Ticket Q.: No show = cancel onward flights?

[LH2]

Greetings. I am hoping some of the airline ground staff who frequent this part of Pprune would be able to offer some guidance on this one.

Say I have this itinerary:

AZ881 TIPMXP / AZ50 MXPBCN / AZ7895 BCNFCO / AZ870 FCOTIP

...which (obviously) is a round trip from Tripoli to Barcelona, fare basis I believe will be YEE3M. Stay in Barcelona will be a few weeks, MXP and FCO are transits.

If I were to miss the MXPBCN leg (having a boarding pass already, if that makes any difference), what would happen to the next two legs, i.e., the return part of the ticket, would they be cancelled? Would there be any way to avoid that?

The reason why I'm considering this course of action is that I'll be making a detour on the way to Barcelona and spending a few days in Bulgaria. The cheapest and most convenient option at the moment seems to be buying a separate, open-jaw ticket MXP-Bulgaria-BCN.

So, I would appreciate any knowledgeable comments on this before I approach my travel agent.

P.S. As for the practicalities of my missing the flight after I've got my boarding pass (they give you it in TIP already), I would obviously be happy to go to the door and tell them not to wait for me (and no checked-in luggage either) so as not to delay anyone unnecessarily.

P.P.S. Apologies if this question sounds a bit confusing. I have tried to be as clear as I could, but this sleep deficit of mine is not helping :bored:

TIA.

[CHIVILCOY]

I only have experience of going out to Buenos Aires with Air France by myself and coming back with my wife. Taking a chance I had bought two return tickets as a one way ticket for my wife was a lot more expensive.

About a week before the return leg I phoned Air France in Buenos Aires to get some seats allocated and half expected them to say that her ticket had been cancelled as she was a no show on the first leg but the guy just said "that's strange the system shows one portion of your ticket hasn't been used" he then informed me that everything was now okay and your preferred seating has been allocated.:ok:

Maybe I was lucky as I have heard that if you don't show up on the first leg your ticket can be cancelled.

[FairlieFlyer]

Same here - My experience is no show on first leg, then PROBABLY remainder will be cancelled. The airline wouldn't confirm until I arrived to check in whether they would honour the remaining ticket

I would guess its to stop passengers buying cheaper through fares not available in the stopover country. eg Air NZ had a special recently for their new route AKL-LHR via HKG, which was cheaper than just HKG-LHR.

The airline could then risk overselling seats due to the no-show for particularly full flights when the missing passenger finally joins the aircraft on its stopover...

[172driver]

AFAIK any no-show will lead to cancellation of the remainder of the ticket. The only exceptions are, wait for it, EZY and FR as they treat every sector as a one-way, regardless of the flight being such or a return.

[LH2]

OP here - thanks for the replies.

Please note that what I was inquiring about was skipping the SECOND leg, not the first. At any rate, at least one of my travel agents agrees with what has been posted by 172, that any no-show results in cancellation of the remainder of the trip.

I do have some experience on this, having forgotten to take a flight on one occasion. I only noticed when I was tidying up my flat and looked at a ticket on the dinning table and saw that day's date was on it. I promptly phoned KLM and asked if I was supposed to be on a flight at that precise instant. "Yes indeed, sir---came the reply---you are listed as a no-show". However, I asked if it'd be possible to reschedule the ticket for the next day and they said no problem, so that leads me to think the cancellation might not happen automatically, as pointed out by FairlieFlyer.

[172driver]

LH2, there may be two separate issues here. The KLM scenario you describe has happened to me (albeit being stuck in a broken-down tube en route to LHR :sad: ), missing a BA flight. They were happy to put me on the next one. In both these cases you and I missed the first outbound sector. In other words, neither of us had started his trip yet. We both started it later (in my case it was a return to Rome) and completed the rest as scheduled (well, I did, don't know about you, of course)

Your original post, however, describes a different scenario, one in which you do complete the first outbound, but then fail to show. This, in my experience, leads to the cancellation of the rest of your flight (as would have, for that matter, a complete no-show in my case described above; I would not have been able to use only the return portion of the ticket). Now, if AZ would honor your BCN-FCO-TIP coupons if you reconfirmed this portion I don't know but doubt. Might be worth getting in touch with AZ and if they say they would honor it, get that in writing, or least the locator code for that amendment.

PS: coming to think of it - couldn't you buy an open-yaw for your TIP-MXP/BCN-TIP flights also ? Would eliminate all doubts.

[LH2]

172,

Now, if AZ would honor your BCN-FCO-TIP coupons if you reconfirmed this portion I don't know but doubt.


Dunno myself. That is plan 'B', walk up to the counter and tell them I won't be able to make that flight b/c of blah blah blah and could they leave the rest intact. Bit of a bet there though. Having said that, nothing prevents me from walking from counter to counter until I find someone who is willing to help, which seems to be the standard approach in MXP :* from all my previous experience.

PS: coming to think of it - couldn't you buy an open-yaw for your TIP-MXP/BCN-TIP flights also ? Would eliminate all doubts.

Well, that is plan 'A'. However, this has to go through the company's local travel agent in Tripoli and... well, let's say they're not the most knowledgeable, efficient, capable, or helpful people around :rolleyes:

Thanks for your answers.