Lori_Q

I don't understand. If I buy a ticket for someone, using my own credit card, I can still cancel the ticket and receive the refund in a travel credit, or to the original form of payment (my card). How can it "belong" to the person whose name is on the ticket? I've bought & refunded many tickets for my family members, and I've never been questioned about my right to "take" the tickets away from the person named on the itinerary.

This situation has a whiff of cheapness combined with revenge. If the OP's friend is really concerned about the value of the ticket -- rather than the desire to exclude the wife from the trip that he still wants to take -- he will have to pay a change fee in any case. He should cancel whatever needs to be canceled so that the marital assets (minus the change fee) will be accounted for correctly.

raehl311

Only if you buy a refundable ticket. Most people buy non-refundable tickets, in which case you pay a $150-$250 change fee and receive a credit for the value of the ticket in the name of the passenger on the ticket.

The credit remains in the name of the passenger, so it "belongs" in the sense that you can't use it (absent some tricks) on any travel not involving the party named on the original ticket.

Are you buying refundable tickets?

And if they're married, it really is her ticket.

PV_Premier

yes and reassign her to a middle in E-

greg99

Actually, and though I'm not a matrimonial lawyer (I'm just a simple country M&A lawyer), the OP shouldn't do *anything* to this ticket without talking to his divorce lawyer.

Especially here in California, the stupidest little stuff turns into nasty, nasty fights in cases like this one seems to be. Something that seems so small could become economically very painful when the other side's lawyer gets wind of it.

Greg

sincx

Like Kanye West says, "we want prenup"

DocTravel

He paid for the tickets as she does not work and has not since the marriage. Also, they are only into the marriage for 2 years thus far. Living togther only for a year in the USA as she came from another country in Asia as a wife of a USA Citizen.

Good ideas. I do believe she does not care about the tickets for now and she does not have a lawyer due to the fact I just posted above and the lack of money.

wdrg

Doesn't matter if she has a job.

If no lawyer, how did she file? Pro se?

He needs to check with his own attorney. Some jurisdictions will hold parties in contempt if they do anything to/with marital assets without court permission.

Ejote

Ditto as another simple country non-matrimonial lawyer. I can't, and won't, suggest any legal advice, but will say that end-of-marriage issues are complicated enough that I would talk to a lawyer for *everything*.

raehl311

You realize that 2 years of marriage is how long it takes to get a permanent green card instead of a provisional one, right?

She didn't suddenly go crazy, this was her plan the whole time.

Marriage for the sole purpose of obtaining a green card is a criminal offense that can lead to significant jail time, if not deportation, so if your friend feels this is what happened to him, he might have the leverage of getting the soon-to-be-ex tossed back to her home country.

Of course, she might claim all sorts of things in response, so this is definitely a case where you friend should consult not only a divorce attorney, but a divorce attorney with experience in divorces involving marriage to a recent immigrant.


Or, if he wants to be really mean, let her fly the outbound, then cancel the return.

jmastron

Outside of the potential issue of immigration fraud, in at least community property states a ticket bought during the marriage with money he earned during the marriage would be considered community property. Presumably those GPUs were also earned during the marriage. Doing anything to her ticket could easily end up paying the cost of a full fare last minute first class seat.

Let's say they had 2 cars, bought during the marriage (but yes, bought with "his" money), and he finds hers at the curb and trashes it to the point of being totalled -- it's entirely likely he'd be held liable for at least the cost of replacing it on the spot. While we can argue the value of an advance purchase, upgrade coupon, etc, is less, a judge might not see it that way if she says "my trip is next week; I'm ready and want to go".

He should get a good lawyer now and ask these questions before doing anything.

drewguy

The difference is they're getting divorced, which means that somehow they have to divide up the assets. In this case there's an asset of two tickets to China or, if cancelled, two travel vouchers of whatever value is left.

At some point during the divorce process the assets could be divided.

The goal here should be to maximize the cash value for purposes of dividing the assets. Whatever value there is will be split just like everything else.

PVDProf

Many of the legal issues, and a lot of the schadenfreude, has already been dealt with in this thread:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/delta...000-miles.html

Ejote

Interesting. I don't plan to read all 28 pages, but (having read a few) think talking to a lawyer is pretty important here. (And before anyone asks, I do not even remotely practice in this area, and could not (even if I wanted to) provide competent advice.)

Loren Pechtel

I rather suspect she's in for a rude surprise here--last I knew at least (and I very much doubt the rules have gotten more lenient) a green card issued within two years of marriage is provisional and another application is needed after two years. For us that was nothing but a formality (she had followed me through two job relocations by then) but it did have to be done.

Yup, she might be going to claim abuse to try to stay here once she realizes the green card problem.

raehl311

Yeah, all we know is the friend of the guy says it's been about 2 years, so tough to tell how far along in the process they are.

Either way still sounds like the guy may have gotten himself in a tough spot. Had a cousin on the inlaws' side who married a foreigner and he divorced her as soon as he got the permanent green card. "Fortunately" there wasn't much in the realm of assets to fight over. Going to suck for this guy if he's spent 3-4 years of his life on this relationship and ends up out a bunch of his assets to boot.