What's it called when you book two round-trip tix for a particular destination and only intend to use one leg of each trip because of the HUGE price differential? And how do the airlines figure this out (is it only problem on the return leg, since you never used the arriving ticket for that flight?) and how do the airlines penalize you for doing this?

Thanks,

Hal

different airlines have different rules.

Most airlines go more 'after' travel-agencies selling such 'throw-away' tickets/segments than directly after the flying costumer.

My best friend tactics are:
* he tries to book the two tickets on two different airlines (not always possible/convenient)
* he books/buys the two tickets with/from 2 different sources (or from the airline itself, but on diffentt dates and speaking with different agents)
* he doesn't use the same Frequent Flier number for those two tickets at booking time , he also uses different addresses and contact phone numer
* he cancels officially the return flights by phone saying that hisr plans changed ..., 'innocently' even asking for a refund (which will be regrettfully denied)

I think it's called "back-to-back" ticketing.

Consider this: I usually get a RT booked by the company, say BUF-BHM. Out on a monday, back on a Friday two weeks later. For the weekend in between, I can get a BHM-BUF RT. No problem, all in my name, my FF number, etc.

Of course, I actually take all the trips so there's no problem.

I don't know how they can catch you, and this is ethically a grey area, though most airlines try to discourage it. Not sure why: they get paid and wind up with an extra seat they can sell that's already paid for. And it can't be any sort of technical reason - WN will sell you one-ways all day long.

I thonk this is a holdover from the old days, and we (the airline) do it because ... because ... because we;ve always done it, so there!

Hal,
If you're buying 2 RT tickets and only planning to fly one leg of each, make sure that the 2nd ticket originates in the other city, so your trip home is the first leg of that 2nd ticket. If you skip the first leg of any ticket, the airline will cancel the whole itinerary.

Although airlines call this back to back ticketing " illegal", it isn't... it is only against their rules. It's not a "holdover" rule, and it's there to keep business flyers from using the cheaper stay-/Saturday- night discount tickets. It is the same motivation as the higher and more restricted change fees.. to encourage people to buy the more expensive and more flexible tickets. They come down pretty hard on travel agents for this, and are increasingly enforcing it with individuals, when they catch up with them. The techniques Rudi mentions can help avoid that. My guess is that as airlines try more and more to force business flyers into more expensive ticketrs, this rule will be more and more enforced.

This is what United Released about it a few months ago (end of August), some other airlines followed them:


Back-to-Back Ticketing

As a result of an audit of tickets earlier this year, the company detected a sizeable number of transactions that involve violations of its tariff rules.� The prohibited practice is commonly referred to as �back-to-back ticketing.� Flight coupons across tickets are used in an order other than that in which they were issued. Ultimately, it results in a wrongful effort to obtain a discount to which the customer is not entitled.

This resulted in travel agencies receiving formal notification in June of United�s plan to enforce its ticketing rules, including suspending or terminating the agency�s ticketing authority on United and taking action against the agency to recover the difference in fares by:

� Requiring the traveler to pay the applicable fare differential; or
� Issuing a debit memo to travel agencies for the fare difference and collecting the amount due in full.



Not saying it's being enforced, only stating what they say they will do.