Poor website design
 

Has anyone else encountered similar problems:

I've registered as living in France (which I do) but most of my flighs with KLM originate in Amsterdam. The website (www.klm.com) only lets me select the French airports they fly from as starting point; even if I hit "more options", Amsterdam is not an option.

Annoying...

I recently had a very similiar problem with the NWA/KLM website. I wanted to purchase a ticket from the USA to Canada. Instead I was redirected to the UK site where I live and as such - It will not let me use any city other than a UK city as my departure point.

result = no sale to NWA/KLM

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

KLM have regional sites / booking tools. One of the reasons for this is because each regional has a KLM office / affiliate that is responsible for sales in their area.

As an example, in the United Kingdom KLM uk are responsible for reservations and sales for KLM, KLM uk & Northwest.

For "andersja" to get around the problem of living in France but wishing to purchase tickets originating in Amsterdam he needs to do the following: go to http://www.klm.com and select "The Netherlands" as his country and not "France". When selecting flights you will be offered only airports in The Netherlands as points of departure.

I figured that much out, but I still think it is very poor website functional design, seeing that frequent travellers not necessarily always originate their flights in their country of residence. At least "more options" should give ... well - more options http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

Just for your knowledge:

On the Air France site in France, you can depart only from french cities.
If you want to depart from US citie, you need to go to the US site, but then have to pay with an american credit card.

On the Delta Airlines site, if you are french, you are only allowed to depart from France, which is still worse, because you are even not allowed to buy the flights for South of France, or Germany in codeshare, you can only by intercontinental (AF monopoly).
If you want to buy a national US flight, you need to pay with a US card.

Few sites seem to allow to buy any ticket from any country with any credit card. at the end, I do think the credit card is the problem.
One of these sites that was pointed to me on this forum (but I did not really use it, so be careful) is www.flights.com