Choice Air or direct through United?

Pricing for our flights for our upcoming cruise are cheaper on Choice Air so obviously that is a better deal but I've never booked with Choice Air.

Can you tell me pros and cons (other than pricing)? Negatives about choice air????

Look at the sticky at the top of the forum that discusses this.

Yep, look around this board a bit. Many threads on the pros and con's.

Personally, because after many years of flying, cost isn't always the top three priorities for scheduling our flights, I would book direct with United.

Often there is more to a "deal" than just a dollar amount. Sometimes spending more is a better deal. You just need to know what you're getting.

Pricing for our flights for our upcoming cruise are cheaper on Choice Air so obviously that is a better deal but I've never booked with Choice Air.

It's obvious!!

To the OP....caveat emptor. The tickets you buy through the cruiseline may be quite different than what you buy from the airline directly, even for the same flights. Flights may be the same, but the ticket and the underlying rules and protections may be very un-alike. Buy on price alone at your own peril and risk.

That having been said, if you perform your own due diligence, then do as you see fit. That's what free markets are all about.

I us choice air a lot as very good for single and multi destination trips

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I us choice air a lot as very good for single and multi destination trips

Please define "very good", so we can evaluate your statement.

I see a lot of lawyer words in this thread... may, sometimes, not always, and often and that is in only 7 posts.

Shak

I see a lot of lawyer words in this thread... may, sometimes, not always, and often and that is in only 7 posts.

 

Shak

Because there no absolutes here. Choice Air might be the best price or routing, or it may not be. There are what might be called hidden surprises here. Ever heard of test questions that say "always" or "never"?

I see a lot of lawyer words in this thread... may, sometimes, not always, and often and that is in only 7 posts.

 

Shak

The CA website ALSO contains a lot of lawyer words. Unfortunately, folks who equate "cheapest price" with "best flight option" often attach their own meaning to those words.

Pricing for our flights for our upcoming cruise are cheaper on Choice Air so obviously that is a better deal but I've never booked with Choice Air.

 

Can you tell me pros and cons (other than pricing)? Negatives about choice air????

I also thought this a good question but unfortunately not any good answers. Where is the spirit to help rather than criticize and humiliate. And I don't want to read a sticky that is over 7 years old.

I also thought this a good question but unfortunately not any good answers. Where is the spirit to help rather than criticize and humiliate. And I don't want to read a sticky that is over 7 years old.

The information is still relevant. You can use the search function to pull up many threads discussing this subject. Some are listed below:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1962913&highlight=cruise+air+missed+flight

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2082473&highlight=cruise+air+missed+flight

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1930958&highlight=missed+cruise

Can you tell me pros and cons (other than pricing)? Negatives about choice air????

Where is the spirit to help rather than criticize and humiliate. And I don't want to read a sticky that is over 7 years old.

Lots of relevant info in the sticky, but here it is in a nutshell:

Pros of CA? On international flights you can often find a much cheaper option. If the ONLY thing you care about is price, go for it, just understand that while the flight may be the same as you'd book directly through the airline, the ticket likely will not be the same.

Cons of CA? That cheap price may bite you in the behind if your flights are disrupted, so it's a big gamble. Why? Because as stated above, while the flight may be the same as you'd book directly through the airline, the ticket likely will not be the same, as it will probably have different rules and restrictions attached to it. (Kind of like when you buy a sweater on final clearance...it's the same sweater you could have bought 2 months ago, but now that it's on clearance, it's a final sale and can't be returned...same sweater, different rules.)

What kind of different rules? If your flight is severely delayed or canceled, you could find out that you cannot be rerouted through another city to get to your cruise, or that you cannot get your ticket endorsed over to another airline to get to your cruise, etc. In the end it means you have a greater likelihood of missing your cruise. Read the sticky for more details.

I also thought this a good question but unfortunately not any good answers. Where is the spirit to help rather than criticize and humiliate. And I don't want to read a sticky that is over 7 years old.

The spirit to help is here. It just doesn't manifest itself in rah rah group hugs, but rather with cold, hard reality. In addition, the OP has been MIA since the initial posting leading me to suspect that the post was more about looking for post-purchase confirmation rather than pre-purchase advice. Dancinman still hasn't explained what's "good". And, as 6rugrats notes, the info in the sticky is still valid and relevant.

My ultimate conclusion: People want black and white absolute answers from a complete stranger about a situation that depends upon the value judgments of the individual questioner.

As was once stated: "For every complex question, there is a simple and obvious answer. And it's usually wrong."

I also thought this a good question but unfortunately not any good answers. Where is the spirit to help rather than criticize and humiliate. And I don't want to read a sticky that is over 7 years old.

Welcome to the Cruise Air forum :)

Speaking the truth is what is done here - as was posted above with "cold, hard reality." Tact and balance have nothing to do with it unfortunately. I try to impart a softer, gentler side but it gets tiring.

I should put a link to a story about cruise-sourced air as I am sick of repeated typing it.

Was on a cruise from Europe just about the time the hurricane hit the U.S. east coast 2 years ago. Met some fellow cruisers from the NYC area that wanted to get out early as everyone knew it was big, coming and going to hit hard. Even though U.S. airlines were offering waivers for people to leave early (days in advance), they were not permitted to as they were on cruise-sourced tickets. Of course, their flight got cancelled. They were eventually rerouted through Marrakesh to meet the ship in either Alicante or Cadiz (or was it Malaga)on the 3rd or 4th day of the cruise instead of boarding in Rome...

I also thought this a good question but unfortunately not any good answers. Where is the spirit to help rather than criticize and humiliate. And I don't want to read a sticky that is over 7 years old.

The sticky is as relevant today as when I wrote it. There are very few differences other than the cruise line TRIED to make Choice Air look like an online purchasing site in real time. In reality, all they did was get rid of a lot of people in the air/sea dept, save themselves a lot of money in labor and con the passengers into thinking this was all something new and different. It's not.

These are the cons about buying Choice Air, Princess EZ Air or any cruise line air which were pointed out in the sticky.

1. You have NO IDEA what you are purchasing. As others have posted, it may LOOK like the same ticket-same plane, same flight number, same airport pair. It rarely is. The underlying FARE RULES generally cannot be accessed on Choice Air/EZ Air. They can on an airline direct ticket. So you have no idea if you have a ticket with the full protections and perks of an airline direct purchased ticket or even what the rules are when purchasing a Choice Air ticket.

2. The majority of Choice Air tickets are still bulk purchased, contract purchased, "specially negotiated fares", consolidator tickets-call them what you like. They are the same old tickets that are essentially "stting on a shelf" waiting for a name to be attached to them just like in the days when the cruise line did the work of matching tickets to passengers. Cruise air tickets are NOT purchased in real time as you would online direct from the airline. They were purchased well over a year before the flight date. Only real difference-now YOU do the work and save the cruise line a lot of money from having to match up all the passengers and tickets.

Just an example to show you how it works. Approx 15-18 months before a cruise, cruise line contacts airline and states-we need 80 tickets from JFK to Venice on January 20, 2016. Give us your best price. Airlines states we will sell you 80 for that day at $300 per ticket. BUT these rules are attached (can be anything the two of them agree to).

Cruiseline says OK, finalizes the purchase offer. At that point in time, the tickets now belong to the CRUISE LINE. Part of that underlying agreement with the airline is they will have NOTHING to do with those tickets after the purchase agreement is signed. It is all up to the cruise line from that point forward to deal with problems, cancellations, late planes, any problems. The cruise line tacks on their profit and you now have 1/2 of a RT ticket for $500 which could have been purchased airline direct with the full protections of an airline direct ticket for less money for the same RT ticket.

If you purchase a one way on a US carrier to an international destination, you are still getting 1/2 of a RT ticket. Someone else gets the other 1/2. So in essence, you are not getting much of a bargain. In fact, when you multiply the price some people post x 2, you are actually paying a premium for your 1/2 of the RT ticket.

3. Because you have no access to the COMPLETE fare rules, you have no idea about the rules for your ticket. And the two biggies that impact those traveling with Choice Air/EZ Air, most cruiseline purchased air are NON ENDORSABLE (NO GOOD on another airline) and NON REROUTABLE (means you MUST take the original airline on the ORIGINAL routing). Either of these could totally trash your trip if you happen to have a glitch in your travels.

Example (and this is a real life example posted on CC). Plane from the West Coast to Florida made an emergency landing in Omaha. OTHER passengers were re-routed through other cities on other airlines. Most arrived within 2 hours of the originally scheduled time.

The poor lady who had the Choice Air tickets could NOT re routed on another airline and HAD to fly through Philadelphia per the rules of her Choice Air tickets. She was put at the end of the line for re booking because there was only one other US Airways flight to PHL that day. When she got to PHL, she found out the ship had sailed and she needed passports to get on the ship. Only 2 out of the 4 had passports. The entire group ended up flying home from PHL. They got their airfare back and an additional $500 from RCCL. NOT much compensation for a $10,000 trip.

Same game, same rules. Just a different format.

If the OP would have stated something like: Need to fly from MIA to LHR on Dec. 20, 2014, return Jan 4, 2015 and posted the price of the Choice Air ticket, the OP would have had all kinds of help, probably routings, flight times and even seat availability. In addition, how to get the most airline miles and other items would have probably been posted. And when the choice was United or Choice Air, to those of us that post regularly, it said the OP hadn't even explored "out of the box" thinking that so many of us employ. There have been some simply spectacular bargains on Middle Eastern and Asian airlines from the USA to Europe the most don't even know about.

But just a question that Choice Air was cheaper vs United? Not a lot you could even add to that other than pointing out the flaws in Choice Air tickets.

I should put a link to a story about cruise-sourced air as I am sick of repeated typing it.

 

Was on a cruise from Europe just about the time the hurricane hit the U.S. east coast 2 years ago. Met some fellow cruisers from the NYC area that wanted to get out early as everyone knew it was big, coming and going to hit hard. Even though U.S. airlines were offering waivers for people to leave early (days in advance), they were not permitted to as they were on cruise-sourced tickets. Of course, their flight got cancelled. They were eventually rerouted through Marrakesh to meet the ship in either Alicante or Cadiz (or was it Malaga)on the 3rd or 4th day of the cruise instead of boarding in Rome...

Thanks for posting this again.

I know for a fact the airlines were offering all kinds of waivers-even refunds on non refundable tickets. We flew United from PHX to EWR the day after Hurricane Sandy hit.We had already put off the trip by 1 day and United was happy to oblige changing our tickets.

When we got to NJ and saw the long lines for gas, I KNEW we would be out of gas in the rental by Friday and I sure wasn't standing in line for 6-7 hours for 5 gallons of gas. I tried to make a deal with the rental car place-I will bring you back the car we have now, you give us a new one with a full tank of gas and I will GLADLY pay, IIRC, $8.30 per gallon (whatever the posted price was if you don't bring the car back full) for the new car with gas. NOPE-they too were running short of gas.

At that point in time, instead of going to NYC for a fun weekend and business meetings Monday returning Monday night on the red-eye into Phoenix, we thought we better go home. Nothing to do and we would be out of gas very soon. Called United Friday night late. They told us if we could make the 6AM flight, they would gladly change our tickets AGAIN for free. Not much sleep that night but two changes in one trip for no money was a blessing.

Thanks for the info about choice air. I did not know about the possibility of not re routing in weather situations. Just the kind of information I was looking for.

I also thought this a good question but unfortunately not any good answers. Where is the spirit to help rather than criticize and humiliate. And I don't want to read a sticky that is over 7 years old.

Of course if people spent a few minutes searching the threads BEFORE posting, most of their questions would be answered. But no, the same questions are asked over and over again. (and not just in this section but in pretty much all sections of this website. Just look in the Florida or Gulf Coast port sections and see how many "what is a good hotel" or "what is the best way to get from the airport to port" threads there are)

Of course if people spent a few minutes searching the threads BEFORE posting, most of their questions would be answered. But no, the same questions are asked over and over again. (and not just in this section but in pretty much all sections of this website. Just look in the Florida or Gulf Coast port sections and see how many "what is a good hotel" or "what is the best way to get from the airport to port" threads there are)

If only "new" questions were asked it would be a very small forum and what fun would that be? No one is asking you to reply to an "old" question. We live in a fluid world and things are are always changing and people have so many different perspectives. T

Thanks for the info about choice air. I did not know about the possibility of not re routing in weather situations. Just the kind of information I was looking for.

And it's just that- a possibility. Search, and you will likely find stories of people who DID get re-routed with their CA tickets and they'll say CA is fine and don't worry about it. Then you'll be completely confused.

But....if/when you read those stories, you need to ask why they were able to get rerouted on CA tickets? Was it because theirs were not bulk purchased tickets (Not ALL CA tickets are)? Maybe. Or bulk purchased tickets that weren't quite as restrictive and didn't prevent rerouting? Maybe. Or because the airline made an exception and rerouted them (when they shouldn't have, according to the rules of their ticket) because it helped their (the airline's) big picture of getting everyone where they needed to go? Maybe. Point is, you'll never know, because you won't be able to see the complete fare rules before purchasing.

So not only is there risk that your ticket will come with additional restrictions, there's the guessing game of will it or won't it and what will they be?

If only "new" questions were asked it would be a very small forum and what fun would that be? No one is asking you to reply to an "old" question. We live in a fluid world and things are are always changing and people have so many different perspectives. T

But do we really need to have the SAME questions asked 2-3 times per week? :rolleyes:

I would look at both but if choice air was similar price would go with them

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If only "new" questions were asked it would be a very small forum and what fun would that be? No one is asking you to reply to an "old" question. We live in a fluid world and things are are always changing and people have so many different perspectives.