I helped someone with an award ticket through US Airways. Reservation set up, about an hour total on the phone while the rate desk validated and priced the itinerary, they took the credit card and told me everything went trhough.
Miles were deducted but turns out that the credit card didn’t process and the tickets weren’t issued, US Airways never contacted anyone about this. Passenger shows up at the airport, no ticket, can’t fly. (To protect the privacy of the person involved, I’m not going to go into greater detail about what actually happened here, but suffice to say it won’t repeat itself for customers whose credit cards aren’t in the name of a third party living in Asia.)
I call US Airways to get it fixed, they tell me they would and I gave them my credit card for the taxes. Race against the clock as the check-in cutoff time approaches. They get everything issued, but the passenger has left the airport, the airline had discouraged them. They couldn’t make it back on time.
Now I was going to help get them set up to travel the next day. US Airways goes from problem-solving to coverup mode, supervisor tries arguing that the itinerary shouldn’t have been issued in the first place, that’s probably why there was a problem (I had already been told the problem was with the credit card used to pay taxes), and that even if it had ticketed they passenger would have been denied boarding by Lufthansa for an invalid routing (which is preposterous).
The routing was:
- Shanghai – Frankfurt – Washington Dulles – Kansas City (destination)
- Kansas City – Washington Dulles – Munich – Kiev (stopover)
- Kiev – Istanbul – Shanghai
Now, I’ve on rare occasion been told by US Airways that a stopover had to be in a Star Alliance hub city. Kiev is not one. But (1) the rate desk validated the routing, they deducted the miles and agreed to issue the tickets and never notified anyone that there was a problem and (2) this isn’t the reason they were telling me the routing was a problem.
Rather, they said that Kansas City isn’t an allowable destination because it isn’t a United gateway. They seemed to almost be reaching for the actual rule here, but misunderstanding and misapplying it because Kansas City is the destination.
First I got them to agree that Kansas City was the destination, it’s the point of turnaround. They still insisted it had to be a gateway.
Me: “Are you telling me that the only destinations that are permitted are gateway cities? That a US Airways award isn’t allowed to destinations like the Caribbean and US Airways awards aren’t permitted to San Diego or to Sydney?”
Agent: “I won’t tell you anything or confirm anything, I’m just not going to authorize it.”
They finally came back and told me that even though the same flights the passenger was supposed to take today were available tomorrow, since the onward flights had been cancelled and they couldn’t just reconstruct those they couldn’t assist.
No problem, I’ll just grab the flights for tomorrow and set up alternate flights for the rest of the trip. Right? Not so fast, the supervisor says “I’ll need to find someone who will be a little more professional” recognizing that she didn’t like being told she was wrong and wouldn’t help any further.
Fortunately I got an agent who simply said, “Legal routing or not, we took a credit card on it and then we messed up.” She wasn’t the most adept agent imaginable, even though I had all the flights she still took an incredibly long time to process. All-in this took two and a half hours. But we got it done. Everything was set to fly one day later, and they’re ending the trip on their original flights as-desired.
The problem in this case was a last-minute booking, so the cancellations happened just prior to travel. But there are general lessons worth keeping in mind to prevent this from happening to you. Lots of things can happen any time you’re dealing with multiple airlines on a reservation, award or not, though sometimes awards are more complicated if only because the availability in relevant fare classes can be tougher to come by so if there are problems those problems can be harder to fix.
- After your award is booked and ticketed, call each partner. Assign seats with them and ask whether the reservation is travel-ready. Do they see the e-ticket associated with the reservation?
- Especially if booking far in advance, check your reservation periodically. Schedule changes and cancellations of flights happen, you don’t want to be caught by surprise. A schedule change or cancellation can cause a flight to drop out of a reservation, or can cause a misconnection, the earlier you know about any potential problem the better.
- Get the confirmation codes of each operating airline, not just the airline issuing your tickets. Those will make it easier to pull up your reservations when you call, and it’ll also make it easier to monitor your reservations online with the operating carriers (though not all airlines will display flights booked by partners over the phone, but many will).
In the end problems do occur, they can usually be fixed, but it’s incredibly frustrating. And first-level agents aren’t the frequently the best problem-solvers or the most empowered.
Have you ever had anything like this happen to you, and how did you deal with it?
Good advice, Gary.
As you know, we used Continental miles to book
JFK – Joberg and Joberg-Instanbul – JFK return.
We used South African Air going & Turkish Air returning.
When I could not find us on either web site, I asked for your help. You found that we were ok, but just not visible on the web site.
A week before the trip I looked at the web sites again. Continental showed only my wife! S African & Turkish showed nothing.
On to the phones and all the fun that entails: But I got the locator codes for each airline which were not the same ones Continental gave us when we bought the seats with miles!
I also learned the importance of the e-Ticket number…Never lose that one!
I am so over my head with mile awards…But I am learning.
My thanks to all the experts who post here and on Milepoints.com.
Doug
Gary,
I do this anyway, because I learned the hard way. Agree with all your points. Absolutely necessary for trouble free travel.
I did this on behalf of someone hardly ever redeems awards, and he had no appreciation for the 1 hour plus I spent with Thai and Singapore. Nor did he have any appreciation how hard the seats were to get.
i hope your friend appreciates the effort you went to to restore the travel.
Out of curiosity, do you ever record your conversations with airline agents? It sounds like with all the award tickets you book, you could come up with some really fine material such as “US Airways does not allow award travel to Kansas City” and in the days of StarNet blocking “Lufthansa does not fly to Frankfurt”
Anyways, this sounds like quite the horror story, so fortunately things got resolved ok.
Legally I’m not sure you could record conversations.
In my case it wasn’t a trip booked but US Airways placed a reward ticket on hold (US Airways PHX-IAH, LH IAH-FRA). When I called back within 48 hrs (I was told the hold was good for 72 hrs) the lady told me the mileage/fees required and the numbers certainly didn’t add up. So I asked her to repeat the flights and the only ones they had were the PHX-IAH, IAH-PHX portions.
Fortunately my flights/seats were still available and I got them. I’m thinking the first lady screwed up. When I was talking to her she didn’t seem very adept.
great story, thanks !
A few months ago I booked a Virgin Atlantic ticket using ANA miles. Everything looked fine & the flights were visible on the Virgin Flying Club website under my Gold Account.
Recently, for no reason I went to look at the reservation. The outbound flight I booked was GONE.
I called and the Virgin Gold rep was incredibly rude but eventually stated that my flight had been cancelled & they rebooked me on an earlier flight.
I asked why I was never notified either by Virgin or ANA and was given some nonsense about them not having my contact info. Never mind that all my communication with ANA was by email and that I’m a Gold Member with Virgin Atlantic and my email addy is in my profile.
That said, I think it’s time to recheck my res & insure nothing else has changed!
btw, taping phone calls is governed by State law. It all boils down to whether you are a 1 or 2 party State. http://www.rcfp.org/taping/
@Rich – how do airlines record conversations then? Answer: they disclose it. Even if the caller’s state doesn’t allow recordings with one-party consent (and many do) couldn’t the caller just tell the agent they would be recordIng the call? I’m absolutely no frequent flyer expert, but I’d imagine If the agent refuses they’d at least kick your call up a level rather than just hanging up on you.
Yes, US airways did the SAME thing to me on a (non-complicated) flight to BQN on Continental. I had to tell them the flights I wanted, they finally “saw” it, and then took my credit card and gave me a confirmation # and said I was all set. 2 days before the flight, I went to reconfirm at CO, and they didnt have my res! Oh SHOOT! I thought. Im screwed. I called back US to find, “the credit card did not process”, although the res was still on hold. I gave them another card, and it was ok.. I ended up flying.
My experience with many call centers saying that I wanted to record, too, is that they (the agent) say “We are not allowed to give permission to record and must terminate this call”.
As for one vs two-party states, both ends have to be in a one party state for you to record without notice or consent. If either is in a 2 party, or out of the US, where 2 party is most common, then the act of recording can be considered [criminal] wiretapping.
Steve (retired atty).
The easy thing to prevent this kind of thing is just to log in to manage my trips on usairways.com and check that a ticket number is in the reservation before hanging up the phone. With BMI this is a major problem because they don’t issue itineraries immediately and often they get lost in the queue.
Your itinerary was actually in violation of the routing rules (Kiev is not a valid stopover) which is a risk you take when anything goes wrong. US Air reps are notorious for blaming you for anything and everything before they fix any problem. If you are hitting any sort of resistance of this type, the advisable thing is to say thank you (to avoid any notation on the reservation; being rude will almost guarantee that this happens) and hang up and try again.
I had something similar occur recently. I booked well in advance (early March for late May trip) through US DM for a trip to Asia. I placed a courtesy hold on the itinerary, then called back two days later to finalize the booking. They took my credit card informations, gave me the PNRs for each of the partners and I called them and changed my seat assignments.
Apparently, something happened, because three weeks later, I called to make a change to the itinerary (to avoid a connection at NRT). I was told that the reservation was still in the system, but that it had not been ticketed.
In this case, checking for the E-ticket number with the partner would have prevented this. Excellent advice.
And, any time you change an award reservation (or, for that matter, any reservation) involving partner airlines, check on the operating carriers Web site(s) (and call their res lines) to ensure the bookings are changed correctly. A few months ago, I booked a simple SFO-IAH-MSY-IAH-SFO domestic award itinerary with United miles flying on Continental. I changed our returns from the 13th to the 14th; United confirmed the change. But CO’s Web site showed that the flights on the 13th had not been cancelled (the booking showed we were returninging on both the 13th and the 14th). When we did not show up for our flights on the 13th, the entire reservation was automatically cancelled. Fortunately I checked in advance, and United was able to reinstate our return reservations.
Admire your tenacity in going the extra mile to help the client by using your own CC and spending hours on the phone to bring the situation under control. And thanks for all your posts!
A couple of years ago, I built an award ticket on NW:
CVG-DL-CDG-stop-LHR-(long layover, but not stopover)-IT-BLR-IT-DEL-KL-AMS-NW-MSP-NW-CVG
When making some change, somehow the ticketing agent left off the MSP-CVG portion. But with NW, they used to update the web in real time, so I could see all of the changes before telling him that everything was ok.
Me: Is there a problem with the return MSP-CVG segment?
Him: Um, you want to get back to CVG?
Me: Um, yeah???
Him: There’s no saver award availability that day
Me: Call whomever you have to call and get an override, cause if I can get this far on a saver award, surely they can cough up a seat on an RJ to get me back to CVG
They did manage to force that booking, and my trip went off without a hitch.
One of the best and easiest ways I’ve found to make sure that the cc processed is simply to check your online account ie: amex/chase/citi etc. and see if there was a charge by US. If there isn’t then it is almost guaranteed that the transaction didn’t go through. I also learned this the hard way but was saved when an SK phone agent told me that there was a reservation but no ticket number. I had to call US back and was told “ohh yeah they didn’t type in the information correctly.” I later noticed that only after I called back the second time was my card charged.
The other thing to be sure to check is any emails you get from the issuing airline.
I booked an AS ticket using QF miles. Alaska had the res. (I had to call to get the PNR, because QF didn’t provide it.) Called twice and no one bothered to tell me that the ticket hadn’t been issues.
Figured that out the night before the flight. It turns out that QF hadn’t issued the ticket… they had sent me an email asking for my passport information, which I missed. (Totally unnecessary for a PDX-SFO trip, but it’s their system.)
Because I didn’t see the email and click through to provide the info, the ticket wasn’t issued. Not sure why this info wasn’t requested during the online booking process.
Agree just get an email confirm from the issueing airline. Then call the other carriers.
My story isn’t even about an award ticket, but backs up the “always double and triple check” method. I booked myself and 4 family members on a trip to Prague from 3 different cities. I used miles for my business award, and my parents bought the other tickets. There was a scheduling change on the return for my parents and grandmother, so I called and they changed it to a legal connection. We arrive in Prague and they say that there’s a reservation, but the change was never ticketed. We sprint over to the Delta office (which turned out not to open for another hour and a half). We tried calling the US, but the phone wouldn’t read the credit card correctly. Finally, after the office opened, she didn’t understand how to fix it. My mom sent me on to catch the PRG-CDG flight figuring that if they missed this one, they’d get home eventually. There was fortunately a slight delay which allowed them to make it to the gate before boarding. Everyone made it, but my grandmother was a little worried. No harm, no foul though, right? Now I know to make sure that any change is ticketed. Gotta love that eticket number.
I had something wild happen with my OneWorld Alliance reservation when I was redeeming my AA miles to fly on FinAir to Russia. I booked my tickets through AAdvantage desk, redeemed my miles, had the routing set (JFK – Helsinki – Moscow (stop), St.Peter – Helsinki – JFK). Had the eticket number issued and reservation was showing up in my AA.com account. I decided to check with FinAir about a week or two out, they said I was not in the system, I had to dig deeper with AA and it turns out the ticket was booked, proccessed by the reservation as not tied to the ticket number. I was assured by AA that I will get seats on these flights, it was just a computer glitch. Of course, we showed up early to check-in with FinAir, we had a complication, it was not showing up in their system, they had to call AA and do it manual and process it there on the spot. It took about 45 minutes to get it done, so we were not happy campers, I dont’ know why this happened, but it did, and good thing we showed up earlier and we expected this complication to arise. On the way back, everything went smoothly, the reservation was connected to our eticket.
Best,
PedroNY
The solution to problems like this is simple: pay Gary Leff and have it all taken care of automtically ….thats how I would deal with something like this.
Sometimes, even precautions don’t work:
In February 2010, after much trial and error on delta.com, I was able to book the following award tickets for my spouse and 2 minor children for 60,000 miles per person for travel commencing 31 May 2010: JAN-DTW-AMS-KPB 2 mo. stay then KBP-AMS-BRU 2 week stay, then BRU-ATL-MLU.
After booking and paying for the tix, I periodically checked the booking on delta.com and KLM.com, using the KLM booking #. Everything looked A-OK.
Well the day finally came, and after a 2 hr. car trip to JAN, we were told at the airport that the flight to DTW had been canceled, and that they would re-book my family for the next day. (Of course, before departing for JAN, I checked online and my e-mail, but no mention of a cancelation). Delta’s commuter partner put my spouse and kids up in a hotel at JAN for the night.
The next morning, they were re-booked from JAN-ATL-JFK-KBP. As luck would have it, the flight out of JAN was delayed, and my family literally ran to make the connecting flight in ATL. The gate agent was reluctant to let them board, but after some key-punching relented. (Once on board, other passengers had to be re-positioned to allow my family to sit together).
At JFK, the gate agent again had to do some extensive key-punching to secure their onward travel. At one point, he walked off with their boarding passes, and then “forgot” that he had done so. Fortunately, my wife observed him take the passes, and after further searching he recovered them.
After they arrived in Kiev, I checked their itinerary online and noticed that the KBP-AMS-BRU segment had been deleted. So, I called customer service, and after a lengthy (perhaps 40 mins. process), the CSA figured out that, because of all the keypunching by agents to re-route them, the segment had been deleted. He re-added the segment and assured me that all was well.
And so it was, for a few days . . . until I checked again. The KBP-BRU segment on KLM had again disappeared. It had also disappeared from KLM’s website. So, I called Delta again, spoke with another CSA, and after a lengthy process, he told me not to worry about it, “it was in the system,” or something to that effect. That didn’t placate me, and I asked him to make it “reappear” on the online itinerary. He reluctantly did so.
A few days later, the KBP-AMS-BRU segment again disappeared. This time, I tried to call KLM, but was automatically transferred to Delta, who resurrected the segment, and reassured me that “it was in the system — not to worry. I e-mailed KLM to confirm that everything was set on their end, but, they replied by urging me to contact Delta.
The day before the KBP-AMS-BRU segment, I called Delta one last time because — surprise, surprise — the segment was again missing from the online itinerary. For about the 4th time, Delta reassured me that they could see the booking and not to worry — be happy.
As you may have guessed, my family arrived at KLM check-in at KBP, only to be told that their reservations were not on the computer. The agent tried to contact someone, possibly Delta, without success. She said she would have to book them “herself,” but it would take some time because of the different booking systems between KLM and Delta. My wife asked for boarding passes from AMS-BRU, because of the tight connection (45-50 mins.). The agent replied, however, that she could not issue the boarding passes for the connecting fight because the reservation was not in the system. Nonetheless, she was able to check the bags all the way to BRU.
Although they left KBP late, they arrived at AMS early. At the end of the jetway, however, they would not let anyone into the concourse. Eventually, they relented. My family went to the KLM transfer desk, where they explained their situation to an attendant, including the time of their connecting flight. The agent scanned her passport a few times, and then directed her to another line, behind some travelers who were scheduling (rescheduling?) travel for the next day!
Once they got to the front of the line, the agent looked at the computer and said that they did not have reservations to BRU. My wife told the agent, that the reservation had been there, but that it had kept disappearing. The agent said that Delta did not timely reimburse KLM for the tickets, and that was why she was having trouble with the reservations. She said that she could put her on the waiting list for the flight and that she need to be there by 20:22. She added you might have to run, but don’t worry, there should be enough seats for you.
My wife took the passes, grabbed the kids and ran headlong for Terminal B. They then reached passport control, which had a slow moving line. Then, they went to security. At security, the security officer got in a fight with the passenger in front of my wife, because she improperly disposed of trash. My 7 year old set off the metal detector. They had to wait for another security officer to clear her.
After security, they mostly ran to gate B22. The kids were crying that they were tired, and that their sides were hurting. My wife’s hand was shaking when she handed the boarding passes to the gate agent, who promptly informed them that they were late. She said they closed the door 10 mins before departure and that it was 20:26. (The flight was scheduled to depart at 20:35). They could see the plane at the gate, but were not allowed to board. The agent explained that she was not expecting them. The gate agent sent my family to another KLM CSA for rebooking.
After again waiting in line, the KLM CSA offered to place my distraught family on the last train to BRU that night. However, they only had 30 mins. to retrieve their checked bags, and somehow lug them all the way to, and on to the train. She conceded that it was unlikely that they would make it. So, the CSA re-booked them for the next morning and checked to see if KLM could pay for a hotel. She said that it was Delta’s fault. The CSA was very nice, and said that even if not, she would not let my family sleep at the airport and that she would take them home with her for the night. Eventually, she was able to arrange for a room, and forwarded my family to another CSA near baggage claim. KLM ended up keeping the check-in luggage overnight.
The new CSA issued a hotel and food vouchers. They then went outside to wait for the hotel shuttle. They didn’t arrive to the hotel until after 22:15. After a SNAFU with the hotel voucher (I believe the voucher was for 2 people, requiring the hotel to call KLM to obtain confirmation for 3 persons), the desk-clerk advised them to immediately go and eat in the hotel restaurant before it closed. Their meal arrived at 23:15. They did not get to their room until 0:00.
Meanwhile, my wife’s sister who was awaiting their arrival in BRU, and myself were anxiously wondering what had happened. We knew that my family had experienced some trouble with the boarding passes in AMS, and a friend of a relative who was on board the flight to AMS, had notified my wife’s family that they had made it to AMS and were awaiting the flight to BRU. When they did not appear an hour to an hour and one-half hours after their plane arrived in BRU, we knew something was amiss.
So, I started calling Schiphol area hotels. I started with the Sheraton, and asked them which hotel KLM used to house passengers. She told me that they used the Van Der Valk Hotel. So, I called there, and asked the front desk if my wife was staying there. The clerk asked me why I wanted to know. I explained the situation and who I was. She then confirmed that my wife had checked in, but was eating in the restaurant. I called back later, and finally was able to talk to her.
The next day, they returned to Schiphol and flew to BRU, without further incident.
I’m sorry about the long story, but Gary struck a chord. So, to make a long story short, make sure you confirm the booking with the partner airline — even if the partner airline keeps referring you back to the award ticket airline, who repeatedly assures you that everything is okay!
P.S. Thank you for your column Gary!
Bill
I’m pretty anal about reward trip bookings. With aeroplan you have to wait for the final itinerary to come through which can take two or three days. I always phone back the next day to prod them on.
The biggest problem I run into from there on is re-timing of flights. I never seem to get the notice. That’s another store.
Thankfully nothing like this has occurred.
I am constantly running into problems with tickets booked on partner airlines — and reward tickets seem to involve extra troubles. Fortunately, I’ve never been denied travel, but I’ve come close — and it will probably happen eventually.
The biggest problems seem to stem from schedule changes and getting the revised reservation “in sync” with the partner airline. At a minimum, I usually wind up with multiple ticket numbers in my parrtner airline rez, and this prevents me from using online check-in. It’s usually fixable at the airport pretty quickly, but you have to wait on line.
Bill, just another reason for me to stay away from DELTA! Thank you for posting your experience. I feel so bad for your family.