Delta or Alitalia?
 

Hey,

I'm am unfortunately late in finding out that Alitalia is near bankruptcy. I bought a ticket from Chicago to Milan. The ticket says Delta Airlines operated by Alitalia on the flight from Chicago to Rome. The Rome to Milan leg is all Alitalia. What does this mean? Should that give me more confidence that my flight will actually take off and at least land in Rome?

I believe it usually means the flight from ORD will be on an Alitalia aircraft (a codeshare in other words). If Alitalia declares bankruptcy one doesn't know if they will stop operating (if they are doing a Chapter 11) vs. going out of business altogether).

If they DO stop operating I do not know what Delta's responsibilities to affected passengers might be.

"Skyteam" will take care of you if something happens to Alitalia -- you could end up on Northwest, Air France or KLM.

Search for Alitalia... there's another thread on Fodors about it and someone reported that the Italian government is bankrolling them through (I think) the end of the year. So if your tickets are for this year, you'll probably be flying Alitalia.

If something does happen, analogue is right - Delta will have to reassign you to another airline in the SkyTeam family. But my guess is you'll be on Alitalia.

what analogue said. quit worrying.

So my counter to the "don't worry" is should my travel companions all double down on alitalia b/c of the low fares OR should one of us fly on an airline that won't lose our luggage???

the airlines don't handle your luggage. The airports do.

It won't matter what airline you are flying if you switch through Roma.

If you are going to Florence, why are you switching to Milano? You can take a one-hour train directly from the Rome airport (FCO) into Roma, and then get a 90 minute train to Firenze.

Besides - I thought you wanted to visit Roma.

It would help to know when this flight is occurring, but I agree that if the ticket was sold "on Delta stock" (an antiquated term, since there are no paper tickets anymore) - - then Skyteam will look after you.

The "crisis" of the impending "death watch" of Alitalia is being documented daily on flyertalk.com and throughout much of March and April, the forecasts were that they had "no more than a few days to stay in business". Now it seems so entangled in the ("illegal") bailout by the Italian government, and the European courts (trying to oppose the bailout), that the proverbial "end is near" could stretch on for weeks, months or maybe even years.

As for the loss of luggage. eight out of eight out of my family did not get their luggage on time after our return travels from Sicily - - three got theirs in 24 hours or less... one, still doesn't have hers 13 days later! (I might think it permanently lost but it was reported "found" in London on day 9); it's astonishing to me that it has not made it "home" four days later from London since it is not in Continental's responsibility.

For what it's worth, we did not observe ANY system - - but this is boarding from Palermo, which could be entirely different from what you find in Chicago - - for measuring or weighing your carry-on luggage, so I would put a WEEK's worth of clothes in your carry-on, if I were you.

Best wishes,

Rex

zeppole-crazy enough it was $800 to fly from chi-rome then rome-mxp

It's 1200 to fly from chicago-rome...

It made no sense to me.

rex-thanks!