Ant

I've been farnarkling around on various flight bookings sites, including
straight Qantas, and have come up with an annoying routing problem.

My trip is from Canberra to a city in western USA. So that's usually
cbr-syd-lax-US City.
But if I put in Cbr - US City, it makes me go Canberra - Melbourne - LAX.
Cbr - LAX gets the same result.

The Aus-LAX Qantas flight appears to start in Sydney, then goes off to
Melbourne, then to LAX. Yuck! I bet that one's always full. I prefer the
mid-arvo QF11 from Sydney. Plenty of time to get there, and it gets into LA
mid-morning. Very civilised.

I can book my own can-syd connection, and there's no tight connection times
or anything. But from what I could determine from various travel sites, it's
quite a bit cheaper if I book it all together.

Why are Qantas making me route through Melbourne? That's just weird.

(btw, Qantas appear to be offering some very nice deals on this trip right
now, good aus-us prices and they are long-stay tickets rather than
penalising you if you're there for 5 months).

--
ant

Kiran

ant <[email protected]> wrote:

    : I've been farnarkling around on various flight bookings sites, including
    : straight Qantas, and have come up with an annoying routing problem.
    :
    : My trip is from Canberra to a city in western USA. So that's usually
    : cbr-syd-lax-US City.
    : But if I put in Cbr - US City, it makes me go Canberra - Melbourne - LAX.
    : Cbr - LAX gets the same result.
    :...
    : Why are Qantas making me route through Melbourne? That's just weird.

Why not call them?

Rak

"ant" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
    > I've been farnarkling around on various flight bookings sites, including
    > straight Qantas, and have come up with an annoying routing problem.
    > My trip is from Canberra to a city in western USA. So that's usually
    > cbr-syd-lax-US City.
    > But if I put in Cbr - US City, it makes me go Canberra - Melbourne - LAX.
    > Cbr - LAX gets the same result.
    > The Aus-LAX Qantas flight appears to start in Sydney, then goes off to
    > Melbourne, then to LAX. Yuck! I bet that one's always full. I prefer the
    > mid-arvo QF11 from Sydney. Plenty of time to get there, and it gets into
    > LA mid-morning. Very civilised.
    > I can book my own can-syd connection, and there's no tight connection
    > times or anything. But from what I could determine from various travel
    > sites, it's quite a bit cheaper if I book it all together.
    > Why are Qantas making me route through Melbourne? That's just weird.
    > (btw, Qantas appear to be offering some very nice deals on this trip right
    > now, good aus-us prices and they are long-stay tickets rather than
    > penalising you if you're there for 5 months).
    > --
    > ant
Try using a travel agent. Their booking systems can control routing. Some
consumer online booking systems cannot. I still use agents for any
complicated routing, and it doesn't cost any more on the routes I fly
(mostly UK-SE Asia-Australia/NZ).





--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

Jeff Hacker

"ant" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
    > I've been farnarkling around on various flight bookings sites, including
    > straight Qantas, and have come up with an annoying routing problem.
    > My trip is from Canberra to a city in western USA. So that's usually
    > cbr-syd-lax-US City.
    > But if I put in Cbr - US City, it makes me go Canberra - Melbourne - LAX.
    > Cbr - LAX gets the same result.
    > The Aus-LAX Qantas flight appears to start in Sydney, then goes off to
    > Melbourne, then to LAX. Yuck! I bet that one's always full. I prefer the
    > mid-arvo QF11 from Sydney. Plenty of time to get there, and it gets into
    > LA mid-morning. Very civilised.
Why not choose "multiple cities" and manually construct your flight -
CBR-MEL-LAX-etc.


    > I can book my own can-syd connection, and there's no tight connection
    > times or anything. But from what I could determine from various travel
    > sites, it's quite a bit cheaper if I book it all together.
    > Why are Qantas making me route through Melbourne? That's just weird.
    > (btw, Qantas appear to be offering some very nice deals on this trip right
    > now, good aus-us prices and they are long-stay tickets rather than
    > penalising you if you're there for 5 months).
    > --
    > ant
    >

Nobody

ant wrote:
    > But if I put in Cbr - US City, it makes me go Canberra - Melbourne - LAX.
    > Cbr - LAX gets the same result.

This detour may be due to some silly capacity system software. If you
are trying to get the lowest fare, it is possible that
canberra-syd-lax-xxx is not available because SYD-LAX is sold out in
that booking class, but the flight from melbourne still has available
seats, so it routes you via a flight that still has those cheaper seats
available even though it costs Qantas far more to fly you though that detour.

You may try to ask for SYD-xxx and see if the same fare is available, or
if it also tells you to fly SYD-MEL-LAX-XXX.

If the low fare is available via Sydney, you could then call Qantas and
tell them to book you on a canberra-syd-lax-xxx itinerary and force it
that way. (note if there is no availability of that booking class on
canberra-sydney, but there is on canberra-melbourne, it may also explain
this situation.

B Anderson

    > I can book my own can-syd connection, and there's no tight connection times
    > or anything. But from what I could determine from various travel sites, it's
    > quite a bit cheaper if I book it all together.
    >
    > Why are Qantas making me route through Melbourne? That's just weird.

I get those routing suggestions flying from Brisbane, which is
ridiculous... not that I've ever booked such a flight.

Qantas complains about fuel costs, and yet they suggest I fly thousands
of unnecessary kilometres when my own city has its own international
airport.

Ant

RAK wrote:

    > Try using a travel agent. Their booking systems can control routing.
    > Some consumer online booking systems cannot. I still use agents for
    > any complicated routing, and it doesn't cost any more on the routes I
    > fly (mostly UK-SE Asia-Australia/NZ).

I usually use Travelplan every year, but they are amazing, they seem to
quote retail prices, hundreds more than the same flights on the 'net.
Maybe I should take my proposed itinerary to flight centre or something, and
see if they can swing it, yeah.

actually, I can book syd-lax-US City online, and then the cbr-syd leg
separatly, and really the only extra is about 40 bucks.

It's just weird though.


--
ant

Ant

Jeff Hacker wrote:

    > Why not choose "multiple cities" and manually construct your flight -
    > CBR-MEL-LAX-etc.

I saw that on the site, but the way they had done it, it looked like a RTW
flight.
I might go back and have a prod.

--
ant

Ant

nobody wrote:
    > ant wrote:
    > > But if I put in Cbr - US City, it makes me go Canberra - Melbourne
    > > - LAX. Cbr - LAX gets the same result.
    > This detour may be due to some silly capacity system software. If you
    > are trying to get the lowest fare, it is possible that
    > canberra-syd-lax-xxx is not available because SYD-LAX is sold out in
    > that booking class, but the flight from melbourne still has available
    > seats, so it routes you via a flight that still has those cheaper
    > seats available even though it costs Qantas far more to fly you
    > though that detour.
    > You may try to ask for SYD-xxx and see if the same fare is available,
    > or
    > if it also tells you to fly SYD-MEL-LAX-XXX.
    > If the low fare is available via Sydney, you could then call Qantas
    > and
    > tell them to book you on a canberra-syd-lax-xxx itinerary and force it
    > that way. (note if there is no availability of that booking class on
    > canberra-sydney, but there is on canberra-melbourne, it may also
    > explain this situation.

Yeah, I'm assuming there's some weird rule in force. But there are red
e-deals CBR-SYD at appropriate times, and even FF flights. It's not until
December, btw.
I wondered if it was a connection time, but the SYD-LAX flight doesn't leave
til 3.20pm, and there's a FF/Red e-deal at 12.10. So the system wouldn't be
nuking it for that.

It's not a biggie, I guess, it's just bizarre-as.


--
ant

Ant

B Anderson wrote:
    > > I can book my own can-syd connection, and there's no tight
    > > connection times or anything. But from what I could determine from
    > > various travel sites, it's quite a bit cheaper if I book it all
    > > together. Why are Qantas making me route through Melbourne? That's just
    > > weird.
    > I get those routing suggestions flying from Brisbane, which is
    > ridiculous... not that I've ever booked such a flight.
    > Qantas complains about fuel costs, and yet they suggest I fly
    > thousands of unnecessary kilometres when my own city has its own
    > international airport.

'zackly. (they've just jacked the "fuel levy" - like it's going to go down
or something - up again too).

Qantas own the CBR-SYD route, they've seen off all the opposition. So if you
put into webjet for that route, the cheapest flight is Virgin Blue, going
Canberra-Melbourne-Sydney!!!!! Crazy. Takes forever too.


--
ant