Cancellation / no-show?
 

Hello everyone,

I have an enquiry regarding whether it's better to cancel or not show at the airport.

My situation is as follows: I am currently in the process of migrating countries so I can be together with my girlfriend. She will be visiting me on the 23th of October and we would like to fly back together on the 24th of October. Unfortunatly she is flying with KLM and booking a single flight with them will cost in excess of €500! Whereas a return flight will cost about €140 euros.

Would booking a return flight, and then once there cancelling the flight or not showing up get me into any kind of trouble / penalty fares? I can't seem to find any definite answer on the KLM site.

Kind regards

Welcome to Flyertalk, Linnar
I am moving this over to the KLM Forum.
Obscure2k
TravelBuzz Moderator

Welcome to FT.

Book the cheapest fare you can find, and forget about the return. Don't give it a second thought, you will be fine.

Johan

Be careful both KLM and LH have been fining travel agents or online bookers who fail to show up for return flights, they simply charge the TA or use the CC # to apply a charge. I was reading in a newspaper on a trip to Asia recently how they can do this and actually get away with it, the article was asking why they dont simply stop ripping people off for flying one way.

What you could do is book the cheapest r/t fare, and not enter your FB details. Pay with anything else than creditcard, so KLM cannot just debit a surcharge, and you should be fine.

One thing that might be difficult though is getting lounge access if you have FB status. You have to be alert that the lounge attendants do not enter your FB number in the itinerary, cause they try to every chance they get :P If they succeed, theoretically KLM could apply a penalty to your FB account. Although I have never heard of that happening.

Johan, have you ever tried skipping segments with KLM when originating from Germany? Since German law is actually different in this matter, and there have been cases (Albeit with LH I believe) where the airline did come after the traveler.

[edit]
snickerstestpilot, I have not heard of cases where KLM did this. Do you have a reference / link? Thanks!

The Revenue Police will put you on every available black list so be very careful.
Just kidding, it should be OK but I would avoid inserting FB numbers indeed.

Why is everybody assuming that the OP is a Flying Blue member?

This is a first-time poster (welcome, Linnar!) who originally posted this to Travelbuzz, so FB numbers and lounge access are unlikely to come into it.

As for skipping the return... people do it all the time. We do hear the occasional story of an airline coming after someone, but I suspect those are probably people who do it on a regular basis.

However, as others suggested, it may be wise to use something other than a credit card to book your flight if you can.

In many jurisdictions, a merchant could not debit your card without your authorisation. So if you have only authorised the amount of the ticket, KL could not unilaterally debit more from your card even if you happened to owe them money.

Being a no-show for the last segment of a flight is not a problem. The airline will not send the revenue-police to come knocking on your door at night or anything.

I wouldn't even worry about not putting in my frequent flyer number. After all, I paid for it and I flew it, so the miles are mine.

I would just be very careful with checked luggage. If you check any luggage, make sure that is is not checked through to the final destination but only to the point where you plan to disembark. A good explanation for this request is usually that you have something in the luggage which you'll have to drop off, e.g. something for a colleague whom you are meeting at the airport or a favourite on the other side of the pond seems to be to claim that there are pharmaceuticals in the luggage to which you need to have access. And verify that the luggage is indeed _NOT_ checked through.

I wouldn't worry about the credit card number, it is in fact illegal to bill a credit card without an authorization by the owner of said card.

I do not know about Europe but some travel agents in the US have indeed been billed the difference between the booked and the actually flown flight. To prevent your travel agent from potentially having some hassle I'd suggest booking the flight directly with the airline. It might be 10USD/EUR more expensive but at least no one else suffers...

cheers

I have done this (although it was approx 5 years ago) where I needed a 1 way ticket CPT-MAN and I wanted WBC.

I booked on KLM.com and did enter my FB number and of course I didn't turn up for the return journey 1 month later-and never heard anything further.

My FB account was credited for the miles for the trip which I actually travelled.

I was even able to start the booking with WBC and then go through day by day until I found a date where WBC was full and it enabled me to book the return flight in Economy (significantly reducing the price) if I recall correctly the return trip came in at £1100.00-an absolute bargain compared to a 1 way WBC ticket.

I don't know if the system will still allow mixed class bookings but to get back to the point, I also doubt KLM will come looking for you.

If you are still unsure why not book at a travel agent and pay cash?

This wouldn't be fair on the travel agent... as KLM could then debit the agent's account, and the agent would have no way of getting it back.

Something that I recently learned might be useful. When planning to not show up for the next segment, you can check out for that specific segment on the mobile KLM website. So if you have a smartphone, go to klm.com, enter the ticket number and the flight you intent to skip, and check out. This saves the gate agent some work, and also it allows KL so give out your seat to somebody else.

Hello all,

Sorry about the late reply but it's been absolutely crazy with the emigration and all :)

Thank you for your replies! I'll book the flight including return on a weekday as the flight seems to never fill completely on those days from my experience, then try to check out via the mobile site.

Kind regards,
Linnar.

Don't airlines on purpose overbook flights just for the reason that passengers do not always show up for their flights?
I remember reading an article that if airlines would not overbook a flight, they would have to compensate this by raising the ticket prices by X%.

Q: As some people here seen to be worried that missing the flight might send the airline chasing after you, have there actually been any cases where this has happened?

Gajan

Since KLM has updated their OLCI, it now even is possible to change your seat. Before after confirming (after pressing confirm & close [the seatmap]) your seat in the second section of OLCI, it would not be possible to change your seat. Nowadays it is^