In a pickle--Connecting flight issue
 

Thanks in advance for any insight that you all can give to help me from the pickle I've gotten myself into with separately booked travel on air France and United

I have these flights scheduled:
Air France
7:10--Departing Nice
8:45--Arriving Paris CDG

United
10:05--Departing Paris (CDG)

So 1:20 with a checked bag to make it from terminal 2 to terminal 1.
- Any chance of making this?
- What's the best option that I have?
- Can I notify air France in Nice that I'm continuing travel? Or, would it be better to try and claim my own bag and make it?
- Can I do customs in Nice to save time?

Finally, if I miss the flight, will united let me stand by for the next one?

Again, thanks for any help and advice.

Definitely ambitious, if not impossible.

To answer just a few questions:
- Any chance of making this? If you check your bag in Paris, I don't think so. Claiming your bags and dropping them off again will almost certainly be impossible.

-Customs: No. You can't. Customs are done at the arrival airport. Immigration is done, when you leave/enter Schengen. In your case, you wouldn't be subjected to customs or immigration as you arrive in Paris on a domestic flight.

In any case, you need to pass immigration in Paris as you leave.

Thank you. I guess I was referring to the immigration/passport control leaving France.
I'll try and see if air France will help tag the bag for continuing travel.

What's my worst case here? A huge fee from United?

In most cases, airlines will no longer check bags through to another carrier if the 2nd flight is not part of the same ticket as the first. Even if your bags were to make it, you would have a tough time yourself. Find out how much it would cost to change your AF flight to the night before - it would be well worth it.

And if that doesn't work, throw away the flight and take a train to Paris. Your planned connection just isn't realistic.

I doubt that AF will check a bag through to UA; different alliances are involved. IIRC you must change from T2 to T1 at CDG, so I doubt that this would be a legal "connection". UA's deadline for check in and bag drop is probably T-60 minutes for international.

Same as the other posters. CDG is a nightmare for connecting flights/baggage/immigration. Unless you have a flex ticket with UA they won't change your flight for an affordable fee.

UA does have an unpublished "flat tire" rule. But who knows if there will be seats on next flight or if Paris will honor this "rule."

Second the idea of flying day before or just taking train if it's too expensive to fly.

A long time ago I took a sleeper from Paris to Nice. Not sure how many are still running with LCCs around, but consider that price of hotel night.

Thanks for the replies. I called united and they wanted more than 5k to go to the next flight. Night before options are slim.
If I can figure out how to dump a checked bag, maybe I'll have a chance without the luggage?

Barely. But better odds than with bags.

I don't know about sleeper service on SNCF, but the LLCs haven't really poached travelers from the railroads in Europe. It's mostly the other way around. Nice isn't on one of the major lines, though, so he may have to get to Marseilles to catch a TGV.

United won't interline to another non-SA airline, so you would be correct.

OP - Are you on one or two tickets? AF & UA most certainly do interline bags. But, neither will interline across tickets.

If on one ticket, you may possibly have a fighting chance. If the latter, forget it.

Rather than changing your UA flight, what about simply purchasing a new AF ticket for the night before and spending the night at a CDG-area hotel? A heck of a lot less than $5K. AF tickets at roughly $175.

UA might or it might not let you stand by for its next flight, but it won't commit to that in advance until you actually now show. Maybe you get onto its next flight and, depending on the rules of your ticket, you have to buy a new ticket.

He said it was separately booked so I took that to mean two tickets.

This is not entirely true. UA absolutely can and will interline with non-*A partners. It has the agreements in place to do so. But it generally does not on separate tickets for a variety of reasons. Of course, in this case the bag would be inbound to UA from AF. I'm guessing 80 minutes is below the MCT so even if AF was willing to interline to UA (and the agreement exists, it is a matter of policy and agent willingness) I'd bet that the system would not permit it with the short connection.

Sleeper service in France is nearly all gone now. Not because of LCCs "poaching" passengers but because the trains are all much faster now. Marseille to Paris is under 3:30 now. It just doesn't make sense to run sleepers on a lot of these routes.