Go Back  FlyerTalk Forums > Miles&Points > Mileage Run Deals > Mileage Run Discussion
Reload this Page >

TIP: How to specify the fare basis code on ITA

TIP: How to specify the fare basis code on ITA

Old Jun 9, 2004, 6:17 pm
  #1  
Original Poster
 
Join Date: Aug 2002
Location: Seattle
Programs: UA 1P MM
Posts: 730
TIP: How to specify the fare basis code on ITA

In a recent thread, I showed how you can specify the booking code in ITA.

Here's another unpublished feature of the ITA software. This one allows you to specify the fare basis code.

I'm no expert on fare basis codes, but I suspect this will be useful to some FTers.

The extensions to the itasoftware routing language are accessed by postpending commands after a '/'. There's a wide set of commands available, but there's no description of them available on the ITA web site. Unfortunately, each command applies only to one part of the trip, so they must usually be entered in each box.

CONSTRAINING FARE BASIS CODES:

Command is: "f CC.AAA+BBB.FFFFF" or "f CC.AAA+BBB.FFFFF|..."
where CC is carrier code, AAA and BBB are fare origin
and destination city, FFFFF is fare basis code

Ex: fare only with NW BOS-LAX YUP fares:
from: BOS::/ f nw.bos+lax.yup
to : LAX::/ f nw.bos+lax.yup

Ex: fare with either YUP or F fares on any airline and between any
points:
from: BOS::/ f ..yup|..f
to : LAX::/ f ..yup|..f

Ex: fare using only "through" fares
from: BOS::/ f .bos+lax.
to : LAX::/ f .bos+lax.

Ex: fare using only NW YUP fares or UA F fares:
from: BOS::/ f nw..yup|ua..f
to : LAX::/ f nw..yup|ua..f


More to come
sokolov likes this.

Last edited by SeattleFred; Jun 9, 2004 at 6:28 pm
SeattleFred is offline  
Old Jun 9, 2004, 6:52 pm
  #2  
NNH
 
Join Date: Mar 2004
Location: LA, after growing up in London and living all over Europe
Programs: Ex-BD, ex-NW, ex-AA, BA Gold
Posts: 1,457
That is seriously clever stuff! I love all the features you can access through the ITA language.
NNH is offline  
Old Jun 9, 2004, 9:23 pm
  #3  
FlyerTalk Evangelist
 
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: Greener Pastures
Posts: 10,515
This is so good that I'm worried ITA might start charging!
bhatnasx is offline  
Old Jun 10, 2004, 8:24 pm
  #4  
 
Join Date: Dec 2002
Location: DC
Programs: AA EXP; UAMM
Posts: 1,902
Any chance someone can put together a cumulative set of ITA instructions rather than in separate threads? This info puts ITA miles ahead of other sites.
nor4 is offline  
Old Jun 10, 2004, 9:56 pm
  #5  
A FlyerTalk Posting Legend
 
Join Date: Aug 2002
Programs: UALifetimePremierGold, Marriott LifetimeTitanium
Posts: 71,007
Can someone put it into simple English for us poor dummies who don't get that stuff above? (sigh). I need to organize an ITA Do...
SkiAdcock is offline  
Old Jun 10, 2004, 11:21 pm
  #6  
FlyerTalk Evangelist
 
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: Greener Pastures
Posts: 10,515
nor4 - I've tried to link to every ITA thread I've seen in the MR Tools, Part 2 thread. At the very least it's a common place to find stuff.


Originally Posted by SkiAdcock
Can someone put it into simple English for us poor dummies who don't get that stuff above? (sigh). I need to organize an ITA Do...
Sharon,

Basically, ITA's got some amazing functionality that's just coming to light (for me anyways) - you can use it to search for multiple segments on one carrier (i.e. a 4 segment UA flight from IAD-LAX) - you can also use it to search a particular booking class (like what are all the possibilities of S fares on UA from IAD-LAX for a promo that requires you to fly an S fare - like that'd ever happen!) - or you can use it to find flights that are based off a particular fare basis code (which you can find on the Expedia site) - it makes cheap flying & mileage run flying & promo-run flying easier!
bhatnasx is offline  
Old Aug 15, 2004, 8:50 am
  #7  
 
Join Date: Dec 2000
Location: Farmington Hills, MI, USA, NWA MillionAir, Gold or Plat since '92
Programs: Delta Million Miler
Posts: 194
new tool (maximum price) at ITASoftware

You can now put a maximum price in your search at ITASoftware. It keeps getting better and better.

Bob Cowen
The Internet Travel Guru (TM)
www.InternetTravelTips.com
rcowen is offline  
Old Apr 2, 2006, 7:05 pm
  #8  
 
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: EWR
Programs: CO OP Serf
Posts: 370
I've been trying to use this on a multi-leg flight with DL but have been unable to get it to work. Here's what I put into the multi-segment search for 4 DL flights EWR-ATL-MCO-ATL-SEA all in one day:

Segment 1

ewr::/ f dl.ewr+mco.mhqk
mco::/ f dl.ewr+mco.mhqk

Segment 2

MCO::/ f dl.mco+sea.mhqk
SEA::/ f dl.mco+sea.mhqk

Could someone tell me what I'm doing wrong? I did wind up calling DL but it's a big ole pain in the ... to go through the song and dance without tipping my MR hand.
thenewflesh is offline  
Old Apr 2, 2006, 7:41 pm
  #9  
 
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Out and about..
Posts: 1,102
Thanks again! Going to use this to make sure my DEN YMTWTU promo
jjgollum is offline  
Old Nov 19, 2006, 3:44 pm
  #10  
 
Join Date: Oct 2003
Location: bay area, california
Programs: aa exp 1MM, alaska air, united, hhonors gold, spg gold
Posts: 686
Fred: does this still work? I entered

from lax ::/ f aa.lax+lhr.SLW7E3U
to lhr ::/ f aa.lax+lhr.SLW7E3U

and also used SLW7 and SLW7E

it found no fares yet I'd just found it before without the fare basis code.

any ideas.



Originally Posted by SeattleFred
In a recent thread, I showed how you can specify the booking code in ITA.

Here's another unpublished feature of the ITA software. This one allows you to specify the fare basis code.

I'm no expert on fare basis codes, but I suspect this will be useful to some FTers.

The extensions to the itasoftware routing language are accessed by postpending commands after a '/'. There's a wide set of commands available, but there's no description of them available on the ITA web site. Unfortunately, each command applies only to one part of the trip, so they must usually be entered in each box.

CONSTRAINING FARE BASIS CODES:

Command is: "f CC.AAA+BBB.FFFFF" or "f CC.AAA+BBB.FFFFF|..."
where CC is carrier code, AAA and BBB are fare origin
and destination city, FFFFF is fare basis code

Ex: fare only with NW BOS-LAX YUP fares:
from: BOS::/ f nw.bos+lax.yup
to : LAX::/ f nw.bos+lax.yup

Ex: fare with either YUP or F fares on any airline and between any
points:
from: BOS::/ f ..yup|..f
to : LAX::/ f ..yup|..f

Ex: fare using only "through" fares
from: BOS::/ f .bos+lax.
to : LAX::/ f .bos+lax.

Ex: fare using only NW YUP fares or UA F fares:
from: BOS::/ f nw..yup|ua..f
to : LAX::/ f nw..yup|ua..f


More to come
pixpixpix is offline  
Old Nov 19, 2006, 5:06 pm
  #11  
Company Representative - ITA Software
 
Join Date: Feb 2006
Location: Cambridge, MA
Posts: 362
Originally Posted by pixpixpix
Fred: does this still work? I entered

from lax ::/ f aa.lax+lhr.SLW7E3U
to lhr ::/ f aa.lax+lhr.SLW7E3U

and also used SLW7 and SLW7E

it found no fares yet I'd just found it before without the fare basis code.

any ideas.
While I can see how these advanced features are useful, I'm sure the lack of proper documentation is often frustrating

Fares are generally filed to CITY codes, not to AIRPORT codes. LHR is an airport code, while LON is the city code. The fare language lets you narrow things down to a specific carrier, market, and fare basis, but you need to know the actual endpoints of the fare (city or airport).

In this case, you want:
From: lax ::/ f aa.lax+lon.SLW7E3U
To: lhr ::/ f aa.lax+lon.SLW7E3U

Which seemed to work okay for me just now.
ITA Hacker is offline  
Old Nov 19, 2006, 5:11 pm
  #12  
 
Join Date: May 2006
Location: Chitown
Programs: UA 1P
Posts: 149
In any case, the multicity option isn't allowing me to use any more then 2 stopovers ( 7 segments ), when I add a 3rd stop over with even just 1 segment it refuses to "Find" results with a generic "no results can be processed" ... I can copy paste the from/to stuff as one-ways and they all return results. They must be capping max segments. Ah well, need to find a good travel agent I guess...anyone have any recommendations, IM me plz
tazan007 is offline  
Old Nov 19, 2006, 5:12 pm
  #13  
 
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Pennsylvania
Programs: AA Platinum Pro, AC *S, Marriott Gold Elite, Hyatt Explorist
Posts: 9,688
wow ^ and thanks - it works great.

does anyone know if it would work for YY fares?
sadiqhassan is online now  
Old Nov 19, 2006, 5:17 pm
  #14  
Original Poster
 
Join Date: Aug 2002
Location: Seattle
Programs: UA 1P MM
Posts: 730
Originally Posted by pixpixpix
Fred: does this still work? I entered

from lax ::/ f aa.lax+lhr.SLW7E3U
to lhr ::/ f aa.lax+lhr.SLW7E3U

and also used SLW7 and SLW7E

it found no fares yet I'd just found it before without the fare basis code.
any ideas.
I'm not sure what the problem is, but the following works to search for AA flights from LAX-LHR with booking code S:

from lax::aa /f bc=s
to lhr::aa /f bc=s
SeattleFred is offline  
Old Nov 19, 2006, 5:27 pm
  #15  
 
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Pennsylvania
Programs: AA Platinum Pro, AC *S, Marriott Gold Elite, Hyatt Explorist
Posts: 9,688
Could someone please help? I am not sure how to use this for fares which require more then one segment:

From: KHI ::/ f BA.KHI+YYZ. DFFPKOW
To: YYZ::

This should bring up 3 segments: KHI-BAH on GF, BAH-LHR on BA and LHR-YYZ on BA. However, I keep getting an error. Do I need to put a + somewhere or do I have to enter it as 3 flights?

Thanks!
sadiqhassan is online now  

Thread Tools
Search this Thread

Contact Us - Manage Preferences - Archive - Advertising - Cookie Policy - Privacy Statement - Terms of Service -

This site is owned, operated, and maintained by MH Sub I, LLC dba Internet Brands. Copyright © 2024 MH Sub I, LLC dba Internet Brands. All rights reserved. Designated trademarks are the property of their respective owners.