GenevaFlyer

Exactly my point .... this was my 5-minutes of searching, and it's the best I could find. The governmental website, here, doesn't mention transits ...

YVR Cockroach

This page should give the OP some hope since it is from the proverbial horse's mouth.

Unless the OP didn't have a print out of his connecting flight.

Finkface

Exactly. Same with me. Searching got me some random speculation from bloggers but no concrete source that I could see anyone, much less an airline, relying on. I was agreeing with you. I am still not seeing anything from the OP or those crying 'sue the airline, sue IATA, sue the gate agent, sue Tony Fernandes' that shows an official, easily searchable source that says that 24hr TWOV is permitted at SZX.

If no one here can find anything, what do you expect the gate agent to do? Take your word for it?

kupper

At denial of boarding by Air Asia, it is very difficult to make them compensate. Here are your steps:
1st: you need to have evidence of your claim of unrightfully denied boarding. The visa requirements must be clearly in your favor. (They wanted once to deny me boarding to Thailand as the boarding agent didn't know the visa requirements.)
2nd: you place your claim to customer care via email and all social media channels, and you must make reference to Consumer Rights Tribunal Malaysia (find the channel on Google).
3rd: you need a lot of patience. I was able to once get refunded, but it took about 6 months and a lot of screaming. Air Asia is like that, you won't get anything unless you scream. And don't hesitate to also tweet to Tony Fernandez directly.

babypuwet

Unfortunately OP is completely hosed here unless he/she has good travel insurance. At best, AirAsia would only provide a refund for their portion of the travel. They would no way cover anything related to the travel to Seattle.....

exwannabe

But "directly Transit" would presumably mean staying airside, while looks like at that airport you must clear customs.

And that source explicitly states that it is only valid if staying airside.

Given that Timitac and the airport both deny the 24 hour visa applies, it "appears" he did not have the required paperwork. And "appears" is what the COC calls out.

Yeah, obviously he is out of luck on that. I know of no airline in the world that will compensate for a missed forward connection on a split tick on an unpartnered airline. So even if Air Asia admits they screwed up, all he would be looking at is compensation for the late arrival in Schenzen, which would be next to nothing anyway.

YVR Cockroach

No sterile transit at SZX? That changes things. I've only flown domestic out of there.

exwannabe

I took this straight from the airport website which says I-I goes through customs. Maybe they have build a transfer security which (assuming OP had no checked luggage and a BP) would have allowed it. But how would Air Asia know?

Kind of funny, but I blame the PROC for much of the China TWOV issue. Timitac works with countries to get their database up to date. PROC hurts themselves by not doing this.

Of course suing PROC will not exactly get very far :-)

leeflyer

Just my 2 cents, avoid China when possible. Had enough visa, transit, delay issues plus poor customer services.

lolstebbo

OP would've had to clear customs to transfer since SZX-SEA is only operated by MF; looking on SZX's Chinese website, there's no information about International-to-International transit that I can find, either. Which means the "direct transit" option wouldn't have existed anyway.

fpmurphy

Timatic can be woefully out of date!

GenevaFlyer

Yes, it can be, but, whether it is or not, it is the agreed IATA standard for airlines to check against.

GenevaFlyer

Bradhattan

+1,000

davistev

From Titamic
China - Transit Visa

Visa required.

Transiting without a visa is possible for:

Holders of confirmed onward air, cruise or train tickets for a max. transit time of 24 hours. Transit incl. multiple stops within China (People's Rep.), with a total transit time of max. 24 hours, is permitted. They must travel to a third country.

Nationals of USA holding confirmed onward airline tickets to a third country, if arriving in and departing from the same city:

at Changsha (CSX), Chengdu (CTU), Chongqing (CKG), Dalian (DLC), Guangzhou (CAN), Qingdao (TAO), Tianjin (TSN), Wuhan (WUH), Xi'an (XIY) or Xiamen (XMN) for a max. transit time of 72 hours, starting from 00:01 on the day following the day of entry.




CLEAR AS MUD

"Nationals of USA holding confirmed onward airline tickets to a third country, if arriving in and departing from the same city:"

What the heck does this mean?
Just above it said "Transit incl. multiple stops within China (People's Rep.), with a total transit time of max. 24 hours, is permitted." Or..........

exwannabe

Regardless of what it means, it does not include SZX.