c1mth0g

I have a couple of TATL reservations where the return was not used because of Covid-19.
I couldn't rebook online and when I called, the agent had to spend a long time talking to the rate desk.
Turns out that if it has been more than a year since the outbound, the tickets have to be repriced using a special "more than one year" fare, which comes to some ridiculous price (eg between $3k and $4k for a W fare).

Obviously at these fares it would make sense just to abandon the return, but was just wondering if others have had the same experience or if this is one of the HUACA situations ...

IAH-OIL-TRASH

Round-trip tickets are significantly cheaper than one-ways TATL (usually), so appears you are coming up against a one-way fare for remaining value of your ticket. There's nothing "special" about this - not sure what agent was trying to communicate - you can go online and try to book a one-way and you'll probably get the same result. You might want to check price of another r.t. and just not do the return (if it's significantly cheaper).

WineCountryUA

In this case I would ask for an exemption and get an ETC for the return fare. Initially this will be an issue as converting the orignal trip to an OW would lead to a unfavorable repricing. But I would try to get an supervisor to see the "special" nature of this situation.

Partially used tickets are a corner case that is always somewhat problematic.

c1mth0g

Ah that makes sense - they were trying to reprice the r/t as two o/w and quoting me the huge difference ...
I suppose they were generous enough to extend the expiration date of the ticket but not generous enough to extend the one year fare to two years.

Thanks. I had a bunch of partially used RTWs (for which the extension beyond one year was not possible because other carriers were involved) where they refunded me the unused segments on a pro-rata basis (instead of calculating all the used segments using o/w fares). So maybe they will do this for these tickets too?

findark

Yes - most if not all round trip fares have a maximum stay of 12 months (or shorter). I agree it would be courteous of them to waive the maximum stay restriction as well, but that's what the computer will say.

under2100

I was in this exact situation with a part-flown TATL - I'd purchased the ticket in Nov2019, flown the outbound in Jan2020, and the return was supposed to be in Apr2020, but I cancelled in March2020 because of Covid. I agreed to a FFC at the time for the return - can't remember that the flight was actually cancelled before I cancelled - I think at that time, getting refunds was very difficult. I was worried about when I had to use the return by (nominally Nov2020 under the old rules) and was happy when they extended the expiry. The original itinerary was LHR-YVR return and I was told that it would only make sense to use the FFC for a return trip with the original city pairs - if I tried to use the FFC against some other itinerary, it would not be worth very much. Anyway, finally, this August2021, I needed to fly a single YVR-LHR trip so I called to try to use the ticket. After some consultation with the rate desk, they came back and said, 'yes you can use your old FFC - and you need to pay an additional $1400'. It wasn't even Y class - I think it was in M class. I objected strenuously, and pointed out I could buy a brand new one-way M class ticket on the flights they were suggesting for $1200 without FFC. So they explained exactly as you reported, that the FFC would only work when the return was part of a super-expensive 'more than a year stay' fare. At the end of the conversation, the agent suggested to me that I write into UA and explain the situation and ask for a cash refund. So that's what I did - I pointed out that in all these 'extensions of expiry of FFC' that they granted, they never once explained that in practice, it might render the value useless if you waited more than a year.

Anyway, I received a full cash refund, without any hassle whatsoever, shortly after I sent in my refund request. It was for the full ticket amount as well, not just some partial refund, which I thought was very generous, considering I'd part flown the ticket. I am grateful to the phone agent, because, like you, I was going to throw away the unused half. And I also purchased a new Business class one-way for $1200 on the dates that I wanted (they had some kind of low fare J sale), so United ended up getting their cash back due to my purchase.

I suggest you write in and ask if they would consider giving you a refund in light of your situation.

PS, I used the standard refund request form on the website, because that is what the agent told me to do. (united.com/refunds). I think in the webform, if you try to put in your ticket number or record locator, it gets rejected (because as a part used ticket it's not eligible in theory). So I filed the request under the 'other' heading , and then included the record locator and 016 number in the webform and also in my typed explanation.

emcampbe

To be fair, I doubt this was about how generous they were/wanted to be or didn't; I'd guess it was more a result of not putting together what might happen when COVID went on, and not paying specific attention to all the details. Don't forget, in April 2020, when the pandemic was just settling in, we had convinced ourselves that we'd be through it in 6 or 8 weeks, then travel would go back to what it was. Then a few months, etc. Then came the steep drop in travel...the lots of people trying to get refunds, the managing the new lower demand, the storing planes, furloughing staff, government funding, etc.....a lot of things kept happening, and this situation just likely wasn't at the top of the list.

I'd heed the other advice and try to ask for special dispensation...seems appropriate.

ithinkurdumb

A friend has SFO-TPE roundtrip ticket and had already flown the outbound. He changed the return flight two months ago and got a $360 FFC. Now he needs to change the flight again and United is quoting an extra $600, due to the new flight date is beyond the maximum stay allowed on the ticket. A new OW ticket costs $750.

Is it possible to use the existing $360 FFC to pay the $600 fare difference? There doesn’t seem to be such an option on the website.

The United app is showing 480 PQP for the current return flight. Is that the residue value? If that’s the case, would it make more sense to just cancel the return flight, and use the new FFC ($480) and the existing FFC ($360) to pay for a OW flight?

SPN Lifer

Because the stay has exceeded the maximum, the already-flown segment must be re-calculated at a new (higher) fare basis, for which the new stay is permissible under the fare rules.

So the former ~$480 value of the return ticket is most assuredly not the current remaining value of the ticket on the new date.

ithinkurdumb

Sorry that I wasn’t clear. The stay has not yet exceeded the maximum. The return flight is currently scheduled for next week, which is within the maximum allowed stay. However, his preferred return date would be beyond the maximum allowed stay.

findark

Yes, an agent should be able to tender your FFC as part of the fare difference.

No, the residual value of the ticket is not $480; you would have to reprice the outbound to a one-way.

ithinkurdumb

I wasn’t able to get an agent after waiting 35 minutes in the phone, so went ahead and cancelled his return flight. Now the website is showing two separate FFC: one $520 from the now cancelled return flight, and one $360 from the fare difference due to the previous change (of the same PNR).

If I try to use the $520 FFC for a TPE-SFO flight beyond the maximum allowed stay, it’s quoting $685 and it seems that the $360 FFC cannot be applied to it. A UA chat agent said because FFC needs to cover the whole amount and can’t be combined with credit card (seems to be false according to another thread on FT?). Is there a way to pay the fare difference with the $360 FFC with a credit card? Would converting it to a travel voucher help?

findark

I'm a little unfamiliar with "FFC" as this was a new thing hacked into the system for the pandemic since people didn't understand what it meant to cancel a ticket.

How did you get the $360 FFC? I thought it was by changing the return which resulted in a lower fare, so the $360 was a residual. In that case I'm surprised it isn't already an ETC or equivalent - yes, I think making it an ETC would make it easier for you to tender it for the fare difference. Someone else who has more experience changing flights since 2020 might be able to comment more.

ithinkurdumb

Sorry - I seemed to abbreviate the backstory too much. When he changed his ticket for the first time, the return flight became more expensive so he had to pay a $360 fare difference. He than changed the return flight again, which was priced as the same as the original return flight, so he got a $360 FFC. Now he's trying to change the return flight for the third time, and because it will be outside of the maximum allowed layover, the fare difference is $685. What we are trying to do now is to use the $360 to pay for part of the $685 fare difference. The chat agent said it's not possible because FFC cannot be combined with another form of payment. I will try calling and see how it goes.

findark

Yeah, if there is a way to convert FFC to ETC that would probably help. I don't know what it means to have an "FFC" that is the result of a residual like that (faring back down counts) because it is no longer an unattached coupon with value but rather should simply be an ETC. But I have no idea what they actually fed to the computer when they made of "FFC" as a new concept.