Just wanted to issue a warning for people if you are booking longhaul trips on finnair.com, especially if one segment is on non-AY.

The new booking enginge has no limitations as to keep the travel class the same as the fare class. Meaning, you may pay for a business ticket but get 2/3 of the trip in economy. E.g. ARN-SYD. I had multiple searches end up with tickets combining ARN-HEL in Y, HEL-BKK in J and BKK-SYD in Y.

You do get a small warning ("we have assigned you the closest available alternative") but it is easy to miss, so DO check the "Travel class" info before buying.


What is really annoying is that this makes the flexible search with the 7x7 day fare calendar useless. You can't trust that the price shown is for business even though you explicitly said you wanted business class only.
You need to click into the date and only in "select flights" page you get the first telltale something is wrong.
If you see this box of buttons, at least one flight in one of the options are in economy.

https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...62c8a7a05b.png


There is no telling which one, you need to select flights and look at the specification to know if this business fare will seat you in economy or business.

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...66599ab42d.png

This is 100% scam. Unethical!

I think its the same problem as with US domestic on AA. If the fare, R in this case, is 0, you will be put on lower class even when there is space in J.
I have had this few times and AY CS says they can change you booking code for 1000€ or some other ridiculous sum.
Underlying problem is that light, classic and flex can all be in same fare bucket, which is always the lowest with tickets available.

Here is what i wrote about it in January.

But it really starts to sound like a scam, since we have no control over which fare we book into.

It is actually even worse than that, this is not just caused by the fare bucket.

This is by the way a real drawback of booking flights with Finnair code. Basically, if your longhaul segment is coded AY, then you have a more limited inventory available on the shorthaul segment in the US. See e.g. below - when flying with AY code, you have I0 on the AA shorthaul segment... but the same flights on AA code are all in seated in business on a I fare.

...and due to the join venture arrangements, these flights all cost basically the same.

https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...4d79f1374e.jpg

Very well put and superbad for customer. This is in my mind very clearly mastered by a clever bisnesman at AY, draining all they can from even exloiting the atlantic cartel, but the big loser is customer. Have they thought even perhaps that customers are stupid and sont ynderstand these and will not care??? That is not just ”scam” as a typical phrase but…

It really is a scam and p….s me off big time, almost impossible to book reasonably priced AY premium cabin codeshares on AA in many cases..I’d sometimes prefer to fly to LAX etc. west coast via JFK instead of direct, for many reasons actually.. (break long light into 2, more points, enjoy AA transcon flagship, do US immigration mid trip and not when internal clock is next morning.)

No experience if this still works in Y or not..but for sure not in J..🤬

Another nice feature is that they show you Light price, and when you click, they move you to Classic without a single word of warning. Easy miss for holiday travellers.

This is the problem. I can easily imagine a situation where someone is booking ”once-in-a-lifetime” trip in J and end up sitting in Y but paid J price. Who would book AY after such experience. I wouldn’t. People here at FT are aware of the issues when booking but the average Joe is not. And the Joe seems to be the target customer for AY.

Same message, when upgrading with points on an AY-codeshare, KUL-BKK-HEL. BKK-HEL got upgraded, KUL-BKK not, even though there definitely IS business class on MH to BKK.

BTW - should this feeder be upgraded according to AY rules? This is a MH flight with AY code.

Does anyone know a search engine where you can search lowest price for Finnair flex tickets?

I know expedia can filter it (airline=Finnair and check-box "cancellations without fee") but then I must already know destination and date. Looking for that plus Google flight style flexible dates ("weekend trip in the next 6 months")

I think upgrades are limited to AY metal (unless it’s a ”operated on behalf” -thing..)

Upgrade cleared, app updated, no new e ticket. Only when I called in to change another ticket did the CS ask me if I have a ”case” and they said my upgraded ticket had not been issued. Well she said to fix that and yes I got an email new ticket.
Then at LHR OLCI did not work, went to desk for queueing quite some time at prio desk and lady says, ”did you change you ticket?”. No its only been upgraded. ”Aha I see but its not been updated thats why OLCI didnt work for you”.

Oh well. Pls buy new computers AY.

Had similar issues with upgraded ticket - luckily a quick (!!) call and they issued it

Anybody else not received points yet for recent flights?

My flights from 13 & 15 May have yet to post...