bromleygirl

I bought non-transferable, return tickets for our relocation as they were actually cheaper than purchasing one-way tickets. Our return is booked for tomorrow but of course not going to use them - I'm just wondering if anyone has ever contacted the airline in these circumstances and asked for a credit in terms of tickets so that I can put these towards a future flight for a trip back to the UK next year??

meauxna

Yes, I have and many others too. The credit should be good for up to a year (a fee may apply, but still better than losing it altogether).

bromleygirl

Thanks - did you just call and explain that you were not going to use the tickets and wanted a credit for the unused return portion of the ticket? Do you think they will ask me to pay some sort of cancellation fee??

Jerseygirl

Continental will credit you as long as you use it within 12 months. They charge a fee though I think it's now around $250 so that may be more than the cost of what the tickets worth.

meauxna

Yes, something like that.
Like JG says, you have to see what the change fee is.. I thought it was much less than $250!

bromleygirl

I went to yapta.com and it said that the change fee was $250 - I think that's for each ticket and if so would add up to $750. Like you say not sure if it's worth it.
If I called Continental to say we were not going to use the flight could they charge a cancellation fee??

GeoffM

Airlines know full well that a percentage of the second portion of return tickets are going to be thrown away when they cost more than a one-way, hence the change fees. Otherwise people would wise up to the ruise and mess up their reservations system. It's not nice but it's the way they work. One of the few reasons why low cost airlines that charge per leg rather than return fares can be better.... sometimes (sadly not trans-Atlantic these days).

If the change fee is more than the money you'd "throw away", ignore it. They can't charge you a cancellation fee more than what you already paid for the ticket. In that situation I wouldn't tell the airline I wasn't going to fly as all they'd do is sell your seat to somebody else and make more money. A standby passenger might get lucky regardless of whether you tell them or not.

The only time you should NOT miss a flight is when you have a sequence of segments, such as LHR-ORD, ORD-LAX, LAX-ORD, ORD-LHR and you still need to fly ORD-LHR. Don't skip the ORD-LAX or LAX-ORD flights because they'll most often cancel the remainder of the ticket as soon as you fail to board the intermediate flight(s).

Jerseygirl

Continental's fee used to be around $120/130 but they more or less doubled it about a year ago. This is for discounted fares...you can normally get a refund or change the date of a full fare ticket without penalty.

meauxna

Dig thru the small print?
http://www.continental.com/web/en-US...s/default.aspx

edit: after reading Geoff's post--caution! They do reference a cancellation fee for some fares/changes.

bromleygirl

Thanks everyone for all the helpful replies. I guess I could go ahead and pay the $750 change fee now and get credit for at least one way for our trip next year.
How would that work? Would Continental give me credit for the outbound and then I'd have to pay the return (i.e. one-way back)? One-ways are always expensive - would I infact end up paying more doing it this way rather than just buying return tickets??

Jerseygirl

The value of the ticket after the penalty has been deducted will be held by Continental until your next booking as long as it's within 12 months. You will lose it if it's longer than 12 months.

I'm assuming you bought a discounted ticket...if you paid for a full fare ticket you will probably be able to change it or get a refund without paying a penalty. Give their 1-800 number a call and ask them...I have always found them to be very helpful.

bromleygirl

Just finished speaking to Continental. I can cancel our return flights for tomorrow and have credit for the return flights to use within 12 months from the date of our original outbound ticket. There is a $100/ticket change fee plus I would need to pay the difference if any in the cost of the new return tickets.

I asked if the credit could be used towards round trip tickets but as we have already used the outbound tickets LHR to SFO we can only use the return portion as it is. Given that one way tickets are generally more expensive than return it may be the case that even if I paid the $100/ticket change fee plus any differences plus the one way tickets to get back again to SFO I'd still end up paying more than just buying round trip tickets

I spose I can keep my options open and call and cancel tomorrow and get the credit and evaluate it again next year when we're making a trip back.

Jerseygirl

They've charged me $250 a couple of times this year to change my flights...even before that it was more than $100. Maybe you had a different type of ticket.

scrubbedexpat099

I was trying to remember where I lost the return section, if you are over here full time it is going to happen eventually.

Does remind me of the Ferry deals (Dover/Calais), a friend who was living in Holland would get the booze cruise deals. After a while they insisted on CC's and would charge the extra if you did not use the return.

Mummy in the foothills

I canceled the return portion and asked for a refund on the taxes, so instead of losing it all I got $150 back on Ds's return portion as he's not coming back.
They returned the taxes (or part of it) to the Credit card I paid with. So I have a credit sitting there I'm sure it'll be gone on Christmas presents in no time.