wrp96

Except that the flight is not on UA.

Doc Savage

They can work that out with the partner airline. Bottom line, this is UAs IT problem. Hire some competent programmers.

Jumpgate

UA is definitely inconsistent with automatically adding the lap child cost. It is what it is.

A friend recently redeemed for ORD - YUL - GVA on UA/AC and the web site did *not* automatically add the 10% cost for the lap child and she had to pay for it separately. She, similar to the OP, was *not* happy.

Net net - it's unfair and unscrupulous for UA's web site to not consistently work and portray to true cost of the lap child upon final "check out" which is consistent with its policies.

That being said, this is UA's policy, it is made clear elsewhere on the web site, and in this case UA is judge, jury, executioner and technically doesn't owe the OP anything.

I agree it would be a great customer service move for UA to just issue the ticket and subsequently fix the web site so this doesn't happen again ... but other than being a "good corporate citizen" there is no requirement for them to do so. Also, UA hasn't shown much willingness to make these concessions in recent memory.

OP - in my opinion, you're sadly out of luck.

Baze

Ok, I see what you are referring to. But I don't see that the OP even saw that. And there is another post early in the thread that says the infant price was included and they saw an extra $12XX dollars at the end. So it appears it is a jumbled mess on the UA website where sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn't. Which just reinforces my statements that if the OP has proof they should contact UA and UA should pony up the ticket.

mgcsinc

All I have to say is this: I'm glad that some of you don't get to design principles of contract law. Because if you did, fundamental aspects of a transaction would apparently be governed by principles such as "anyone whose spent a while on FT knows" and "other parts of the website say."

If any of you run businesses, I hope for your sake that you understand how insane and ungrounded in the law your ideas are.

bandana1948

Here is a screen grab of my itinerary that clearly lists my child as a passenger.

Baze

Thank you, that's most of what I asked for quite a while ago. If you have a receipt that says paid in full coupled with this then I think you have a case. Send it to UA Insider. They may not always bring news we like to hear but they are usually very good at resolving problems like this.

gnetwerker

FWIW, I got bit by this shortly after my oldest was born, about 11 years ago. It turned out to be cheaper to buy a deeply-discounted coach ticket than pay the 10% (of full fare!) lap fee. Then we just put the kid in our lap in F/J (domestic/intl), without objection from the cabin crew. I had some numbnuts elsewhere on this forum tell me that was somehow stealing from the airline, but there you have it. For your itin I'm not sure that a coach tik would cost less than $1800, though.

trekwars2000

Why should the OP have to do anything? If you had that screenshot above why would you think you needed to do anything else?

It clearly says "this reservation is ticketed and confirmed". End of story.

TerryK

Be care if you want to bring out contract law. Transportation contract is evidence by tickets. A booking, without ticket, is not a contract. No ticket, no contract.@:-)

I would pursue this from customer service, due to website error, angle.

The infant will be denied boarding by AC if UA doesn't issue an infant ticket.

Baze

Because there is no ticket for the infant issued and AC won't fly them unless there is a ticket for the infant. That was the whole beginning of the thread and what the whole thread is about. All the screenshot says is the infant is in lap. Mileage and price section just says 2 awards. Nothing about the infant ticket which is the whole crux of the problem.

mduell

Booking airline travel is actually more complicated that it appears with the whole reservation/ticket duality. I feel bad that UA's IT failings have put the OP in the spot they're in.

The OP has no contract for the child to fly. Reservations/PNRs are not contracts to fly.

In a very practical sense, because they want their infant to fly. No, many people would not.

Except the child will not be flying at the end of your story.

trekwars2000

I understand that. However, if you had a conformation like that why would you think you need to do anything?

Kacee

I think if I was looking to make an international booking that included my infant, I would read what the UA website has to say on the subject. Here it is:

TICKETING

Infants under the age of two, traveling without a seat within the United States, do not require a ticket. All infants traveling internationally must have a ticket, even if no seat is purchased and they are traveling as a lap child.

Infants traveling between the U.S. and Canada only pay taxes on the ticket. Infants traveling without a seat to other international destinations are charged 10% of the adult fare at the time of infant ticketing (it is usually less expensive to purchase the infant ticket in advance). Infants traveling on an adult’s lap on front cabin rewards or upgrades must pay 10% of the front cabin fare in applicable markets.

(emphasis added). Here's the link: https://www.united.com/web/en-US/con...s/default.aspx

mgcsinc

Whether or not the OP's kid has a formal contract for carriage with UA has nothing to do with a potential state law contract claim based on the OP's interaction with the website, unless there's some preemption that I don't know about.

Kacee: I would think the website had charged me that fee, naturally. Why on earth would I expect to have to confirm that they had.