins. If this is correct, then my original ticket would not have allowed for a legal connection which provides me more options.

How accurate is the KVS info? Is it something that I can quote when seeking a refund?

CHUD
found this on the beijing airport website FAQ section
the person asking asked if 2 hr 10 min conex was enough but his flight times are off:
I will have 2 hours and 10 minutes at PEK for transfer. Will this be enough time for the transfer? I plan to arrive at PEK at 9:45 via OZ331, and I will leave PEK for ULN at 14:30 via CA901, both on 26 January. Thank you for your answer. [2016-01-18 14:47]
Answer:
Hello! Dear passenger When you arrive in beijing airport,you need 4ominutes or 1 hour for your immigration,customs and pick your baggage,then your next international flight checking counter will be closed before 1hour,so 2hours and 10minutes is not enough for you transfer,please reschedule your time and hope you will have a good trip! Thanks!

Again, that's MCT vs. SCT 2hrs10min, if you've to make the connection, is crazy. If you don't mind taking a later flight, no problem at all.

I've done 2hrs 30min in PEK on two tickets, in freaking winter, with baggage to recheck. Absolutely possible if you're aware of the consequences (and, obviously, should only travel alone)

And I've done some int-int connections just above 2hrs. Made them, but not with much time to spare in some cases. For someone apparently not being very known to PEK, it's rules, and maybe having some disadvantages due to his nationality, I wouldn't suggest to cut it as close as I do. With family in tow, much, much less.

On the other hand, I've found PEK staff being very nice when you admit it's your fault. 2nd hand experience but I was "live" in by SMS, late arrival at airport (int-departure) just 50min prior to departure - still got checked in (staff was just going to leave for the gate - deadline on that one was 70min) and actually the luggage was accepted too.

I think your experience in PEK was really a bad, bad one off - it certainly doesn't represent what the average experience is (which is, overall, not great, but I would transit PEK any day.. )

Back to this discussion (which I seem to have missed till today) - thanks to GinFizz it seems that somehow this connection was indeed illegal - which would make sense, as Air China was barely running late (10min - sorry, but that's not really a delay in my books) and yet he was already considered a "no show" when he got to the counter.

So, I would really check if you got sold everything on one, single ticket - as I'm not sure that should have been allowed now. Expedia is known for some "fishy" things.. maybe you just got hit by one of those. In any way, if it was a clean, single ticket, and AA sold you it, it's them taking the risk. Air China wasn't late - they could have said to wait to AA for your party of 3, something the transfer counter apparently tried, wasn't it? In fact, in my opinion, they should have. But that's probably to ground staff wanting a timely "door close" situation.

And then, they just didn't care about your case anymore. For CA, they didn't misconnect you - they got you to Beijing on time, but your connection was crazy tight, you didn't had a boarding pass (if you somehow managed to get a boarding pass at your origin, or using web-checkin (not sure if AA does have it Ex-PEK), or anything else getting you to departures, you would have probably fine. If you presented yourself at the Gate before it was closed, and they already had removed your luggage from it, they would have some things to explain.. but considering you connected from a "foreign" carrier to AA, their systems apparently were barely talking to each other..

For me, you should try to get your expenses from AA. All of them. They should have assisted you, not let you being on your own. Unfortunately, that's happening way too often, airlines trying to shift the blame. CA was kinda put in the line of fire, since it happened at their hub, but I can't really see much fault on them.

Lessons to learn:

#1 Don't book too tight connections. Definitely not when it's on different carriers, and especially not when on different alliances. Disaster waiting to happen. Unless you wouldn't mind a misconnect, actually (Yes, those exists)

#2 Explain your situation to the right people. CA staff couldn't do much. Probably the hotel voucher was already over what they should have done for you. AA staff was the ones to hit. Or AA city office. Or anyone from AA callcenter, whoever was able to fix your issue. And definitely to rebook you for free onto the next connection out (not even necessarily on their own metal, if they wouldn't have a reasonable fast next flight) - UNLESS, like said above, the whole thing was on two tickets.. which brings us to #3

#3 If booking two tickets, be either prepared to pay a walk-up fare, or have alternate transport, or leave LONG time. Whenever I have to make a connection (but on two tickets) I'll make sure to have either a night reserve, or at least one extra flight from the same company that I could be rebooked onto should anything happen with the first one. That means 5-6 hours to transfer usually. Or even more. You often save money that way, but the risk is real.

#4 Yes, in case you know you're overstaying a Visa/allowance, or anything similar that will cause problems at immigration, use as much time possible - and as others said before, I'd try to fix it before with police/immigration. I've been to PEK checkin counters myself often way too early (for other reasons) - they're usually opening around 3.5hrs before departure for long haul departure. I've seen some crowd at that time, but even in the Y/no status queue, it wasn't more than maybe 30 pax. Which wouldn't take 2 hours to proceed. I don't know what happened with AA at PEK, but certainly their operation is really bad there from what it seems overall?

#5 Pay more, fly direct. Not really true FT spirit (It's fun to hit all lounges along the way ) - but if travelling with family, sometimes paying more for a direct flight - or at least all on the same airline, with better travel schedule etc - is making sense. Considering the difference isn't THAT much usually, spending a few hundred $/RMB more could bring much more convenience.

One thing not mentioned on here: File DOT complaints against Air China, AA and Expedia. These are exactly the types of things DOT complaints are good for. From personal experience, AA and Expedia are slow to reply, but they are required to and ultimately they will.

And never, ever use Expedia for anything.

I honestly don't know the answer to that question - but I suspect that the information is accurate. IATA manage the MCT database and any exceptions have to be negotiated between airports/airlines and submitted into the database. You could ask on the KVS thread (or maybe send the KVS representative a PM) about how "official" (and accurate) this information is.

I also just checked on the ITA Matrix website - putting in a one way search from TPE to DFW via PEK on the specific flights you were booked on

i.e.
{Departing from} TPE::CA186 PEK AA262
{Destination} DFW

and using +/-2 days for a random day in February gives a shortest connection time of 42h 05 minutes ... i.e. it doesn't give the option of the short same day connection. One caveat here is both flights have already been retimed since your trip - the new arrival time of CA186 in PEK is 16:15 and the departure time of AA is now 17:25 (70 minutes difference).

This is still though 10 minutes more than the default T3 Int-Int connection time of 60 minutes and is not picked up by the search - so my guess is that the "exception" mentioned above is binding.

That is extremely valuable information! As YuropFlyer already mentioned above, this puts AA and Expedia squarely into the line of fire. AA was already there before - I have repeatedly explained why that is - but now it turns out that Expedia sold you a ticket that may well have violated stated airline policy. Would that make them liable for what ensued? I'm not sure - AA honored the Expedia booking and issued a ticket.

Why am I giving Expedia the benefit of the doubt ("... may well have"...) regarding the violation of MCT rules? Because there is a distinct possibility that the carrier-specific MCT exceptions for AA were only filed after the date at which your ticket was issued, perhaps as a consequence of other, similar incidents to yours... After all, assuming that the KVS data that GinFizz provided has not been truncated, it is quite telling that AA is the ONLY carrier serving PEK to have blanket exceptions to the standard MCT... Normally, the reservation systems (GDS) that travel agents such as Expedia use have automated checks in place to prevent bookings that violate published MCT. No checks are failsafe of course, but I haven't previously come across an instance of a large online agent such as Expedia selling a ticket that violated MCT rules.

Carrier-specific exceptions to standard MCT are filed by the carrier in question, so by AA themselves in this case. In other words, not only did AA fail to live up to its contractual obligations by not providing onward carriage at no extra cost when you misconnected at PEK, it also sold you a defective product, which violated THEIR OWN RULES. Or, if those rules were modified between the time of ticket issuance and your date of departure, AA failed to rebook you accordingly.

I don't know which source KVS uses for its data feed, but in my experience, MCT information is quite consistent across all systems used by airlines and travel agents, so I strongly doubt that AA would dispute it.

I don't know which source KVS uses for its data feed, but in my experience, MCT information is quite consistent across all systems used by airlines and travel agents, so I strongly doubt that AA would dispute it.[/QUOTE]

andre,
don't know how accurate that mct guidelines are for PEK but looking on Cathay Pacific''s website it states 90 mins for int to int and Asiana's states 2 hrs, which is not even mentioned here.

When I mentioned consistency (not the same as accuracy, but I'm being pedantic ), I was referring to the information contained in the various GDS, as well as in the airlines' own booking systems, not to anything on websites.

That said, could you provide the website links to the info for CX and OZ?

EDIT: found the relevant page for CX:
http://www.cathaypacific.com/cx/en_H...tails.PEK.html
They list 4 MCTs, of which 3 match the KVS information exactly. The only exception is Int-Int wholly within terminal 3, which they list as 90 minutes vs. the 60 minute(!) rule published in KVS. So quite consistent actually, and I have no idea how often that webpage is updated with the most recent GDS data.

EDIT 2: also found the relevant page for OZ:
http://us.flyasiana.com/C/en/noneCms...oardCmd=search
Rather messy stuff... spelling errors, no MCT provided for "domestic" (I assume Int-Dom?) etc.

In summary, I would definitely trust the KVS information to be consistent with what Expedia and the airlines see in their booking systems. Airline websites are not updated as frequently, nor do they provide a full set of MCT rules.

Update.

I received a tentative refund on my Credit Card from AA in the amount of $1,642.75. This is not the full amount charged by AA ($2,407.90) for my flight on Jan 1st but is much better than nothing. I'm not sure how they arrived at that figure but am assuming that AA has agreed to a refund minus certain fees. In the case this is a forced refund from AA, Chase mentioned that AA would have 45days to respond.

Considering that with all information so far collected, it looks VERY much like it was a combined OH-OH by Expedia and AA (they can internally discuss who is to pay up for it) I would settle for no less than a refund of ALL costs that you had by them. Plus, actually, a proper "we're sorry we fu... up" voucher..

Honestly, if they're selling you a illegal ticket, and then refuse to support you, it's a BIG problem. It looks like they've "learned" from it, as any such connection isn't available anymore, but it doesn't matter. They let you fly an illegal connection, it went South, and they didn't took responsibility to help you it, in fact they tried to scam you hard, and forced you to take matters into your own hands. While sometimes this can be needed (and you apparently didn't so bad yourself later, getting yourself and your family home) at the time, the follow-up events should quite clearly be that they're paying up for all (reasonable) expenses you had.

Which would be in this case here: AA "change fees", new flight home (UA), any meals, accommodation (whatever not paid by CA already - which seems to be a victim to AA and Expedia just as yourself too) and transport in Beijing, and as well the "overstay" fee you had to pay (the last one we could discuss if they need to pay it, but in the bigger context, the amount is small compared to the other costs anyway)

That said, I would expect no less than 1000$ voucher by AA (or Expedia) per person on top. IF they indeed sold you an illegal connection and let you down.

I would try to bring your case up to (higher) management level, ie escalate it.