Force airline to comply with price?

[sjordi]

Hi,
I was wondering if one can force an airline to apply the price from one country compared to another one.

Example: I often fly Geneva(Switzerland)->Portland, OR->Geneva.
The price on Delta Airlines is $1600 when bought GVA-PDX-GVA. It's $900 for the same flight but starting from the US, PDX-GVA-PDX.
Now, taxes are the sames in airports, routes are the same.
It looks like there is no way to buy it from outside the US at the US price.

After writing to Delta about that and asking for a price-match, they just replied that fares change minute by minute. Telling me that when I check one way, I'm lucky since it's cheap, but then the inverted route, I have no luck, the price just almost doubled. If I check again US-Switzerland-US, I'm lucky again, it dropped but I can't buy it, then I'm out of luck again when switching to the foreign web site.

Result: I will fly United/Lufthansa instead of Delta.

Again, telling me that they have different fees abroad is not an excuse since no matter which way you fly, the two airports charge the airline anyway.

Any idea on how to get flights at the regular price instead of being ripped-off when abroad?
Even price search engines tell you that the fare will be priced in foreign currency (the one from the departing airport).

Thanks for any advice.
Steve

 

[gizmo_sc]

In the past there was a problem due to currency. The airlines worked thru a system called NUC (The Neutral Unit of Construction or Neutral Unit of Currency (code: NUC) is a private currency used by the airline industry,[1] to record fare calculation information.[2] A set of exchange rates are issued by the International Air Transport Association (IATA) every month.[3] The ticket component prices are converted from the original currency (of the country of commencement of travel) and recorded on the airline ticket.[4]

So unless you are buying from the US website with a US credit card you probably can not possibly get a price match from DL. Their customer service ( customer relations) what ever they are called now will send you a simple form letter. Sorry this is not applicable for you.

 

[sjordi]

Well,
I try to buy from the US website, with a US credit card and a US billing address. Still they don't care and force you to pay in the currency of the departing airport.

Well, I saif good bye to Delta. In that specific case, they kept saying that charges are different in different airport, which is wrong since you have them anyway, the same amount of time, etc...
In a time where people have access to the Internet and can compare price, they should be very carefull not to show that they consider customers as plain imbeciles.
The same flight, same route, same dates, has no reason to be +180% more expensive when departing from abroad.

I could consider VAT taxes. In my example, starting from Portland, OR you don't have taxes. Leaving from Geneva, Switzerland, you have a 8% tax on the flight ticket. But 8 is not 180.

Too bad for them (Delta). Found a flight on United/Lufthansa where the price was almost matching both ways.

 

[BoeingBoy]

Example: I often fly Geneva(Switzerland)->Portland, OR->Geneva.
The price on Delta Airlines is $1600 when bought GVA-PDX-GVA. It's $900 for the same flight but starting from the US, PDX-GVA-PDX.

If you fly a route often, there's an easy work-around. First trip GVA-PDX-GVA buy a one-way GVA-PDX. Then, while in PDX buy a round trip PDX-GVE-PDX. Do the same next trip and so on. Voila, you're paying the U.S. price for all but that first one-way (and the last one-way if a time comes when you won't be flying that route again.

If you don't have a set schedule for a particular itinerary, do the same but when you buy the PDX-GVE-PDX round trips pick a date that's after your next expected GVE-PDX. You'll pay a change fee but maybe nothing else.

Jim

 

[sjordi]

Jim,
that's what I actually thought afterwards.
The problem is that the one-way only ticket is about $2k
So I thought, why not buy a PDX-GVA-PDX and skip the PDX-GVA and just use the GVA-PDX, then come back with a PDX-GVA-PDX ticket which will then alway keep the return to the US, all this at US prices.

I'll probably do this.

Thanks for the tip.
Steve

 

[BoeingBoy]

So I thought, why not buy a PDX-GVA-PDX and skip the PDX-GVA and just use the GVA-PDX, then come back with a PDX-GVA-PDX ticket which will then alway keep the return to the US, all this at US prices.

One big problem with that. I think every U.S. carrier (and probably major international carriers) will cancel your ticket if you skip the first segment so your plan won't work.

The only way I know of to get around it requires buying that one-way ticket first, although if a round trip GVE-PDX-GVE can be bought for less than the one-way you could skip the last segment (PDX-GVE) of that first trip. Then you're set to purchase future tickets in the U.S. Even then, I'd probably call the airline and cancel that last segment. Buying a ticket with no intention of flying all the segments in order to get a lower fare usually falls into one of several prohibitions in most airline's Contract of Carriage.

Jim

 

[sjordi]

ouch
I didn't know that they could invalidate one segment.
I thought that I could actually pretend to have miss edthe plane for the first segment, and have flown with another airline and then I would use the return leg.
Oh well. I'll check this soon.
Thanks again for your advice.

 

[BoeingBoy]

I thought that I could actually pretend to have miss edthe plane for the first segment, and have flown with another airline and then I would use the return leg.

That's different from just "skipping" the first segment, i.e. not showing up for it. By all means DO NOT just not show up for the GVE-PDX segments.

Back in the olden days one of the CAB then DOT rules was commonly called the flat tire rule. If you missed your flight through no fault of your own, for instance a flat tire delayed you on the way to the airport, the airline was required to still provide the transportation on the next available flight - no extra charge involved. Some older agents will still do that but it is no U.S. carrier's policy that I know of. The policy is that you have to pay a change fee and possibly the fare difference at the time of making the change.

It's probably better to cough up the GVE price of that 1st round trip ticket (unless a cheaper one-way is available on any carrier) and skip the return portion. Here's how I'd do it to minimize risk, using a hypothetical schedule of spending a weekend in PDX once a month:

Buy the first round trip or one way (cheaper is better unless you specifically want DL miles), departing GVE on Friday and leaving PDX the following Wednesday - not Monday like you really want. This eliminates the airline having 2 reservations for you on the same day.

Buy a round trip departing Monday (the day you really wanted to depart) and returning whichever Friday fits your schedule the following month.

Each successive ticket would be the same - round trip departing PDX on your chosen travel date and departing GVE the following month.

As you can see, a once a month trip requires knowing your schedule a month ahead more or less. Less time between trips means not having to plan so far ahead, more means having to plan further ahead. After all, change fees incurred by picking the wrong dates can eat up the fare difference you're trying to save pretty fast.

I assume that you can buy the U.S. priced ticket without actually being in the U.S. since you can see the prices. If not, it does limit when you can buy those round trip tickets to when you're in PDX which may not give you the best fare.

Jim

 

[kingjggff]

To be honest, I really USAP is a role here, and the Committee of the boys truly at the forefront of the DCA is to be commended. It 'clear ALPA wanted no part of them to get any credit.