Yes, your suggestion is indeed possible, in the sense that your (physical) ticket could list a segment as open, while you simultaneously have a confirmed reservation for that segment. You can make the reservation directly with the carrier (or seat-issuer, if it's a codeshare on OW metal), with the PNR independent of any other PNRs that are associated with your ticket.

Viajero,

1) Buy ticket. Date the first segment, leave the rest open
2) Make reservation for the open segments through your travel agent or the airline
3) When reservation is made, airline will at times ask for a ticket number
4) Give it to them if they do
5) Fly with a big smile on your face

They ask for the ticket number to make sure that the reservation is at least somewhat legitimate. There is the occasional problem of agents basically holding seats open by reserving them and later releasing them.

The airlines don't want to overbook premium cabins much, and don't want the seats going out empty due to spurious bookings, so you can understand what they're trying to do. Nicely, in my limited experience, they also understand our needs, and are more than willing to help you make and hold reservations they're fairly confident will actually be used. I'm pretty sure that if you have a plan, and explain it to them they'll be perfectly happy to let you execute it. i.e. I'll be in CAI on x date to pick up my tickets, can you hold my res till then.

In the case of CAI, both Emeco and BA have been willing to issue the tix and hold them for arrival, which also puts an end to the matter. Emeco wants wire transfer, probably, while Ms. Sobhi will likely take a c/c. Emeco will Fedex ahead of time, Ms. Sobhi probably would except she doesn't have the budget and doesn't know how to charge you for it (guessing.) CX/CMB would likely have issued/held in advance (against c/c) but in my case by the time they got around to issuing the tickets there wasn't much of a hold time. But the CX agent in NA I originally spoke with about ex-CMB had no trouble holding a straw-man itin without any mention of a deadline, because first segment was almost a year away. The seat in question wasn't going to be important to them for a long time.

Bottom line, I'm pretty sure it will never be an issue, or will be easily handled by asking for a later deadline.

So why then for my DONE5 have AA insisted on putting a date in for 3 open segments on my next ticket?

Thanks all.

I finally get it: it is done by a little rule bending on the part of the airlines and a lot of sweet talking on our part, with a pinch of common sense thrown in. Like everything, I suppose.


You are right. I called AA and asked nicely for a late date; was told yes, no problem (just as you say), they will put in a date as late as I want. But, the agent also warned me that 'the system' constantly checks passenger loads and if the flight becomes heavily booked a "robot" (her term) will automatically override any such 'generous' late date and will demand ticketing, or else. Fair enough, I will get ready to sweet talk the robot when and if the time comes; just hope it's a spanish-speaking-she-robot.

Update: I made a reservation this morning with AA MAD for a OWE starting January 4, 2005, and didn't say a word about ticketing date, nor was there any mention about "robots" this time by the agent Two minutes after making the reservation I checked aa.com and the itin is right there; status is:

ON HOLD - Purchase By:
01/04/2005 03:25 PM CET

The 'system' has automatically given me until one hour before the first flight to purchase the ticket. Not bad at all. ^

If that's the whole story, then you're simply dealing with an agent who hasn't been properly trained. Unfortunately, in this era of airline economizing that seems to be all too common.

Jeez, some people. I suppose you also expect it to be a sultry-voiced, female spanish-speaking robot?

Seriously, it's nice to hear a success story here once in a while. Do peek at your res once in a while to make sure the girl robot didn't do something naughty and not bother to call.

Actually, I think that for AA to make an open reservation they must make a dated reservation, thereby confirming to the computer that the flight exists, and then when its ticketed its done so as OPEN. If they are asking for the flights in order to avoid ticketing as OPEN then yes its a training issue. But I expect its the former in this case.

Er, que? On three occasions now Emeco have quite happily accepted my credit card scan/faxed in advance and signed at the airport when I pick up the ticket.

Sorry, I was just passing along what I thought I remembered seeing posted here. Perhaps that poster wanted tix Fedex'ed and the rules are different for that versus airport pickup against a physical card and signature.

My personal experience with them was during the price-increase push a year and a half ago when they were accepting c/c's and Fedex'ing for free, and a later email exchange regarding non-OWE ticketing. In that latter case they certainly offered wire transfer as the only payment option, but again it for Fedex delivery.

My Emeco-issued tix were all open (except as req'd) with no suggestion of phantom or real bookings, and during a recent re-issue at LAX (painful) they stayed that way. You may well be right and there's a hidden step where the agent makes a booking, prints the tickets (somehow telling that process to ignore the reservations and show the segments OPEN), then cancels the bookings. Sounds like a lot of extra work, but where programmers and programming budgets are involved, anything is possible.

Thats not really what I mean. I mean that from my understanding the agent must enter a date into the computer that is valid so that the computer knows its a valid flight. Heres an example. Without entering anything, I could ask for an open segment from Philadelphia to Vancouver because I have not been there and would like to have a Tim Horton Donut. If there was no validation, the computer enters the ticket and voila. I have a PHL-YVR segment. Then I ask for a reservation to be made, and there will be no flight. With the validation, the agent has to enter a validation date which tells the computer that a flight exists and that its okay to ticket the segment. In this case, the computer will only come up with connections and the agent will know not to try and ticket PHL-YVR. In the end, no donut. Maybe it works this way, maybe not, but this is how it was explained to me.

And for what its worth, CX does the same thing. There was one flight that I had them book that wasnt beginning until several months after the ticketing. When she went to ticket it without me in the office, she couldnt find the flihgt. When I returned, I told her to try a date several months away and boom. 20 mins later I walked out with a ticket.

Doesn't this happen all the time? This mornng I reserved and open segment AKL-ADL, for a flight that right now does no exist, or the many FTers that reserve open segments to ANC, a seasonal flight. In none of these cases this represents a problem, either for reservation or ticketing, so I must be missing something because I fail to see why "the agent must enter a date into the computer that is valid so that the computer knows its a valid flight". I guess it's time for another 1-2-3-4 list to help me understand and fly happy again. :)

I guess I just dont understand why this is a question. I have found, though, that it usually means that 1) I am not making myself clear or 2) that I am seeing a different question or problem than what is being asked. My underlying point, though, is that its not something worth worrying about. Your ticket is king. You could have 20 seperate reservations for a 20 segment ticket if you chose to. If AA insists on putting a date in the reservation for an open ticket then fine. Let them do 2x the work if they choose. Just make sure that your ticket is OPEN if you want an OPEN ticket and you are good to go. If they insist on dating the res just put the dates far in advance so the res doesnt auto cancel. In other words, if you think you will be flying from NY to London sometime in December or January, put the date in April and change it when you need to. AA has ideosyncracies both with their pricing agents and their computer systems that you need to learn to deal with if youre going to do business with them. In fact, all the carriers do. That's why the question of which is the "best" to buy a ticket from or do a reroute is futile. Each has their way of doing things and each has advantages and disadvantages. If the idea of giving them a date is bothersome then just go to Cathay or whatever and have it ticketed because this is obviously one of those ideosyncracies specifically with AA.

Darren, you were right the first time, I just didn't understand the problem. I do now, today, and only because I got a phone call from AA, about the very same situation you described before and I failed to see.

Two days ago I made a reservation, with the first three segments dated, the rest totally open. Today AA rings me and starts blabbing about my tenth segment being "invalid". I said "what on earth do you mean invalid, how can HKG-AKL be ìnvalid?". The agent says "because you can only cross the Pacific once" ... :confused: ... after I picked myself off the floor I managed a timid "pardon? HKG-AKL is a transpacific?" She says "YES, (with a tone usually reserved for a five year old with a learning impediment), of course, because you are connecting at LAX (HKG-LAX-AKL)". I am?? ... anyhow, to cut it short, it turns out that all 17 of my 'open' segments had been actually dated, by AA, with flights and dates pulled out of thin air by someone at AA with a vivid imagination. Needless to say many of those gems of dummy flights were way out, and naturally caused the rate desk to have a coronary.

So yes, you are right, they do have to date all segments, for their own internal validation purposes. The ticket stays open, but there are phantom dates/flights behind those open sectors.