Do we have any travel agents here who knows how to read fare rules? What's REROUTE, TRANSFERS, COMBINATIONS, CO-TERMINALS? Thanks.

Anybody know how open jaw fares are calculated?

Rerouting is a change in the cities involved in the ticket. I don't know if it includes changes on the connections (for example, switching from STL-CVG-CHA to STL-ATL-CHA).

Transfers are another word for connections--they happen when it takes more than one flight to get from point A to point B.

Combinations are putting two separately priced flights on the same ticket. For example, if the fare from ATL-YYZ plus the fare from YYZ-YEG is lower than the single fare ATL-YEG, you can put the two flights on the same ticket. (That is a simple variety, known as an end-on-end--there are others.)

Co-terminals are airports that count as the same for purposes of defining roundtrips. For example, if you fly LAX-EWR in one direction and LGA-SNA in the other, that's still a round trip--the three NYC airports are co-terminals, as are the five in the Los Angeles area. (Other common examples in the States are the three in the Baltimore-Washington area, the three in South Florida, and the two in Houston.)

Can't help you on the open-jaw question.

Co-terminals are two or more airports that are considered the same for routing and/or fare purposes and can be route specific; i.e., SFO and SJC are co-terminals on routings to from IAH, but may not be for routings to another destination. For example, CO will sell as a standard roundtrip fare IAH-SJC/SFO-IAH because SJC and SFO are co-terminals in that market.

And some airlines will allow you to standby for no charge when ticketed out of one airport and standing by from that airport's co-terminal on the same day as ticketed.

Open jaws, unless using co-terminals, are typically point to point and demand full Y fares, unless that segment has a discounted advance purchase one-way fare.

A change in connection city is a re-route. For example, out of IAH, DL offers a lot of low fares when an ATL connection is involved, but not to the same ultimate destination via CVG. The markets this affects are those where AirTran competes. And when ticketed with a connection on a route where that same airline offers a non-stop, is considered a re-route and not allowed on a restricted ticket. However, it never hurts to ask at the airport, as some gate agents will allow you to standby when it involves a re-route. This is on a discretionary basis and will not be allowed by calling the airline in advance.

I have been ticketed, and travelled, on open jaws many, many times, on discounted tickets. You have to check the rules for your specific fare, but open jaws are allowed more often than they are not, as long as all the other fare rules are followed. An open jaw, which can be generally defined as either an outbound trip from A to B, with a return from B to C, or an outbound trip from A to B, with a return trip from C to A, generally requires that the distance of the non-flown segment be less than the distances of either of the flown segments.

The fare generally (but not without exception) is half of the sum of the round-trip fares that would otherwise apply to the two segments flown.

RichG, when you've flown on discounted open jaws, have they always been on routes where there is low fare competition? If not, would you mind listing some routings where you've flown open jaws at a discount?

I've flown a couple of open jaw itineraies in the past few years.

PDX-MCO/DCA-PDX (Q, V or W on UA - can't remember which)
PDX-JFK/ROC-PDX (L on DL)

Almost did PDX-LHR/PRG-PDX three years ago but scrubbed it when I couldn't make the ground transportation work. Fare would have been in V or W class and about the same as two RTs purchased separately (PDX-LHR and LHR-PRG).

I've also been looking at PDX-PRG/BUD-PDX for next spring and so far it's just nominal difference for the open jaw routing.

http://www.travelterminal.com/glossary.shtml is good glossary of fare rule terms.

Sheryl: This spring I had following open jaw on a K fare.

SFO-ROM/VCE-SFO

I was quite surprised and when it priced out exactly the same as SFO-ROM-SFO ~$450.

One thing I noticed out of PDX, United has very,very competitive rates. I have flown open jaws out of PDX for very low rates.

PDX-DEN-IAH
IAH-LAX for $445 mid week

PDX-DEN-DALLAS
DALLAS-DEN-LAX for $540 mid week.

But compare to
ONT-DEN-KCI-DEN-ONT for $1498 mid week...

Oh well

I currently have a open-jaw:

YNG-LAS/LAX-YNG for $219(V) on NW

I haven't been able to figure out why NW is so deeply discounting these fares. Is this to keep people from driving to CMH and CLE where people could use a discount carrier?

The open jaw I was looking at was:

JFK-SYD
SIN-JFK

However, I found that if I did
JFK-SYD UA
SYD-SIN SQ
SIN-JFK UA

It came out to be cheaper: $1907 vs $3000 for the first one. Beats me as to why throwing in an extra flight from SYD-SIN actually saves me more money in the end. Guess the first itinerary was priced as two one-ways where as the second one was priced as a circle-trip. In any case, the good thing about the $1907 fare is that it is upgradeable.

[This message has been edited by seawolf (edited 12-14-1999).]

Side note to theorbo: Northwest is the one discounting the most fares in Columbus -- they start the fare wars there all the time. I don't know why fares from Youngstown are like that... I've seen USAirways reduce fares there to locations where they have little competition, like Charlotte... I can drive an hour to Youngstown, take a puddle jumper to Pittsburgh and save over $100 per person

I beleive that for a TRUE open jaw - such as EWR-LAX and then PBI-EWR, they take half of the roundtrip fare for each leg, and add them with taxes, etc.

Example:

You wanted the above routing.
Current EWR-LAX roundtrip on CO is $400. They would add $200 to your ticket for that leg.

Current PBI-EWR roundtrip on CO is $200. They will add $100 to your fare.

Your total fare is now $300, plus taxes, fees, etc.

Sheryl: Can't help you re the low-fare competition, since I wouldn't have checked, but the last open jaw I can recall flying was last June on UA, LGA-ORD, ORD-PHL. Fare was as previously described by me, or as just above by Tute84, which amounts to the same thing, and came to about $400.