Silly question about an empty seat
 

My mom and I were to be flying this week to NOLA but she has become ill and will not be taking the trip. She had purchased a non-refundable tickets so we know she is out the money. Here is my pretty silly question; she had already had a seat assigned next to me for all flights. Will they move someone into her seat when they realize she did not make the flight? It would be nice to have an empty seat next to me.

Go ahead and do online check-in for her. That should keep the seat open unless the flights is overbooked and everybody showed up.

BTW, non-refundable tickets can usually be reissued, for a fee. That way, your mom won't be out everything. She can go again later.

You can't have it both ways though.

If you checkin online for her, you'll lose the value of the ticket for future use but the seat 'may' be free. No guarantee, because if it's a full flight with stand-bys, they will do an open seat count before departure and squeeze every last person on they can.

If you call the airline ahead and tell them she won't use the ticket you can retain the value of the ticket but the seat may be assigned to someone else.


By telling the airline in advance she won't be able to fly you won't get a refund, but you can use the full value of the ticket at a later date, minus any change fee (seems to be ~$100 these days).

I suppose you could, theoretically checkin online ahead and still call the airline in advance (maybe 1hr before departure?) to tell them the ticket won't be used, but then the seat will be released to any and all.

Right, I wasn't expecting the OP to be able to do both. Just two different scenarios, two outcomes. :)

Why not call the airline and tell them that you want the 2 seates as you need the space. You could change the name to yours, that way will help as you will have 2 seats

Not very easy to change a name on a ticket.

First, check with airline about what you get for turning in ticket - varies by airline and ticket code. Likely to be a fee involved, but can be either a monetary credit or flight on same route within a certain time period - even on non-=refundable ticket. But you must do this before date of flight.

I didn't know that the name on a ticket could be changed at all?

Keith

<b>Keith</b>

I totally agree. I don't know of any airline that will allow you to change a name on ANY ticket for any fee.

Yes,ATA and Sun Country allow name changes after ticket is issued, according to my TA.Now, it may be a &quot;perk&quot; for his consortium and not open to the general public.They get a lot of these perks, eg, now he can get a reversal of suspension on any e-ticket on AA, usually due to a no show by the pax.The imprtant thing for the OP is if they want to use the ticket in the future, it almost always must be cacnelled prior to ticketed departure time.

You're are talking about a TA. Totally different from the average Joe/Jane who probably purchased their non-refundable tickets on line? (The &quot;average Joe/Jane&quot; comment is NOT directed at the OP :-) ).


Reporting from Lima, Peru. My last full day of the month long trip through South America. Flying early morning on LAN Chile in F tomorrow to Santiago for 1 more shopping day and in F again from SCL to MIA tomorrow night. Santiago, Chile - what a wonderful discovery? LAN Chile First Class - SUPERB!!! Beats AA and BA by miles and for me at least it equals QF and CX. Unfortunately LA is doing away with it's brilliant F product on 767s and keeping it only on 340s, so most, if not all flights to/from US will not have F class. Fortunately they are replacing their old business seats with fully flat, horizontal, great seats in the near future. If they carry over the service part from F to J then it won't be too much of a loss.

I also get few &quot;exceptions and favors&quot;, such as fee waivers or full credit for future use, from AA, but there is a reason for it, because I fly AA almost exclusively and a great deal, when I'm flying revenue, but I could never change a name on the ticket. I asked once and they laughed at me.

If your mother is seriously ill and has been to see a doctor, she may be able to get a full refund. American Airlines will refund (even an extremely discounted ticket) if (1) you cancel the flight BEFORE departure time and (2) provide documentation of the illness (we used a letter from the doctor.

My daughter and I received full refunds on two tickets on AA a few years ago when a family member was seriously ill. The ticket cost was credited to our credit cards.

If you want a refund, you must cancel the reservation before the flight departs.

We will NEVER change the name on a ticket. As someone said earier just call the airline and tell them an emergency came up so u can get a credit towards a future trip.

I tried to buy two seats on a flight overseas once and was told by the airline I absolutely could not purchase two seats in one name. I am a normal size person, I just wanted to be able to stretch out and sleep. They wouldn't let me do it.

Checking her in on line won't matter anyway. When her ticket isn't scanned at the gate, if there are standby people, they might reassign her seat. People check in on line and then get caught in traffic or whatever. It doesn't guarantee your seat if you don't actually show up at the airport.