ChocolateFactory

I think this is just the usual issue of the search timing out before all results have been found (which could take a looong time).
The matrix simply cannot find all possible fares, so after 30 seconds or so, it will simply stop searching and give you the best results that have been found so far. Depending on your search criteria, those results may differ of course, because it may start searching some fares before others.

For this reason, it is usually a good idea to be as specific as possible in the query, to keep the matrix from searching for fares you wouldn't be interested in anyway.

fumje

Ah, thanks. Has the timeout been shortened? I now timed it, and it returns after 20s, but I thought it did used to go longer, which I suppose was part of my confusion.

edit add: after some more attempts, it seems if I ask for specific airports (CHI -> ORD) it goes longer, although still skips DTW when given YYZ,DTW.

ChocolateFactory

Maybe somebody else has a better explanation, but that's what I think happened here at least.

abligh

I'd like to use itamatrix to search for a BA return from ZRH to BOM with ZRH->LHR in CE (economy) and LHR->BOM in WTP/PremiumEconomy (this is so I can use a GUF2 to upgrade it all to business, but that's by the by).

ZRH->LHR has no Premium Economy, so asking matrix to search for "Premium economy" returns only business class fares all the way from ZRH to BOM - presumably because it's doing "at least Premium economy". If I search from LHR->BOM it works as expected. If I use the BA website it also works as expected.

I've read the advanced language instructions but can't work out how to specify that different legs of one journey should be booked into different classes.

Any ideas?

PVDtoDEL

If you try to search a one-way from YYZ,DTW to LIH, it'll provide an error "Journeys with origins in multiple countries are not supported."

I'm guessing because you're searching multi-city, it's tricked into not giving you the error message even though the underlying constraint still exists.

PVDtoDEL

Break it up into two legs using multi-city search.

e.g.

ZRH - LHR ba /f bc=y (or omit the booking class constraint completely)
LHR - BOM ba /f bc=t

Then search for cheapest available.

fumje

Oh, that makes sense. Thanks!

ChocolateFactory

Globaliser

First point: on ZRH-LHR and LHR-ZRH, CE is business class, ET is economy. I suspect that abligh means ET, given the context of the remainder of the post.

Specifying "/f bc=y" for ZRH-LHR and LHR-ZRH will not work. This constrains ITA to try to construct an itinerary using a Y class fare for ZRH-LHR-ZRH and a Y class fare for LHR-BOM-LHR. There are none that combine, so you will get a raspberry from ITA.

If you do it like this, you must leave the booking class constraint blank for ZRH-LHR and LHR-ZRH. ITA will then correctly find a price that uses a T class fare covering LHR-BOM-LHR. As it happens, that will actually be a T class fare that covers the whole ZRH-LHR-BOM-LHR-ZRH trip, with ZRH-LHR and LHR-ZRH booking into K class in accordance with the rules of that T class fare.

If you don't need to specify anything unusual about what happens in London, then a simpler way of doing this is just to search:-
zrh::ba lhr ba /f bc=t
bom::ba lhr ba /f bc=t

That will return fares in economy for ZRH-LHR and LHR-ZRH, and in the WT+ cabin for LHR-BOM-LHR, as originally desired.

zoqfotpik

Airline cabin can be specified by typing "+cabin (type)". Except for premium economy (which has to be entered as "premium-coach"), each cabin type represents a number. You can specify multiple cabins by using space.
1 - First
2 - Business
3 - Economy

Lussac

I have been looking at fares with ITA Matrix to the Far East and NZ for next year and have found the best prices and itineraries that come up are with Swiss Airlines for the dates that I'm interested in. Now the Numpty question - Is it possible to book these itineraries direct with Swiss Airlines call centre (will they know what I'm talking about by quoting the fare code/booking class for each leg) or do I have to go through one of the online agents?

I did do a search on this thread but there's so much info I couldn't weed out the info I was looking for.

Thanks for any help that I might receive.

ChocolateFactory

Lussac

OK, thanks. Just the info I was looking for, when I'm ready I'll give the airline call centre a try if that fails then It'll be Bookwithmatrix.

Thanks again....

100% Green

I was able to find an outbound flight fare basis that is very inexpensive for an upcoming trip, but the return is coming up 4/5 times more expensive than the outbound. Is it possible to use the fare basis for both legs or how can I utilize this information to find a lower return through ita matrix?

Globaliser

Do you have an availability problem for the inbound half of the trip?

One quick way to try to test this is to switch off the ITA availability checker. It will then return the lowest theoretical fare for your trip. If you compare this quote against the quote when the availability checker is on, you may be able to identify quite rapidly whether an availability problem is causing your issue. You can then check this against ExpertFlyer availability displays to (a) confirm that availability is the problem and (b) see whether there's an easy fix by changing a travel date.