If we booked a return flight from England to Brisbane, but only used the return leg, can we do this?

In theory, you could say that you flew with another airline to get to Oz as you missed your initial flight couldn't you?

Are you sure you can get the tickets though? I don't think you can purchase tickets UK - Au - UK unless your home address is in the UK. If you could, everyone would be doing trips using that system. You 'may' get round it if your mother pays the credit card because the airlines often want the credit card holder to be in the party flying, but I'm sure there's some rule against it

Have edited my thread as I re-read it and it was utter gob-shite.

I am under a strong impression that if you do not use the forward leg of your trip, it is considered by the airline as a no-show and cancels the return leg automatically.

If the MIL booked and paid for them and was the lead name on the booking, surely if she said something had come up and we'd follow later then it wouldn't be an issue would it?

I don't to do anything illegal, but I don't want to get shafted for $4000 for the same flight either!

I read it four times, then read it to my husband, still didn't get it. Read it again and light dawned
I think that's right from memory.

In theory, but if newjersey is right (and I think they are) you'd lose even more. As I said, there must be rules against it or everyone would do it.

[QUOTE] I read it four times, then read it to my husband, still didn't get it. Read it again and light dawned [QUOTE]
I'm not having a good day and my mind is a little worse for wear.

Beer is my friend at this very moment in time!

(Oh sod it!)

I checked this with qantas before - my mum booked a flight and I rung and said that she couldnt might not be able make the flight maybe, would she be able to use the return. They said no

Why dont you just call the airline and fake a story to check it out.

WE used to buy returns in the uk and go every year before we had so many

costlesstravel.com.ai is best, you do the hardwork yourself looking for permutations and code shares. I booked finnair but only flew helsinki london with them - rest was ba

I used them lots, their great

If you don't show for the outward leg then the airline cancels the whole ticket so you wouldn't be able to use the return leg.

They can also, if they suspect you buying a return ticket then only using the outward leg send you a bill for the difference if the equivalent one way ticket was more than half of what you paid. The terms and conditions of airline tickets are very complex and are definately in favour of the airline.

Airline pricing is very complex and they deliberately set prices at the level that the target market will bear. So UK-Oz tickets are cheaper than Oz-UK tickets because Aussies are prepared to pay more cause they are used to paying more. Sad but true.

A court of law may not enforce "unfair" contract terms.

But they can definitely cancel the return flight if you don't show for the outbound.

Many thanks for all the help.

I've managed to find a return flight from Brissy for close to what the opposite flight is from England.

It gets my goat that airlines find it acceptable to charge more for a single than a return. Fair enough if it's more than half, I can understand that but to blatently rip people off.....:curse:

Depends on which jurisdiction the ticket is issued or classed as being purchased in!

Whilst some courts won't uphold "unfair" terms, someone has to bring a court case and the "unfairness" of the terms have to be proven. All of which would cost more than the ticket, which is why those "unfair" terms persist in so many transportation tickets around the world.

The classic term in most ticket purchases is that despite buying a ticket the carrier has no obligation to get you, or your luggage to your destination. A term first introduced by British Rail :-)

If you fail to turn up for the forward leg of the journey, the entire journey will be cancelled. I don't know if there is any way to prevent this from happening but it will happen automatically.

- CDM

The airline would have to bring the court case if the person refused to pay a supplementary bill. And if they dipped into someone's credit card, that person could quote possibly claim a chargeback from the card company.

It may be mythology anyway ... I've done it once or twice without any issues and I've not heard of any real cases where it has been a problem.