travelgourmet

Seems like we have some Alitalia shareholders here.

Like I said, Alitalia didn't do anything wrong. My assumptions that they didn't do anything "right" are based upon what was in the article and what I know of Alitalia. Indeed, the article quotes an Alitalia spokesperson washing their hands of everything, including cancelling the tickets.

I've had other carriers go above and beyond for me before. I don't think that "uncancelling" the return portion of the ticket on Alitalia would have been a crazy thing for them to offer. And, no, I don't have evidence that the couple ever communicated with Alitalia, but they somehow found out their ticket was cancelled, so I'm guessing they did speak with them at some point. We all have to work with some assumptions here. That Alitalia is not the sort of provider that I give the benefit of the doubt to is not something that I think needs explanation.

There is a lot of fault to go around in a case like this. Most of it belongs with the couple that booked a two-short connection and didn't have travel insurance. But, AA deserves some for the delays and Alitalia deserves some for playing by the book in what is likely an extreme case.

ira

Hi tg,

>I don't have evidence that the couple ever communicated with Alitalia, but they somehow found out their ticket was cancelled.

They article says that they contacted Alitalia when thet got to Rome.

Probably when they showed up for the return flight.

Why do they think that AA owes them anything?

Padraig

ira wrote: "They article says that they contacted Alitalia when thet got to Rome. Probably when they showed up for the return flight."

It doesn't even say that much. It says "When they arrived in Italy, they learned that Alitalia had canceled their return booking because they had missed the outbound flight."

My read on it is simple. The Lopilatos made a bad plan, and then were hit with bad luck.

I feel some sympathy for them, but I don't think it is for anybody else to pick up the tab. And the journalist who wrote the story up in that way is a disgrace to the profession.

LJ

It did seem to me that the journalist was even more naive than the retirees.But I rather suspect that this section of her newspaper exists, in part, to promote travel agents.

WillTravel

This 2005 poster had a similar very costly experience, even including JFK and a planned 3-hour layover, but with Air France instead of Alitalia:

http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=34533129

For some two-ticket bookings, the risk is less than others. But if you are connecting to a transatlantic flight, the potential for a huge cost if things go wrong means that you should think very carefully before proceeding.

Suki

WillTravel, I kept thinking of that poster and story while reading through the thread, but wasn't industrious enough to look for the post. Thanks.

dawnnoelm

Okay..this is making me a little nervous - we are flying from LAX to London and I want to take a flight from London to Paris that same night.

How many hours would you allow between the flights?

They are seperate bookings...

LAwoman

Some of the travel writers for the LA Times are extremely amateurish.

There was a front page article a couple of months ago about inexpensive intra-europe flights, where the travel writer (one of their long-time regulars) described having her travel agent book her an Easyjet ticket from London to Paris (or Rome, I forget exactly where) - and how the ticket sounded really inexpensive at first, so she told the agent to go ahead and book it, and then it ended costing a lot more because the agent didn't tell her about the taxes.

Why would someone who's supposed to be an experienced traveler use an agent to book a short easyjet flight? How hard is it to get the total Easyjet fare including taxes? Jeesh...

WillTravel

Dawn, you are going in December, right? First, I would figure out the cost if you miss the flight and have to pay walkup fares for another flight, for five people (plus hotel rooms if you can't get a flight until the next day). Then you'll know the extent of the risk you are taking. The problem I see is that the risk for five people is much greater than it is for one, and since you are going around Christmas Eve, the capacity problem as to getting on other flights would be more severe.

I'd never consider it without staying the night in London, and then only with travel insurance. But of course I am somewhat paranoid on this subject, thinking of $10K being gone in a flash.

AAFrequentFlyer

<i>Okay..this is making me a little nervous - we are flying from LAX to London and I want to take a flight from London to Paris that same night.

How many hours would you allow between the flights?

They are seperate bookings...</i>,

in most cases it's not a problem. Your first flight will get there on time, you will have enough time to connect and you will get to your final destination as promised, but......

nobody can guarantee you anything when you are traveling on 2 seperate, deeply discounted tickets. Nobody.

That's the whole point of this thread. Take a chance, save few $, and more time than not you'll be ok. OTOH, if the s__t hits the fan at any time during your first flight, be prepared to spend extra $ to get to the final destination.

yk

dawn - like WT, I'd stay in London the first night you arrive, then fly to paris (or take the train) the next day.

But if you want to head on to Paris the same day, I'd give yourself at least 4-5 hours in between flights, assuming you're flying out of the same airport in London.

dawnnoelm

I have travel insurance but am seriously considering spending the night in London (yet again) perhaps just at the airport and catching a flight first thing in the morning.

Yes, it is 5 persons (maybe 6 - stepson friend is still on the fence) -- we have had too many travel issues to not take this into consideration.

I made the fatal mistake once when we missed a connecting flight to the Bahamas in Ft. Lauderdale of going online and rebooking my own because I did not like what the airline was offering me. I never told the airline -- went to fly out of the Bahamas and bam..no flight. :-? Did not read these boards then. It cost us a pretty penny to get off the Island.

Fortunately I did have a split reservation and my flight from Ft. Lauderdale to LAX was still there...

dawnnoelm

We are currently scheduled to fly into London at 3:00 pm on December 23. I was going to take a British Air flight to Paris that night.

I believe I will be back to spending the night in London by the train station and doing the train to Paris in the am on Christmas Eve.

AAFrequentFlyer

ok, I have to ask.

Why not just book a flight to Paris?

Tuscanson

Many are savvy travelers say the rookies should have known.
But let's step back from this. Suppose I am in Venice and want to take the train to Paris. I check the schedule and see that I need two tickets Venice to Milan and Milan to Paris. There is 3 hours between trains.
Darn. The first one is late and I miss my connection. Have I lost the value of my ticket? Do I have to hope that the RR will be nice to me and accomodate me?
A good chunk of the problem is that years ago the airlines got a ruling that tickets are nontransferable.

Sue_xx_yy

&quot;Seems like we have some Alitalia shareholders here.&quot;

Travelgourmet, I understand that you and I are not in agreement on this one, but this does not justify your suggesting I have ulterior motives for disagreeing with you. Should I suggest, with or without a smiley face, that you are not only a shareholder in American airlines, but have failed to disclose the fact?

For future reference; You don't &quot;know&quot; me but once you do, I can assure you that if I had a vested interest in Alitalia above and beyond the single time I flew with them (and even that as a codeshare with another airline) I would have admitted to same.

I agree that airlines can have very tough rules. The dilemma is whether to have tough rules is fair. I think they were tough, no question. But were they being unfair, as the journalist clearly felt they were?

Here is my criteria for 'fair' - and I welcome your criticism of it (but no more assaults on my character, please, unless you have clear evidence that I have injured you above and beyond my merely disagreeing with you - fair enough?)

Hokay, herewith my 'checklist' for fairness.

1. There has been full disclosure, i.e, the terms and booking conditions are published for the buyer to peruse before they, the buyer puts their money down.

2. The terms are applied in a 'fair market' open to competition.

3 There are alternatives for the customer beyond the contract proffered.

4. The tough rules confer some advantage to the customer, bearing in mind that the customer is a member of a larger group of buyers as well as being an individual buyer.

I concede to making an assumption about '1&quot; based on my own experience. I have always found the terms and conditions associated with a fare to be available for consideration, prior to my booking the fare. It may be tedious to read them all, but they are available.

&quot;2&quot; is satisfied because neither American nor Alitalia has done nothing to prevent competition. Nor has there been some relevant act of God (e.g. a tornado has just destroyed the planes of all their competitors). In other words, a 'fair market' in the formal definition of the term prevailed at the time the couple made their initial bookings, and when they actually traveled.

&quot;3&quot; is satisfied because there were alternatives for the customer at the time of booking. They were not compelled to accept the terms offered. They could have bought a single itinerary ticket, for example, in which case the airlines thereon would have borne any extra cost of rebooking missed flights on the itinerary.

They could further have bought higher fare category tickets enabling them to make changes any time, and which furthermore would have bumped them higher in any rebooking 'queue'. (People often assume that the airline will rebook them on the next flight, when what really is guaranteed is space on the next *available* flight. For discount customers, that means **after** the higher fare customers are taken care of.)

&quot;4&quot; Action taken by airlines to maximize occupancy of an aircraft leads to various economies which overall lower fares. This is why governments permit overbooking (within reason) of aircraft, and why they further permit airlines to cancel the return bookings if the outward leg is missed, and resell the seat. In other words, it is precisely because, not despite, the tough rules that the couple were able to even have the option of booking lower fares.

You assume that the airline could have done this or could have done that, but we aren't privy to just what the status was of the return flight, for example. Perhaps, had they been informed with enough notice that the couple had missed the outbound flight, they could have reinstated the seats. I concede I don't know just when the seats were released back into general inventory after the outbound flight was missed. But neither does anyone else.

travelgourmet

Sue. That was a joke. Didn't mean to suggest anything by it.

And, hey, I think the folks were treated fairly enough. My point is just that it is nice if companies went above and beyond every once in a while.

Sue_xx_yy

If I buy a single itinerary ticket at a discount rate, the airline will rebook any missed connection at their cost - BUT they don't guarantee that they will get me to Rome on time to make a tour departure. Many seats on the next flights are already sold, and there has to be some system for distributing the available unsold seats. We are now dealing with an intensely competitive situation - everybody wants the next flight out, but demand exceeds supply of available seats.

Those who paid higher fares for their tickets can expect to be taken care of first. So, even if the couple had been rebooked at airline expense, they would not have been satisfied, because they wanted a specific arrival time - and it is unlikely that a discount customer would make the 'first cut' of available seats.

The rule of thumb is that one can optimize one's fare, OR one can optimize one's schedule, but rarely both at the same time. The couple asked for seats that optimized the schedule, i.e. that got them to Rome by a specific time. Had they asked for the next departure to Rome with seats not costing more than x$, the airline would have obliged, but they would have had to wait - and taken instead the consequences of missing their tour departure.

I don't lack sympathy for this couple, but it does not follow that this means I should fault the airlines for their situation.

alanRow

Tuscanson

If you were going between Venice and Paris you would book Venice to Paris, not Venice to Milan &amp; Milan to Paris.

In the former case you are covered - just like on the airlines, in the latter case you are in the laps of the train company who may allow you to use the ticket on a 2nd train - just like the airlines.

GranthamMommy

Last year USAirways cancelled all their flights (on a particular day) from Manchester NH to Philly.
No weather here. No weather there.

I got that information from a 3am computerized phone call on my day of departure.

The 4 o clock flight hadn't been cancelled yet, but. I needed to make a 6pm flight to Rome.

Of course USAirways customer service was less than helpful and suggested I go to the airport for help.

I called Southwest and made reservaction to Philly. They were somewhat suprised that the weather was bad. And I didn't have to pay until I got to the airport.

Went directly to the USAirways desk at the airport and told them my issue. I was afraid if I didn't check in for the first flight, they would cancel my flight from Philly to Rome

It took a few minutes to get it figured out, but I got all checked in Manchester for the Rome flight and she told me how to go about applying for a refund for the first leg. The ticket agent was fantastic. Wish I had gotten her name but I was still frantic at the time.

I hated the lack of customer service on the phone, I hate the way USAirways always seems to change their flights....but a very nice and helpful agent in Manchester pulled it all together.

I had to sit in Philly for six hours instead of my original three, but the next morning I woke up landing in Rome........

If the couple knew what they were doing in the first place, well it didn't work. And if they were uneducated to the rules of travel, I feel badly for them, but.... The article certainly didn't make my blood boil about the airlines, maybe about the writer. Slow news day.