Issues involving children very near 2-year-old age cutoff
 

I have friends who are planning a trip close to their child's 2nd birthday. If their kid turns 2 in the middle of their trip would they have to pay full airfare? In other words, does all travel need to completed before the child's 2nd birthday?

if you already bought the ticket at lap infant price, then it all depends on the agent at the check in desk on your return. She will check for a proof of age.

be nice and smile and maybe she will let you get away with it :D

What about when using award tickets?

YMMV, but I would say that generally the child has to be under 2 when the journey is completed. You may of course investigate if it then is worhtwhile to purchase two single tickets instead of a return ticket. Children upto 11 generally pay a child's fare. Some airlines also have youth fares etc.

Wirelessly posted (My IV to the Net: BlackBerry7250/4.1.0 Profile/MIDP-2.0 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/105)

In our experience the agents never checked our child's proof of age.

It is getting tough now that they are 14 and 16 to get them the infant fare. ;)

It depends on the airline - internationally some still allow children to return to the destination as a lap child even after they turn two. Cathay, KLM, and some other used to be included in this list but perhaps are no longer. I don't think there are any US airlines that allow this.

The fare rules on many fares specifically address the situation where the child turns 2 during mid-journey. If you are flying internationally you also usually end up having to buy some version of an infant fare, even on award tickets. This is generally unpublished and the phone agents don't know much about it, so it is a rude shock when you arrive at the airport on an award ticket and the agent wants an additional $400 so your 1 year old can accompany you! As previously posted, you can expect that you would have to buy a regular ticket for the return portion but you can also take a chance that the agent won't notice or will overlook the age change.

Most fare rules say that the infant fare only applies if the child is under two years of age at any stage during the trip. So if your child turns 2 during the trip you will have to pay the childrens fare (if there is a childrens fare which is usually 75% of the adult fare).
On award tickets I have found that many airlines will transport an infant for free (free = no additional points but additional taxes and surcharges). But again, if your child turns two most airlines will charge you additional miles/points.
The ultimate answer depends on the T&C of your frequent flyer program.

Help, my baby is in Spain, turns 2 there, but there are no seats available!!!
 

We are a family of 5, my aire, myself and 3 boys. The youngest has 23 months and will be 2 years and 7 days when we return. As I was not aware of this, we didn't buy a ticket, we are already in Europe and there are no available seats so I can't buy him a ticket to go back home with us. The response of Iberia is: you are in a very big problem, what do you suggest? We already started the trip, we are 6,000 miles away from home. Are there exceptions if the plane is full? Could we arrive to the airport and have to stay because my son is 7 days past his 2nd birthday and there are no seats available? Will they help me solve this without charging us with thousands of dollars?

I appreciate your advice, I'm very nervous at this point.

I'll be frank: you're pretty screwed. There are not exceptions to this because it's FAA (in the States, and pretty much the same with the regional authorities elsewhere) rule that >2yo MUST be in a seat. It's not negotiable, so there are no exceptions. The airline isn't going to risk huge fines and issues to help you out.

However, I am fascinated at how you succeeded to book a lap-child ticket that encompassed your child's 2nd birthday without the system grinding to a halt. I would have thought when you entered the birthday that it would error out for the return.

I don't know what to tell you except that I'd be very nervous, too, if I were you. The situation is definitely no bueno. Let us know how it ends up working out. I'm sorry I don't have helpful advice.

I know that some airlines at least used to make an exception. A friend booked this way and I was aghast. She called her agent who explained that on Lufthansa, if the baby turned 2 during the trip, within a certain time frame, s/he was allowed to return as a lap baby.

Double check, just in case you get lucky.

Iberia is at fault here. You should not have been at least signaled that this wouldn't be allowed. It's really not fair and you should let them know, when this is all done, that they should prevent this happening to other passengers in the future.

One idea is to cancel your ticket after seeing if you can purchase anything going home for yourself and your tot. You wouldn't be together but at least you'd be headed home.

You might play dumb and show up at the airport. See if they'll let your son fly stand-by.

Would Iberia let you leave 8 days early? Or is that not something you'd consider?

The only other case I can reference was domestic and on departure. They let the mother cancel the entire ticket and she rented a car. Obviously not an option for you.

Please let us know what you ended up doing and what the fees were.

More info would be helpful so we can help find a solution. What type of ticket did you buy for yourself and for the baby (round trip - infant ticket?). What flight route/date are you on? Did you use award tickets?

Worst case scenario -one adult changes ticket to available flight and flies with infant.

Be interesting to know how the system didn't flag this up, while another IAG airline allocates a seat 'free' to an infant who turns 2 before the return journey I haven't heard anything that would indicate Iberia having the same rules :/

We did have this happen once. The mother was going home and her baby turned two during the visit. She didn't speak English. It was obvious that she wasn't trying to get away with anything. She just didn't know. The ground agents scrambled around and managed to get her child a free seat. Totally against the rules but we felt so badly for her!

It says on Iberia's website in the infant and children's information page that if your child turns 2 before they return home that they should be booked as a child for the entire trip. Have you tried contacting Iberia directly?