Elite plus vouchers & COVID-19 flight changes
 

Hi all
Looking for some data points of anyone who ended up needing to reschedule flights they upgraded with their vouchers. Right now my theory is that they'll refund the ticket for free buth the rules for reusing the vouchers at a later date will depend on availability. Am I right? What about award tickets? They won't change the date regardless of award availability, correct?

Many thanks for your help.

Yes, if you decide to reissue/transfer your ticket to flight credit, you could use the Elite Plus vouchers only if there is 'J' fare bucket available on the flights that you would rebook.
Same for award tickets, 'X' or 'I' fare class should be available.

Only, in case of an IRROPS, your flight has been canceled is within the next 15 days, you could ask for extended help at one of the sales offices and during this chaos, the only way to reach them is to go to their office and wait for your turn.

Thank you very much. Now the evouchers I used expire in July 2020. If they credit them back to me, does that mean I need to use them by that date too?
Is the $25 cancellation fee waived for Award Tickets?

Yes, as it currently stands, you would need to use the vouchers until July 2020.
I am not sure if they waive the $25 cancellation fee for award tickets.

I actually don't quite understand how this works but also I don't want to call TK hotline now as I know they are processing a lot of calls and my flight does not depart until May.

My booking is HKG/IST/HAM and the miles I used for the redemption has already expired in Dec 2019. However, I would like to postpone my travel now. May I know if I will be only to make a one-time free change or get a credit or what?

Thanks in advance!

If you're currently in Hong Kong, and if it's safe to leave outside; I would have visited ( in person ) the sales office at Hong Kong. Sales office agents have more authorization than hotline agents and they are less likely to ruin your ticket.

You might try emailing or calling them, but don't forget that they might not answer your e-mail or call if there is too much people waiting in person at the office.


https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...bec9afc338.png

My father has a similar challenge. He's in the US currently and has a JFK-IST-DEL flight booked with miles that expired Jan 1st, 2020. TK has now cancelled the flight and the Indian Government has barred incoming passengers from Turkey. Just wrote to the agent who helped book the ticket at the Delhi Sales office but her inbox is full, so the email bounced. I might need to go in person to the sales office to help my dad out...

Let me know you're experience.

Update on my cancellation/refund:

I had a flight cancellation on the return portion (US-IST-EU) of my ticket and called to cancel. Refund of miles used for the upgrade went fine and was instantaneous, the refund for the actual ticket was strangely low, roughly half of what I expected, but the agent insisted it was correct. I went through with it.

This annoyed me for a few days, so I filled out a feedback form, asking if the agent maybe mistakenly applied a cancellation fee.

Response came a few days later, they have issued a refund, to be used or redeemed for cash at a sales office.

Update on my side:
- No refund of my ticket as miles have already expired
- Only one free change offered at the moment, if I need to change my ticket again for the second time, I have to pay 25USD change fee

Thanks a lot for your help.
Indeed I try calling them but the call was directed to the call centre (probably in Turkey) instead. Not sure if the HK office is open at the moment actually.

Slightly OT - seat assignment
 

I have a reservation for September (moved from April) and went to mobile App to assign seats.

Seat map is not visible and there is a message that special COVID-related procedures will apply to enforce social distancing.

Probably it's an auto-block as OLCI is closed for the limited amount of domestic flights that operate until 1 May.
Btw, I had the same message when I tried to assign seats.

Do they not also extend the validityv date of the E+ upgrade voucher by another 6 months ? I lost mine on 31/3, because there was no way to reach any E+ fon office for more than 3 days.

They did extend the validity of Elite Plus vouchers for 6 months. For your case, it should be extended until 30 September 2020.
More details are available in this thread: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/turk...-extended.html

Has anyone experienced a flight cancellation (COVID or otherwise) where your cancelled flight was upgraded using a (now) expired E+ voucher or miles? Did TK re-book you in J on a new flight?

Currently I have two upgraded reservations for June/July that have not yet been officially cancelled. One reservation was upgraded using an E+ voucher which has expired (even beyond the 6 months extension provided by TK). The other reservation was upgraded with miles, part of which expired 31 Dec 2019. I was hoping to use the COVID Zero Change Fee option to re-schedule the upgraded flights without first downgrading (and losing) the expired voucher and/or miles. TK call center said 100% no-chance. I have emailed the TK office in Toronto to see if they could 'carryover' the expired upgrade to the new travel date (same routing and positive availability) as this has been reported with some success previously by some on FT. I have not heard back, so I assume they are either closed or working reduced hours. In either case, I don't have high hopes because the new dates I wish to travel extend beyond the standard 1 year validity since ticket issuance.

Based on the projected international TK schedule for this summer just posted on FT, I am now fully expecting that both my trips will be cancelled. In this case, is there any re-course to have the voucher & miles re-instated or to have TK re-book me in J since it was an involuntary cancellation?

Does anyone have any first hand experience with this so far?