Jumping Ship on a layover
 

I have a situation where I'm trying to get to a particular city and then leave from another one a few weeks later. I've discovered that I can cut the fare in about half if I book a straight roundtrip fare to the city I want to ultimately leave from as opposed to trying to work in that first other city via an open jaw deal. The quandary is that the cheap round trip fare makes a stop at that initial city I'm trying to get to. Being an unexperienced flyer I was wondering if booking the much cheaper roundtrip fare and just jumping ship on the way over and then picking it up again on the return trip later is a major no-no or if it's not that big a deal. The airline is Tarom if that makes any difference. I was kind of hesitant to call them and raise any alerts in case they are extremely touchy about such a practice. Not sure why they'd be too upset since they were compensated for the seat whether I'm in it or not.

I think most airlines will cancel the rest of your itinerary if you're a no-show for an earlier leg. The only way this works is if you ditch the last leg.

It's a no-no.

Airlines view markets as people travelling from A-B or A-C, even if the route goes A-B-C. Now sometimes, in order to get people travelling from A-C, the airline will charge less for A-B-C than it would for A-B. But in order to protect its revenues from A-B, it will try to discourage you from jumping ship at B. The principal way they do this is by cancelling all further sectors on your ticket if you miss a connection. They can also do this by through checking luggage to C. The system can usually be gamed if you know what you are doing and if you are trying to miss your last sector on the ticket, but it isn't always straightforward.

Big time no-no in my experience. Last November I was booked on DL SEA-SFO-ATL-TLV-ATL-SFO-SEA, and became ill on the TLV-ATL leg, so once through ATL Customs and Immigration, I asked if I could change to the non-stop ATL-SEA. I was willing to buy a new ticket for $900 walk-up rate, and the ticket agent refused on the grounds that it "would undercut my cheap RT of $1100." In other words, they turned down an additional $900 in revenue to "protect" the cheap fare. Foolish IMHO, but it just shows how serious the airlines can be about skipping or changing a trip once you have begun.

He acknowledged that I could exit the terminal and buy the $900 ATL-SEA ticket out front if I didn't mention that I already had ATL-SFO-SEA. There wasn't time for that, so I had to grin and bear it, fortunately with the assistance of some pharmaceuticals I had wisely brought along "just in case."