denuaflier

Hi,
I grabbed an incredible business class fare from BOS to DEL in January 2024. I want to fly from DEN but the price is 3 times more. So, I wanted to purchase an economy ticket from DEN to BOS and I can buy that on United or Southwest. But because it is winter time, I thought maybe better to stay on Delta. My question is twofold:
1. If I purchase one way from DEN to BOS in the economy on Delta, will Delta protect me if that flight is delayed and I end up missing my connection in Boston?
2. Is it valid to purchase this ticket, without Delta canceling the whole thing? In other words is it legal ticketing? I tried to do multi-city on Delta but it errors out.
Thanks for your help.

DLASflyer

Generally Delta protects across Delta tickets. As long as you intend to fly the entire itinerary as booked you aren't breaking any rules.

xliioper

DL does not have an explicit policy of protecting you like AA does, but I suspect they will generally work with pax in these cases where you are using them to position. It probably goes without saying you should give yourself a good amount of buffer time to limit the chances of having to test this. DL will not auto-cancel your bookings (DL does not engage in this even if flights are overlapping/impossible).

DL will not allow you to purchase the itin as multi-city unless the connection exceeds the maximum valid connecting time to price on a single fare component which is 24 hours for an international itin like this (4 hours for purely domestic itins). Also, cheaper fares often have end-on-end fare combination restrictions and attempting to purchase two fares with multi-city on a single ticket will often push you into higher priced fares (that do not have such restrictions) than the fares that are available when purchased on separate tickets.

flyerCO

DL does protect across tickets provided

1)both tickets are issued by a Skyteam carrier (or LATAM)

AND

2)all remaining flights on both tickets are interline partners of DL.

AND

3)need to gave enough time between flights that it would be a legal connection time if booked on one ticket. You can't book a 15 minute connection and then ask to be rebooked when obviously misconnect.

Edit - add#3

ND76

I've bought separate roundtrip tickets on the same trip more than once. Delta wanted north of $1,400.00 for DCA-JFK-MXP and return. When I broke up the itinerary, I got the DCA-JFK RT for less than $200.00 and the JFK-MXP RT for just over $500.00. Delta did not object to this.

denuaflier

Thank you!

denuaflier

Thank you so much.

denuaflier

Thanks.

denuaflier

Thank you so much. I should be fine in that case.

denuaflier

That is great to hear. United used to frown upon that. Thanks!

fastflyer

Even though you will be protected, it would be wise to give yourself at least three hours to make the connection in Boston.

denuaflier

Yes of course. I am allowing 3 hours and 26 minutes so should be plenty of time. Thanks!

travelingdrsuz

Adding to FastFlyer's wise rec: I have done this, and when my flight was in winter, I actually decided to book the economy ticket the day before and stay over. In my case, the deal was good enough that I used hotel points and still came out ahead. It was worth it to not worry about a blizzard, etc. You don't have to do that, obviously, but in winter with snowy destinations, I'd rather just be on the ground.

SFO777

I believe that AA stop protecting one on separate AA/OW tickets a least 5 years ago.

flyerCO

They still protect. However OW carriers no longer must interline bags across tickets. (AA doesn't)