I don't fly very often, so I don't know how an airline would handle this situation. I want to fly to Cincinnati next week. The flights on the airline that I want to use are higher than I want to pay, so I did a search on nearby airports. I can fly to nearby Dayton for $200 less on a flight that connects through Cincinnati!! So I want to stay in Cincinnati, since that is my final destination. I don't think they could stop me from doing that.

But would my return trip be affected? I'd obviously have to fly from Dayton on the return leg (I think they would cancel my seat if I didn't get on in Dayton, ie. I couldn't just catch the 2nd leg of my trip in Cincinnati on the way home).

Any advice or thoughts? I'd have to just bring carry-on luggage. Anything else I haven't thought of?

If you miss the second leg of your inbound flight, the airline will cancel the remainder of the ticket (including your entire outbound flight).

Airlines have what is called a contract of carriage.

Not sure what airline you are flying but if it it DL the CoC reads in part (the same language will exist for most airlines)And the rock and hard place difference is that if you notify them they will charge you the difference in the fare

To say nothing of the inconvienience you will put the people on the connecting flight through. If the airline knows that you have arrived and are to connect, they will keep waiting and paging you.

Really a bad idea.

Thanks for the information. I guess I'll either fly to the further destination and catch a shuttle back, or stay home. I had no idea this was a common practise, or an "illegal" one. Live & learn.

you can turn up at the gate of your connecting flight just before it closes and tell them that you got travel-sick from the previous one, spent all your connection throwing up and don't fancy flying again on the day and you've arranged for a friend to pick you up and drive you to the final destination.

It won't earn you a place in heaven but it could mean a nice little saving.

This is also possible if stopovers are allowed and if there is no minimum stay.

You could fly to Dayton, get on the next flight back to Cincinnati, have a "stopover" there... and after fly back home.

I always hear people being paged to board their flights, especially in the Orient for some reason. Does anyone know how long or how many times an airline will page someone before they give up and depart without them?

If you were starting your trip in Cincinnati (CVG) you could rent a car and drive to Dayton for your first leg, drop off the rental car, connect at CVG for your second leg, and then on the return simply get off the plane at Cincinnati and drive your own car back home.

People use this "hidden city" trick all the time in Cincinnati (Delta) and Charlotte (US Airways via Greensboro). If only the airlines had more rational fare structures in their hub cities, there'd be no need to do this, but that's life.

I think the answer is usually as quickly as possible, but I think they often keep trying because if there is checked luggage involved, they are supposed to pull it from the plane.

Yeesh.. this is a really popular question lately. This is the fourth time it's been asked in this forum in the last 7-10 days.

I once passed out (exhausted) 10 feet from the boarding gate in JFK. They paged me all over the place and finally the plane left. When I woke up, I realised what had happened. At first the attendant got all huffy; but when she realised I had been right under her nose, she felt sorry and put me on the next flight out (from EWR) .

Sorry, this wasn't related to the topic I guess.