Reusing/Recovering value of partial used ticket (eg. cancelled return) [Consolidated]
 

Back in November I cancelled the return of my SFO-LIM paid ticket, choosing instead to return via an award ticket on a much-better itin. I assumed there would be no remaining value to the original ticket, but the agent on the phone (at the time it was cancelled) assured me otherwise, however, there was no way to know the value without booking another trip. That seemed odd. She assured me it wasn't an easy thing to figure out.

Today I tried to apply whatever credit there might be to an SFO-CDG itin in July. The agent tried, said she couldn't do it herself, was surprised that it appeared there actually should be some residual value, then worked with the rate desk. Something weird about how it had to be booked as an extension of the original ticket.

35 minutes later (ok, 33 minutes, I'll allow 2 minutes to explain the request, 35 minutes total call time) she says yes, there is a credit! The flight I want can be had for $1350. Plus a $250 change fee. She says this earnestly, like yes, she's surprised, this can work! Then I mention to her that the outright fare, which had been previously discussed, was $1387. Insert pregnant pause here. Oh.

Why do such things take so long, and if it's really this complicated, wastes so much time that could have been spent helping people who need to get where they're going, why isn't there a simple test that says sorry, nothing left on this ticket, go away, what do you expect when you throw away the return?

Was the value really only a few dollars?

My experience, if you try to change a ticket, it over prices the ticket. I always have to go and book a new ticket, find the fare, them call in, agent says the fare is higher, them web support spends 30 minutes and honors the price. Then after the pain and suffering they waive the change fee, since it took so long.

Think I understand the logic (but not the time it takes to figure it out)
 

They claim the cancelled portion of the trip (the return) has no value on its own, only as part of a continuation of the original trip.

And as I think about it, this almost makes sense. When you cancel the return, you actually haven't cancelled the ticket. This is just finally hitting me. The ticket is in limbo-land, waiting to be modified. That modification would be no different than if you were on the original trip and changed the return to something else.

So instead of SFO-LIM-SFO, the trip becomes SFO-LIM-XXX with XXX to be determined. My trip thus became and extreme open jaw with stopover; SFO-LIM followed 8 months later by SFO-CDG-SFO. Plus $250 change fee. And in this scenario it's true, there is no set amount for the residual value. It depends upon how it meshes with the rest of the new booking.

Now it kinda makes sense. It still shouldn't take so long to figure out.

I don't understand.

Are you getting any money back?

Could you have gotten any money money back?

No, I'd owe United more money than just letting the residual time out. Why?

Because the fare, using the original ticket and making a change to the return, would price out at $1350. Add the $250 change fee and you have $1600. A new ticket, outright, would be $1380-something.

So no money coming back. No use for the remainder.

Potentially useful info for future reissues...
 

deleted

Which again points to the misconception that the original itin has been voided. United adds to this when they say it's a "cancelled" itin. Clearly its remaining value exists only because it is still an open ticket, and subject to the change rules for the original ticket.

I tried a sample SFO-LIM itinerary for Nov, and a couple interesting restrictions showed up in the fare rules:

So I don't think this fare allows SFO-LIM/SFO-CDG-SFO itinerary, as SFO-LIM/SFO-CDG is double-open-jaw. If you try, I'm thinking it turns your outbound half-roundtrip fare into SFO-LIM one-way, which may be a few dollars more than the complete roundtrip. Seems to be consistent with what you are reporting.

I think what you need is some method where the outbound doesn't reprice. So I'm wondering if you can do SFO-LIM/XXX-SFO (where the open jaw is shorter than SFO-LIM 4500mi, ie LAX)? You might need to buy a one-way outbound on a separate PNR to make this work. If it prices lower, I think you can get the difference back as TCVA, which you can use at your leisure (typ 1yr from TCVA issuance).

Fare rules are infinitely more complex than we think, and combining them makes things even worse. So I'm not sure if any of this will work. Then again, the cost of the short MR plus change fee may be $400, so out of the $650ish potential, your net would be $250, which is hardly worth it. But if you need to go out to LAX (or any of 90%+ of US destinations) anyway, this may be more reasonable to do, as your cost would only be the change fee.

Good luck!

Likely even more-complex than the example you gave, since there were segments both on UA and COPA. SFO-MEX on UA, the remainder on COPA. At this point it's an academic excercise because I'm not even going to try and go through the process again; the original ticket was $1100 or so, so even if it priced the same as two one-ways, $550 less $250 change fee and we've only got $300 to play with. 35 minutes on the first phone call, who knows how much on another... maybe, if I can find the rules for the original ticket, and I have the time, I'll try and figure out what could be done with it, and give a possibly-workable option to the agent.

It's important to recognize that the agents, even at the rate desk, are looking at hundreds of different sets of rules so there's no possible way for them to instantly have a handle on dealing with each variant. On the other hand, if we, at FT, spend untold hours analyzing just one rule, we may know more about how to deal with it than the poor person at the rate desk. Which does not in any way denigrate their capabilities or willingness to help!

Hey, I had a round trip flight MIL-EWR-MIL that I flew the first segment of. I am most likely not going to take the return flight EWR->MIL. The ticket is a typical non refundable ticket. If I cancel, do I get any sort of refund or credit at United or is it just gone? I also have a lap child booked on the RT ticket, so I really don't know how a refund/credit on that would work. I called United and the agent seemed pretty lost and couldn't really give me any explanation of how it worked, much less any numbers. Thanks.

To further complicate it, I booked it though the Citi TY site using TY points and cash. United sees it as a cash ticket though.

Look at the fare basis for the return - you'll get that amount in credit, but will need up to $400 for the cancelled fare to reuse it.

Here's the fare on the eticket:

2 tickets like this:

Fare Breakdown
Airfare: 165.00 EUR
Equivalent Airfare: 413.20 USD
U.S. Customs User Fee: 5.50
U.S. Immigration User Fee: 7.00
U.S. Transportation Tax: 35.60
U.S. APHIS User Fee: 3.96
September 11th Security Fee: 5.60
Italy Council City Tax: 9.80
Italy Embarkation Tax: 18.90
Italy Passenger Service Charge: 1.20
Italy Security Charge: 3.50
U.S. Passenger Facility Charge: 4.50
Per Person Total: 508.76
eTicket Total: 508.76 USD

The airfare you paid on this itinerary totals: 413.20 USD
The taxes, fees, and surcharges paid total: 95.56 USD

And infant ticket looks like this:

Fare Breakdown
Airfare: 17.00 EUR
Equivalent Airfare: 18.00 USD
U.S. Transportation Tax: 35.60
Per Person Total: 75.66 USD
eTicket Total: 75.66 USD

The airfare you paid on this itinerary totals: 18.00 USD
The taxes, fees, and surcharges paid total: 35.60 USD

You'd need the individual fare basis of the outbound and inbound.

However...that is a cheap ticket. Likely not much value after the outbound is flown..factoring in the change fee.

I'd wait until the last minute to cancel in case of weather or mechanical.

I'm confused why you expect a value of this ticket? Wouldn't the ticket be re-fared as a one-way, which for this type of international trip is usually *a lot* more expensive than a one-way, leading to nothing leftover?

All of the EX-EU flights I've had to make changes to after departure had changes fees much lower. Quick look at saved fare rules shows 100€ on some V fares and 130€ on an L and a K fare. My guess is that EU laws might limit the changes fees.

*edit* though looking at how cheap his fare was, doesn't look like even the lower change fee helps much, unless rescheduling the return to a later date (and being able to use it) is a possibility. Some of the tickets reprice using historical fares, but without the fare rules, only way to tell is doing a dummy-rebook.