Anyway to change flight on basic fare?
 

Going to LA next week and I was wondering if I could change my flight date? (to extend it for a bit from June 7th to June 17th instead of June 8th to June 16th, I called but they said because I have basic fare I couldn't change it, but I am willing to pay money to do it. Any ideas?

Was there a schedule change (especially with the Max8 groundings)?

Easy.

Throw away the first reservation. Buy a new one. The total you will pay money to do it = sum of the two tickets.

This is no different than when people buy no refund tickets where the airline says: look we mean it - literally no refunds, none, don't ask, don't make us feel bad saying no, but not a pfennig back and no value for it either in exchange, so please, understand our measure twice cut once fare. And the luggage fee and boarding pass fee and seat fee and all the other fees we charge as well.

Then a day or two later people ask here how do I get a refund for this non-refundable fare? I paid 1/2 to 1/10th for it compared to what other people paid to allow them to make such changes but I should be allowed to.

Hi guys, I'd like to ask what you think WS would do in a similar situation that AC did for me recently with a Basic fare ticket.

I was supposed to fly HKG-YVR (CX) -YYZ (AC) and connect to a separate YYZ-YQM Basic fare ticket on AC. It was a risk, I know! Unfortunately, we were delayed out of HKG and I missed my connection to YYZ, so CX rebooked me on AC leaving the next morning. I went to the AC customer service counter and told them my situation, including that I would have booked everything on one ticket, but neither the AC nor CX websites would let me book this particular routing on one ticket. They were willing to rebook my YYZ-YQM flight to a later one I could catch, telling me that normally they wouldn't do that but because my incoming delayed flight was on AC, they would help me out this time, for which I was very grateful.

I'd like to fly like this routing again, and sometimes CX uses WS for it's YVR-YYZ connection. I'm wondering if the same thing happened and my incoming WS flight was delayed and I had a separate connecting Basic fare WS ticket, would they help me out or tell me tough luck...?

Is a late-show an option for basic fares? I know you're not allowed to make any changes, not sure if late-show counts as a change or is an exception.

First off, if you want to combine two routing like that onto the same the ticket it can be done.

Travel Agents have more flexibility in their software to ticket all sorts of things like this across multiple airlines. CX has interline agreements with both AC and WS. Some times you can do these things on a travel agents website (e.g. Expedia) and sometimes it needs to be done by one with real employees.

The other way to trick the airline system is a multi-segment routing. On the AC site do the HKG-YYZ as one trip then the next trip is YYZ-YQM. You should be able to do that on the AC website.

As for AC and WS letting you do this on a deeply discounted ticket, if it had been on one ticket then yes would have had to rebook you. Separate tickets then I think your dependent on what I call the "I am overworked so we will make the problem go away" principle. The software probably does not stop them from doing it, the rules are to complex and there is a line of people, so they do what they have to do make the problem go away so they can move on to the next person. It probably happens more frequently than airline management types would want.

Long story short, I need to get from Kaohsiung to Moncton, and the last few years I've bought cheap TPE-YYZ tickets on Chinese carriers and then separate tickets to YQM/YSJ/YFC, it's been several hundred dollars cheaper this way and with much, much better schedules. There has been risk, but I knew that with an AC standard economy ticket I (or my parents) could pay $150 for an airport same day change.

This year I flew CX for the first time from KHH with an excellent schedule and price leaving at night and I took the same risk but with a Basic fare this time. I lost but AC treated me well, and as I said I'm grateful for that. Otherwise, I would've just bought a new ticket to NB for $400~ish and sucked it up. I'm just wondering if this should happen again but with WS how they would treat me.

WS will not allow a late show for basic. Not sure about other airlines.

I am inclined to think based on experience that WJ is much more stricter and less likely to bend the rules for these kinds of things. And also less likely to have one offs with an agent willing to bend the rules.