How to find the fare class / mapping for codeshare mileage earning before purchasing?
 

Hi -

Are there any *A carriers whose underlying fare classes correctly match the ones provided on .bomb when booking a codeshare flight?

Thank you!

LH fare classes map straight across. NH generally do as well, though I'm not sure that's always the case.

Some like LH do, but even when they don't they're easy to look up on EF or similar.

How? EF doesn't have a fare code matrix showing "L" on UA equals "x" code on all other *A carriers.

This is something I am still amazed United, or Star Alliance, have not been sued over yet. They make it impossible to figure out how many miles you will earn on a ticket unless you are diligent and call the partner airline. And even then most partner airline call centers have NO idea what a United "L" fare equates to on that carrier. So you have to ticket the itinerary first and then call the partner.

United, as the selling carrier, should give you this information. But United isn't alone. All *A carriers should be required to do so.

It's a lawsuit waiting to happen...and should happen. Or the airlines should publish a matrix.

-RM

Typically I would agree with you. At lesat about the matrix.

But part of me wonders if it's not a 1:Many problem -- not all airlines have the same number of fare codes... so if these code mappings change on a per route basis depending on demand, what you ask may be impossible.

Yes, they *do* know during the ticketing stage.

Wish *A would take a page out of OW's playbook and have the marketing carrier matter.

I never said it was the same on all carriers; they're not that tightly integrated across *A.

EF does provide a Booking Class Table for each fare for the primary and secondary carriers so you can see what booking class your fare books into.

"Impossible" unless, of course, you look it up where it's published. A lot of things are impossible in that way.

I wasn't implying you said all carriers. But your message said there's a table to look up in EF. I haven't found it. Maybe you can help?

But, again, I don't think EF gives you any ability to see how a UA fare class maps to any other *A carrier. So outside of LH (and probably LX and some others) who have the same fare class structure as UA, it's impossible to know what your UA "L" fares equals on Brussels or another *A carrier.

-RM

Suggest you read mduell's post more carefully:

mduell has frequently answered fare mapping questions in this forum by posting the EF fare map info.

It's conveniently covered on page 10 of the EF user guide:

Fare Rules, Routing Rules, and Booking Class Searches

The fares returned in the response screen for Fare Information will each have a link on the right side to the complete Fare Rules for this fare. Read these rules carefully. They may give restrictions as to when the fare is valid, such as day of the week or on a particular flight number only. They will also give you information on whether or not stopovers are permitted, minimum and maximum stays and any penalties that may exist if you change or cancel your flight.

Also available on the right side is a link to the Routing Rules for this fare. This is useful to determine what, if any, restrictions on how you route from the Departing Airport to the Arriving Airport for that fare. One example of a routing rule is that maybe the fare is only valid for non-stop flights or perhaps only when routed through a specific connecting city. The Routing Rules also contain Ticketed Point Deduction information for applicable fares.

The View Booking Class option will show the Prime Booking Class Table - Booking class information filed by the fare owner (usually the overwater carrier), plus any exceptions filed for segments flown by other carriers. Optional you can specify a secondary airline to show the Secondary Booking Class Table for the fare - Booking class information for segments flown by carriers other than the fare owner who have a different booking code from the prime carriers.

They do indeed have it for every UA fare on every eligible codeshare partner.

That's partially true. That booking class table tells you what booking class you are allowed to book into if you book that carrier's flight number directly, not what the codeshares map to. While they are usually the same, there are some exceptions so you shouldn't rely on that as gospel. For example, I've run into situations in the past where, on a TATL W fare, the booking class table specifies W for Lufthansa, but when the same flight was booked as a UA codeshare operated by Lufthansa, it booked into V. (Fortunately, it was a discrepancy in my favor.)

Some have required options that only apply when available, so you'd have to check availability at the time.

Very useful information! ^

Wonder if we can get it included in one of the various stickies for the UA forum?

I understand this is true only for transatlantic.

Codeshare fare class translation is madness
 

Consider the following bog-standard round trip — a trip from San Francisco to Dublin, booked using a United fare on the outbound and an Air Canada fare on the return.

For simplicity we have chosen a very specific set of flights on the outbound and want to cover them with one specific fare. On the return, we know exactly flights we want, and exactly what fare we want to use to cover the fare, but we're willing to change one thing.

http://i.imgur.com/v2WD24J.png?1

The return portion of this trip is an Air Canada Rouge Premium Rouge fare, fare basis ELW38RCE.

Now, a fare engine finds two ways to satisfy this trip — do you see the difference? It is very subtle, it has to do with who markets the last segment.

http://i.imgur.com/RLWUg6M.png?1

The last segment can either be:

AC5437 ORD-SFO (operated by United) — booked as an AC B fare
or
UA1226 ORD-SFO — booked as a UA M fare

This is, by the way, consistent with the published rules for this fare — this fare books into B for AC flight numbers and M for UA flight numbers on the intra-area-1 portion of a transatlantic journey.

Now, if you were a travel agent, and you had the two choices shown above, which flight number would you pick?

The AC number with the AC B fare?

Or the UA number with the UA M fare?

Gotta go with "B", right? It's higher, it must be better, surely it earns more miles?

YOU CHOSE POORLY.

Here's how United translates that AC B fare into a United fare class:

http://i.imgur.com/zlZkhj6.png?1

That lovely AC B fare on the AC flight number becomes a United "U" fare!

If you had booked the UA prime flight number, you would have gotten M, instant 1K upgrades if PN is available, better position on the pecking list for EUA otherwise. Instead, you gambled, and you got "U".

Now, the UA view of the e-ticket knows you got a "B" fare on the AC flight number, but it doesn't exactly know what to do with that info, and it gives you a bonus piece of info incorrectly suggesting EI has picked up a new fifth-freedom route ;)

http://i.imgur.com/V7Fm7Mf.png?1

I thought I understood codeshares a little bit, but this is crazy. How could anyone possibly know what this AC flight number "B" fare becomes on the prime UA view of the reservation, without actually booking the trip and seeing what happens? As far as I know, the mapping of "AC B => UA U" is not published anywhere.

This is not theoretical — I have a friend who actually booked this. What … what in the world should he do? Can he call UA and ask them why he has a "B" fare ticketed with a "U" fare class confirmed on the ORD-SFO sector? This seems disingenuous; if the AC B => UA U thing is not some kind of mistake, there's no reason for him to be asking a UA agent for UA B on the sector.

The booking class inventory on the AC transatlantic sector is no longer available, so I don't think he can call his OTA and ask them to amend the booking / flight number.

This is just weird. How in the world is anyone supposed to know what fare class to expect when booking a codeshare flight number? Based on the rules of this fare, I would've guessed an AC B => UA M translation. But if the actual mapping isn't published anywhere, what can you possibly do but buy and guess what you're going to get?

It's very simple. If you care, do not book codeshares. Or cancel within 24 hours and rebook it if you don't like it.