Cabotage if one leg on Delta??

Old Aug 12, 2019, 1:43 pm
  #16  
 
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Originally Posted by ethernal
All of those would be cabotage if there are no US carriers on those legs and the stay is short enough that it is a defacto connection or could be perceived as such.

Unfortunately these stupid laws mean that entirely legitimate trips could in theory be blocked. For example, take a business trip from LA and then returning to SFO the next day on a separate ticket within 24 hours after a critical quick meeting in Seoul (they were separate tickets because for some odd reason - in the eyes of the purchaser - KE wouldn't let him book the itinerary as a single ticket)... Oops, theoretically you "could" be denied boarding because it may be cabotage, despite the ridiculousness of someone trying to transit to SFO from LAX via ICN.
LAX-ICN-SFO is fine, that's a regular open jaw and doesn't compete with LAX-SFO (who wants to fly 15 extra hours, other to mileage run

AC though would come closer to cabotage

if you try to book USA-canada-USA on air canada, you see a warning. AC wants 6hours/overnight to break cabotage
Important: your selected itinerary originates in one U.S. city and ends in another U.S. city. This type of itinerary is only valid if you are planning a stop in a Canadian city (e.g. for business, tourism or personal visits).

Please note that your itinerary may be invalid and travel will be denied if the Canadian city in your itinerary is used solely as an onward connection.



If you have more questions, ask DOT? This person's lawyer did, and DOT mentions that ~5 days stay Will unlikely institute an investigate for cabotage under various scenarios
https://www.transportation.gov/sites...​​


https://www.transportation.gov/sites...2002-10-28.pdf

In this document, DOT mentions that transportation between two us points is illegal regardless of duration of stopover,though they are not likely to pursue except in straight forward cases (transportation was continuous or short stopovers that are incident or doesn't break the continuity of the trip)
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Last edited by paperwastage; Aug 12, 2019 at 1:50 pm
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Old Aug 12, 2019, 2:18 pm
  #17  
 
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Originally Posted by paperwastage
LAX-ICN-SFO is fine, that's a regular open jaw and doesn't compete with LAX-SFO (who wants to fly 15 extra hours, other to mileage run

AC though would come closer to cabotage

if you try to book USA-canada-USA on air canada, you see a warning. AC wants 6hours/overnight to break cabotage



If you have more questions, ask DOT? This person's lawyer did, and DOT mentions that ~5 days stay Will unlikely institute an investigate for cabotage under various scenarios
https://www.transportation.gov/sites...​​


https://www.transportation.gov/sites...2002-10-28.pdf[/I]
In this document, DOT mentions that transportation between two us points is illegal regardless of duration of stopover,though they are not likely to pursue except in straight forward cases (transportation was continuous or short stopovers that are incident or doesn't break the continuity of the trip)
Of course a 5 night stay wouldn't. But what about my scenario? I fly LAX-ICN, land at 4 AM, attend my meeting late morning, and then head back to ICN in order to catch the 4 PM SFO flight to be there the next morning to do a meeting in San Francisco. This is a perfectly valid situation. I've done something similar before (TPAC with same-day turnaround for a critical workshop with short notice - landed at 5 AM, left at 8 PM that same day).

Note that KE will not ticket this itinerary unless I include a Delta leg (e.g., via SEA). I cannot take both the KE non-stop leg to ICN and the ICN-SFO leg on the same ticket. They are happy to ticket me LAX-ICN-LAX on a similar (indeed shorter stopover - about 10 vs 12 hours), but not LAX-ICN-SFO.

So no, you are wrong. KE at least clearly believes that LAX-ICN-meeting-ICN-SFO is cabotage. I am being blocked from buying a perfectly valid itinerary that best fits my needs (DL does not fly nonstop to SFO obviously, but KE does) because of unintended spillover effects from ridiculous anti-competitive laws.
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Old Aug 12, 2019, 2:49 pm
  #18  
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At least it sounds like the limitations here are whatever each carrier considers to be "reasonable" and enforced by specific complaints being levied by countries who feel they are wronged. Answers some of my questions about "but what if..."
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Old Aug 12, 2019, 4:13 pm
  #19  
 
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Originally Posted by ethernal
Of course a 5 night stay wouldn't. But what about my scenario? I fly LAX-ICN, land at 4 AM, attend my meeting late morning, and then head back to ICN in order to catch the 4 PM SFO flight to be there the next morning to do a meeting in San Francisco. This is a perfectly valid situation. I've done something similar before (TPAC with same-day turnaround for a critical workshop with short notice - landed at 5 AM, left at 8 PM that same day).

Note that KE will not ticket this itinerary unless I include a Delta leg (e.g., via SEA). I cannot take both the KE non-stop leg to ICN and the ICN-SFO leg on the same ticket. They are happy to ticket me LAX-ICN-LAX on a similar (indeed shorter stopover - about 10 vs 12 hours), but not LAX-ICN-SFO.

So no, you are wrong. KE at least clearly believes that LAX-ICN-meeting-ICN-SFO is cabotage. I am being blocked from buying a perfectly valid itinerary that best fits my needs (DL does not fly nonstop to SFO obviously, but KE does) because of unintended spillover effects from ridiculous anti-competitive laws.
It's too bad that JVs don't appear to get around the rules. IAD-ICN-GUM would be an easy trip on KE (with DL codeshares), but it doesn't come up as a bookable itinerary. All while government employees can book Emirates as a JetBlue codeshare (separate issue, both an example of uneven application of protectionism).

It's ridiculous to enforce these rules outside of the US50, especially in US Pacific territories without a lot of competition among US carriers (UA is the only show in town at this point).
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Old Aug 12, 2019, 4:22 pm
  #20  
 
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Originally Posted by ethernal
So no, you are wrong. KE at least clearly believes that LAX-ICN-meeting-ICN-SFO is cabotage. I am being blocked from buying a perfectly valid itinerary that best fits my needs (DL does not fly nonstop to SFO obviously, but KE does) because of unintended spillover effects from ridiculous anti-competitive laws.
looks like KE is more cautious than they could be (as I mentioned, AC doesn't care that much and only makes the user confirm their intentions during checkout

OZ/JAL got into trouble too, wonder if they have similar checks
Originally Posted by WWads

It's ridiculous to enforce these rules outside of the US50, especially in US Pacific territories without a lot of competition among US carriers (UA is the only show in town at this point).
thats the whole point .. it's purely a protectionist policy
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Old Aug 12, 2019, 5:02 pm
  #21  
 
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Originally Posted by paperwastage
looks like KE is more cautious than they could be (as I mentioned, AC doesn't care that much and only makes the user confirm their intentions during checkout

OZ/JAL got into trouble too, wonder if they have similar checks
AC gets away with it because the US government turns the other eye to our neighbors to the North so long as they don't do it blatantly. This is the problem with arbitrary laws like cabotage. There is no clear definition of what it is or what it isn't - so these things can be capriciously enforced whenever there is a desire to do so.
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Old Aug 12, 2019, 10:07 pm
  #22  
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Originally Posted by ethernal
Of course a 5 night stay wouldn't. But what about my scenario? I fly LAX-ICN, land at 4 AM, attend my meeting late morning, and then head back to ICN in order to catch the 4 PM SFO flight to be there the next morning to do a meeting in San Francisco. This is a perfectly valid situation. I've done something similar before (TPAC with same-day turnaround for a critical workshop with short notice - landed at 5 AM, left at 8 PM that same day).

Note that KE will not ticket this itinerary unless I include a Delta leg (e.g., via SEA). I cannot take both the KE non-stop leg to ICN and the ICN-SFO leg on the same ticket. They are happy to ticket me LAX-ICN-LAX on a similar (indeed shorter stopover - about 10 vs 12 hours), but not LAX-ICN-SFO.

So no, you are wrong. KE at least clearly believes that LAX-ICN-meeting-ICN-SFO is cabotage. I am being blocked from buying a perfectly valid itinerary that best fits my needs (DL does not fly nonstop to SFO obviously, but KE does) because of unintended spillover effects from ridiculous anti-competitive laws.
I think issue is short time in ICN, as under 24hrs is normally considered a connection. Thus on the face it appears that you are flying LAX-SFO via ICN.

LAX-ICN-LAX in no way is a connection. It's simply a RT from LAX-ICN and back. Nothing illegal there.
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Old Aug 13, 2019, 8:03 am
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Originally Posted by flyerCO
I think issue is short time in ICN, as under 24hrs is normally considered a connection. Thus on the face it appears that you are flying LAX-SFO via ICN.

LAX-ICN-LAX in no way is a connection. It's simply a RT from LAX-ICN and back. Nothing illegal there.
​​​Yes. This is my point. I was responding to another poster who tried to imply LAX-ICN-SFO was not cabotage. LAX-ICN-LAX is bookable because a round-trip is fine, LAX-ICN-SFO is not bookable because - despite the obvious absurdity of transiting to SFO from LAX via ICN - is considered cabotage by whatever rules KE uses to identify it.

The law is dumb enough as is, but it is doubly dumb given that my scenario and associated itinerary is not cabotage in practice given that it is actually a multi-leg O&D - it is just very short O&D. Of course one can just blame KE's interpretation of it (I doubt the US would ever go after KE for this routing), but my point is that dumb laws have real impacts and that KE at least considers that route as breaking cabotage laws despite the prima facie absurdity of it being such.
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Old Aug 13, 2019, 8:16 am
  #24  
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Originally Posted by ethernal
​​​Yes. This is my point. I was responding to another poster who tried to imply LAX-ICN-SFO was not cabotage. LAX-ICN-LAX is bookable because a round-trip is fine, LAX-ICN-SFO is not bookable because - despite the obvious absurdity of transiting to SFO from LAX via ICN - is considered cabotage by whatever rules KE uses to identify it.

The law is dumb enough as is, but it is doubly dumb given that my scenario and associated itinerary is not cabotage in practice given that it is actually a multi-leg O&D - it is just very short O&D. Of course one can just blame KE's interpretation of it (I doubt the US would ever go after KE for this routing), but my point is that dumb laws have real impacts and that KE at least considers that route as breaking cabotage laws despite the prima facie absurdity of it being such.
Gotcha. Misunderstood where you were coming from in that post. Agree it's ridiculous, however the DOT guidance leaves the issue open ended. Companies like legal certainty.

I will say for awhile I was able to book a LAX-SAT via MEX fare. The error on that was while AM operated both segments, the LAX-MEX flight was DL coded. Also ticket was issued on NON-DL/AM stock. This was right after DL/AM tightened their relationship. The fare rules weren't entered correctly and as long as it didn't ticket on DL/AM stock there was nothing to stop it.
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