Airlines don't get that married couples can have different last names
 

I get so frustrated with the airlines sometimes. Twice, my husband and I have had an airline mess up our ticketing because I didn't change my name to his. On one occasion, we were forced to change flights during a layover due to a weather delay, and when they reissued the tickets, they split our reservations such that we were assigned separate confirmation numbers. Given I was Premium status and he wasn't, it meant he was shut out of free economy plus. I tried to convince the agent, but she was very over-worked on a bad-weather night in Chicago and said she couldn't do anything.

On the other occasion, I entered my own last name - which obviously I know - but the airline ticketed me with his surname. How that could even happen I have no idea. We didn't discover it until the day before the flight (my bad for not checking), but it seemed an odd error. Lesson learned.

This is largely a venting post, but has anyone else experienced similar situations?

Given the number of countries in the world where the norm is for married, let alone unmarried, couples to have different surnames I'd be surprised if it's a general airline problem.

Sounds more of a problem in your own accounts which you are going to have to contact the airline to find out what is happening.

Sorry this happened - must have been annoying. I keep my name 30+ years ago and have traveled the world with my different-names husband and also with my different-named kids (when kids and now as adults). As long as the reservations were linked - either at time of purchase of after - we have been re-routed, rescheduled and every other imaginable trip disruption without problem. Either you were unlucky or there is some other issue - there have been some trips where by the end either my husband or I have been tempted to un-link our reservations.

Did the airline actually ticket you with his surname or was it just stored under his name and FF account? I have no idea how the former could happen since one has to confirm passenger names prior to purchase.

In the second case, the airline actually ticketed me with his surname. And yes, there was the usual confirmation page, which I'm pretty sure was correct at the time of booking. It's possible, I know that the mistake was mine. But I'm quite positive I did not type it incorrectly. The names are as different as scan be. The only thing I can think of, which i cannot prove, is that after I typed it correctly, it occurred during the ticketing process and I didn't notice it before hitting purchase. I find it very difficult to believe but I suppose it is possible. Even that, though, should not happen. We called the airline (American in the second case) and they straightened it out over the phone, so it was not a big deal (20 minutes on the phone), but it was frustrating.

Will be more careful in the future.

I kept my maiden name and I honestly can't say it's even been a problem. Sorry it happened to you.

Is it possible (if you did this online) that your computer auto-filled your husband's surname in yours? Mine has done that before, apparently my computer thinks my boyfriend has already taken my last name ;)

Yes, the assumption that a woman takes her husband's name is annoying. I've been dealing with that stuff for 21+ years.

To add to the fun, I took my husband's last name as my second surname but don't use a hyphen, so my last name is usually put together as one long name because computers don't like a space in a last name. Then, it doesn't match my last name on my identification even though the web site will say something like, "Your names must match those on your ID." Fortunately, that hasn't been an issue for me at TSA or other security checkpoints. Yet.