Bereavement/compassionate airfare options
 

my friend lives in Rome but is originally from Bogota.Colombia. her Grandmother died and now her Grandfather is quite ill. I looked into bereavement airfare through Air France but there was no discount. I know these benefits have dwindled a great deal in recent years. Does anyone have suggestions for options for discounted airfare. She is experiencing a great deal of culture shock and her loss has compounded her grief.

If anyone has suggestions to help my friend please contact me

I know it sounds harsh, but the airlines are not in the compassion business. Your friend is unlikely to get any kind of discount. She needs to find a generous friend with miles in his/her account to sponsor the trip.

bereavement fares
 

These are usually not the cheaper fares..what they offer is a discount off the FULL fare that lets you change the ticket without penalty. If your friend needs a cheaper ticket she may be better off buying the cheapest ticket she can find and paying change fees if she needs to change the return. Or just buy a one way and deal with the return when she knows more of how long she will stay.

So much for the Information Desk being welcoming.

I apologize for the "evangelist's" post.

As was said in the post directly above, bereavement fares are usually nothing special. The good thing is that from Europe there are often consolidators with some decent fares.

Welcome to Flyertalk. Sorry for your friend's difficult times.

I tried finding bereavement fares a few years ago before I started flying much and found what the others said. It is not really a good discount.

Try consolidators as suggested, local agents, or you could look at matrix.itasoftware (dot) com, which is what many on this site talk about using to compare fares. It let's you search on multiple dates and many airports. If you can't find anything direct that is good, then being in Europe, I'd look for the lowest fare from all of the EU to Columbia, then consider a low cost carrier like Ryanair or Easyjet to get to that international gateway.

You can be most helpful to your friend by doing the legwork and taking the emotion out of the process.

While bereavement fares are not significant discounts, what they do provide is flexibility. Super super cheap fares such as are offered by consolidators may not be changeable at all (in other words, you fly exactly what you book or you lose the ticket). In the middle will be tickets which can be changed for a fee + fare difference.

If your friend is OK with a trip which cannot for any reason be changed, the consolidator fares will be best. But, if she needs the flexibility to stay longer if needed, this is not a good deal.