Does any airline not charge for changing travel dates?
pacecar2000us asked:
We are traveling to UK in September, but don’t have passports yet. If I book airline now and have to change dates later, each airline I spoke to charges $200.00 per ticket fee. If I have to wait until last minute to book flight, then airline charges almost full fare price? Its a catch 22? Passport office said 10 weeks, then changed it to 12 weeks. I know of a friend in NY that has waited 3 months, and still no passport. You would think the airlines would take the passport issue into consideration when assessing these charges.
Silas
We are traveling to UK in September, but don’t have passports yet. If I book airline now and have to change dates later, each airline I spoke to charges $200.00 per ticket fee. If I have to wait until last minute to book flight, then airline charges almost full fare price? Its a catch 22? Passport office said 10 weeks, then changed it to 12 weeks. I know of a friend in NY that has waited 3 months, and still no passport. You would think the airlines would take the passport issue into consideration when assessing these charges.
Silas
September 28th, 2009 at 10:48 pm
Well, yes, you can get a date changed without a fee, but it’s totally up to the agent at the time you try to do it. Every airline has a change fee policy. Some carriers charge $25, $50, or even $100 to make a reservation change.
The airline I work for just charges $30, but most times I’ve seen people waive that. The best way to get it waived is to be honest and sincere. Dont’ try to come up with some dramatic excuse why you are changing the reservation. Good luck
October 1st, 2009 at 6:36 am
First of all it depends on the type of ticket you have and which class of service it was purchased at (not necesserly business vs. coach), Airlines are publishing different fares and of course the least expensive ones are also very restricted (sometimes you can’t even change them). There are also less restircted fares like the full Y- that kind of ticket will allow you to make changes for free or even fully refund the ticket. Most of the airlines have the option to pick which fare you are intrested in- cheapest economy, unrestricted economy, upgreadable economy (same with business class) and so on. In most of the cases if you’re getting the cheapest ticket the airline will charge you the reissue fee on top of any potential fare differences. The low cost carriers like Southwest or JetBlu are charging very little for changes from $20 to $50 depending on the ticket. The big carriers like United, American, Continenetal etc will charge you most of the time $100 (Delta only charges $50)…. Before you make any changes make sure you find out what kind of fare your ticket was purchased at!
October 3rd, 2009 at 12:22 am
I’m sorry you are going through this stress. Unfortunately because of Europe always requiring US citizens to have a passport they aren’t offering any leniency to travelers. They are doing it up until Sept. 30th 2007 for travel to Canada, Mexico & Caribbean - but see that is a new requirement. With Europe, it isn’t up to the airlines on passport laws except waiving fees and they just don’t typically do that. It just is what it is. As for the one that works for an airline that charges $30 dollars and most waive it - curious on what airline they work for because I have never heard of this. Granted I don’t know all carriers’ rules off hand, as there are just too many to remember them all. Especially ones we either never use or rarely do. Unfortunately from the airlines perspective and I mean this in no offence only playing devils advocate here, but it isn’t there fault that a traveler say didn’t apply for there passport in advance. I know you can’t always plan this of course; it’s only what an airline is going to think when it comes to waiving any fees.
Change fees vary with each airline - domestic being lower cost reissue cost, but with international tickets I have seen fees anywhere from $200 - $450 depending on the airline, what type of ticket, etc. The only other way to avoid fees, but this isn’t always better in price to do is to buy a fully refundable ticket (quite expensive tickets).
Even in expediting your passport you are still going to have to wait a while, but you could certainly try. I don’t believe any travel insurance company would even cover something like this if you didn’t get your passport in time. Have you applied for your passport yet? If you haven’t I would say there is just no way you will get it in time.
I would suggest contacting an agent who can check on an international ticket with an air consolidator. A lot of times it is lower than anything you will find online. This however is based off of what availability is left on if it is going to be lower though.
Best of Luck to you! If you are able to postpone your dates out by at least 3 - 4 months that might be best to try an avoid additional cost out of pocket.
~ Servette obviously isn’t that intelligent. Servette, why would the poster care what the European documentation requirements are if they are a US citizen?
From what I am reading from the post, you are a US citizen, therefore you WILL absolutely without a doubt need a passport to travel to the United Kingdom.
Good Luck!
October 3rd, 2009 at 8:08 am
Macaw_Lover says: “I’m sorry you are going through this stress. Unfortunately because of Europe always requiring US citizens to have a passport they aren’t offering any leniency to travelers.”
I am sorry to tell her she is darn wrong. USA have the toughest rules regarding passports. Just tell us if you could come from Europe to USA without a valid passport??? Even a visa before the “visa waiver program”.
Europeans could travel withing western Europe with expired passports or just an official ID card.