Hi,

Sorry about the vague title, I could not think of a more informative way to post it.

I was about to book a fully refundable ticket issued by BA from Karachi to London. The routing is

Karachi - Dubai EK
Dubai - London BA
London - Dubai BA
Dubai - Karachi EK

I phoned expedia to make sure it was refundable (it said "NO PENALTIES"
on the fare rules) they said yes it is. I phoned back a few days later to confirm and I was on hold. After a lengthy wait, I was told that they had phoned Emirates and their WOULD be a penalty to refund the Karachi - Dubai - Karachi segments but the BA sectors are fully refundable. Since it is a through fare, I am not sure

a) how that would work (If I only wanted to refund the BA segments, would they refare it )
b) is that is indeed correct?

Does it make sense to you? It is a BA fare, not an EK fare, but would I still have to pay cancellation penalties to EK. I went in a circular argument with the agent.

He said "the BA sectors are fully refundable but the EK ones are not. If you need more information go to the fare rules on our website"

I said "the rules say the ticket is fully refundable without penalties, it says nothing about refunding parts of it requiring a fee"

He said "well we have to go by the most restrictive rules, which apply to the whole itinerary"

I said "no where in the rules does it say there is a pentalty"

He carried on with his..."the BA sectors are fully refundable but the EK ones are not. If you need more information go to the fare rules on our website"

I finally gave up, cause I knew FT would have the answer

Cheers

You got the first half of the FT mantra right. You hung up. Now all you have to do is call back and try again. Rinse and repeat as necessary.

"If you need more information go to the fare rules on our website" is "call center english" and means in plain english: "I have absolutely no clue, please don't ask me more questions about this"

For complex matters like this, I'd suggest to ask them by e-mail as this will give them the opportunity to double-check everything.

A through fare can only have one set of rules, and if these rules say "no penalty" there will be no penalty. A partial refund would not be possible without recalculating and reissuing.

Hey,

Email response

Would this be good enough evidence to expedia if I do need the ticket to be refunded and they said it is not?

Cheers