Why is Changing a ticket class so impossible?
 

I am booked on IAH-PHX in a week. Because the flight was booked by my corp's travel agent I ended up with a W fare.

Just to see how much it would cost to change to a higher fare class, I called CO and was told: a $150 Change fee, a $25 Re-ticketing fee and whatever the up charge fee would have been to the new fare.

Since I earn my Elite status based on points and not miles, the W fare means I get zip in EQP's.
All I wanted to do was to give CO a few dollars out of my pocket in return for a couple of EQP's.

Has anyone else had this problem?

Not sure this is a problem, just the way airlines operate. However, I understand exactly what you mention.

Since many of us are restricted to buying tickets through our Corporate Travel Agent; and therefore, getting either half EQMs or 0 points - Why does Continental not offer the chance to buy up for a different class of service, within a reasonable period of time (let's say 24 hours) since the reservation was originally booked?

You would not be changing any flight date or time, just the class of service. This would provide additional income for the airline - Just my two cents.

They do let you do this within 24 hours of ticket purchase without a change fee. I have done so more than once.

since lately we have a fee for everything.....and this is a fee that people are asking for.....I hope CO Insider takes note. Worth making the experiment IMO

Wouldn't the 24 hour flexible booking policy cover this issue??? :confused:

Past the first 24 hours, I don't see why it should cost extra to increase my fare class. It's not like I am changing flights or dates.

This would be a great way to allow CO to increase their revenues with almost no effort, especially if I can make the change on-line.

I have ran into this problem as well, sometimes I do not get my booking email till after the 24hr window as I have to go thru clients travel services alot. As such they nail you with that fee each time. you would think that me spending a few hundred extra $'s for the same seat would be good for them, or even better me buying a fc or be seat.

I had a similar experience; although I did need to change dates:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/conti...e-classes.html

I agree that changing to a higher fare class should not involve a change fee --- after all this is simply putting more money into the airline!

The one caveat would be with the "full fare" tickets. If you buy up to a full fare within 24 hours ... great. If you buy up to a full fare after 24 hours, it should be allowed without the change fee, however, it should not be refundable. Otherwise, people could buy non-refundable tickets, and then when they need to refund it, they could buy up to a Y class ticket and then refund.

I was talking to an agent the other day about an upgrade and she said that starting around February 23 CO would be able to do a revenue upgrade, i.e: fare change from ____ class in economy to first, without a change fee. The CSR was excited that it would be easier to calculate and do. Maybe it will work to get from chepo class to B too.

That would be outstanding^

Nope. Info is here: http://www.continental.com/web/en-US...elnotices.aspx and has been previously posted on other threads.

Won't change fare class, and won't happen until after all elite upgrades (although there are those who have posted their concerns that it won't happen that way).

No, she was saying it to me as an elite member. It was basically for people willing to pay the difference from economy to first, a change fee will not be charged.

Yes - but as an elite, there is no benefit. The rev up is supposed to be available only after all eligible elites (and presumably companions) have been upgraded.

Also, I've called and managed to pay the difference from coach to first after the 24 hour mark without a change fee. There have been sporadic reports of others who have also done this (and people who've been turned down). It's the change in-cabin that they hit you up for, and I agree should not. If someone wants to pay for a higher fare class, same flight, cabin and refundability, there shouldn't, IMHO, be a change fee.

Seems I was wrong (guess I was just lucky when doing this before). My wife just called to change a work-travel agent booked fare from L to G. I had calculated the change at somewhat less then $50. She told me is was something like $140... there was a $90 change fee. She was told that if the ticket wasn't booked on CO.com there is a change fee - no 24 hour grace.

I checked and see that the CSR was quoting the correct policy. I think that this one should be changed ASAP. Bad enough that we get 50% eqm on deep discount fares we're required to book through a travel agent. But when we're willing to buy up with our own funds to get full EQM, we shouldn't also be hit with a change fee.

I know Scott and crew have been working on this. Delta has a policy in place to cover fare upgrades and downgrades - their policy allows you to rebook the same flights (no flight/date changes) into a higher class without incurring a change fee, including their A class to book into FC.

The sticking point with CO was the risk of abuse. At DL, apparently their system is setup to retain the original restrictions on a ticket - so you can't book a L fare, rebook it into full Y, then make unlimited changes or get a refund. Their system will assess the change fee if you try to redo the dates or flights, and will only refund the ticket value above the original L fare (less the change fee) if you downgrade.

I don't know how much work is involved in programming CO's systems to handle this process but it was apparently more than just a rule change as they were legitimately concerned about the risk of abuse unless they had a way to track the original ticket restrictions.

I was hoping this would have been fixed by now, but apparently no dice. Your options are to either keep calling the Elite desk until you get an agent willing to waive the fee (most likely if you're booking into A class, not just moving up a few fare classes), or book this type of corporate travel on Delta and rebook into their A class for free and collect the service class bonuses until we leave ST. That's what I had been doing in the past - booking on Delta and re-issuing in A, but only with their Medallion desk as the Indian agents are totally clueless about this rule (and everything else too).

If they only allowed this within the first 24 hours, they wouldn't have to worry about abuse.

You can refund any ticket in 24 hours anyway, so if you're upgrading a < 24 hour old non-refundable to a refundable, you could allow the customer to have full refundability (it would essentially be the same as if the customer had refunded the original and bought the refundable ticket in the first place, so the airline shouldn't really care).

Folks the 24 hour grace is only for tickets bought on Continental.com, which had it been purchashed there there would be no issue with the EQP credits in the first place. This is a problem I run into all the time as well, I usually offer to pay the difference to the travel department when they book the ticket, if they can't or won't book it on continental.com.

CO's systems already do this. You cannot use a non-refundable fare to change to a refundable fare. If you do, the new ticket will also be non-refundable.

For example, I buy an L fare...cancel it and then use the remaining credit on that PNR to buy a Y fare. My new Y fare ticket will be non-refundable.

I found this out the hard way a few months ago....

Nope. They changed this. The 24-hour policy now applies to co.com and call center reservations. It does not apply to 3rd party bookings that I can see, but it is not only online bookings anymore.

https://www.continental.com/web/en-U...romoCode=A5753

Exactly - this was the problem yesterday - the CSR knew and quoted that rule :(