Trip within a trip allowed by airlines????
 

Does anyone know if the airlines let you book a round trip, say on Monday the current week to DC returning the following week on Wednesday, but book another trip within the time frame leaving from DC on Wednesday the current week and returning to DC on the following Monday? The fare is much lower than if you book 2 trips leaving Monday, returning Wednesday and then leave Monday returning Wednesday

This is called back-to-back ticketing and is expressly forbidden by most if not all airlines.

And now you know why they forbid it...

Which is why I do this occasionally but on separate airlines, preferably mileage-earning partners.

You might even explore one way ticketing options. Perhaps to DC on Monday, then a round-trip ticket departing DC Wednesday, returning Monday, and another one way departing again Wednesday. Or if you're going to do this repeatedly, just buy a single one way ticket to your destination and book a bunch of round trips starting from DC. Often a round-trip is cheaper depending which side you start from. Need to look at every option.

Be done and had tickets cancelled. :td:

Is back-to-back legal if you use two different airlines.

Say you book SEA-ORD on AA, and a back to back ORD-SEA on AS.

Would AA say that it is back to back and charge you extra? Could you use your AA account for both?

How would they know if it is two different airlines. Posting occurs after flight not before. But don't do something that would get their attention.

It is never "illegal" but it is a violation of the CoC. They can cancel your tickets or terminate your FF program membership but you're not going to jail.

That being said, using two different airlines is quite fine since you are following the CoC of each airline for the ticket you have with them. A codeshare is a rather gray area (AS code on AA metal and then AA code on AA metal) but I wouldn't risk that one.

Separate airlines should be fine. I once did EWR-PVG-EWR on CO and did a one-night trip PVG-NRT-PVG on Ana in the middle. Didn't think anything of it.

I have done this a couple of times without a problem on NW:

Ticket 1: AUS-MSP-DTW on day A, DTW-AUS on day B.
Ticket 2: DTW-AUS later on day A, AUS-DTW earlier on day B.

Ticket 2 is entirely within ticket 1. The only difference is that I had a companion on ticket 2.

That routing wouldn't be a problem anyways. What you did is end-on-end ticketing and is, in the vast majority of fares, completely acceptable.

It is only a problem for the airlines when you nest trips to avoid fare rules.

This is back-to-back ticketing and is expressly forbidden in NW's Contract of Carriage. Just because others have not had a problem with it doesn't change that you may have a problem with it and it is a violation of the contract of carriage.

I believe all the other legacy carriers have similar rules in their contract of carriage.

People use the terms legal/illegal because the airline industry has historically used them in the context of fare rules. It does get confusing because legal/illegal in this context has nothing to do with breaking laws.

Yeah, the safest thing is--different metal, different code, and different ticket stock.

I believe this type of nesting is forbidden. Consider you are lucky that it did not cause trouble for you.

OTOH, if your ticket 2 is DTW to somewhere else then back to DTW, then it is not a violation of rules.

I haven't had issues with back-to-back trips; granted they were flown with different airlines/alliances.

Roundtrip 1 on UA: Depart IND-MHT Sunday week 1, return MHT-IND Thursday week 2
Roundtrip 2 on NW: Depart MHT-BNA Thurdsay week 1, return BNA-MHT Sunday week 2

As long as you use different airlines, you should be fine.

Do you know anyone who had a problem with bact to back?