Princess EZ Air

When you buy a ticket, and very often prior to actually pressing the buy button many vendors will provide the fare code. It is ,in our experience, a one letter alpha code such as J for business. Often a discounted ticket may be a K or an M. Then google the specific airline fare codes and you should find an explanation. or just call the airline.

This is how we do it though there could well be an easier method.

When you buy a ticket, and very often prior to actually pressing the buy button many vendors will provide the fare code. It is ,in our experience, a one letter alpha code such as J for business. Often a discounted ticket may be a K or an M. Then google the specific airline fare codes and you should find an explanation. or just call the airline.

Not quite. The single letter is the fare bucket that inventory comes from. Aside from full fare Y and F (which are usually single letters), the fare code is a multi-character expression, with the first letter corresponding to the class and fare bucket and the remainder generally showing any advance purchase requirements and other restrictions, such as K21NS1TG on AC from YYZ to MIA. It has a 21 day advance purchase and is in K booking class. Contrast with a G3NR3FL with a 3 day AP requirement. There are many more examples, with subtle but significant differences once you drill down into the rules.

How do you drill down? Well, the tool Expert Flyer gives you full access to see the fares (which is not the same as pricing) for each market and airline. You then can click to read out the full rule. These rules include provisions on connections, route applicability, refunds, endorsements and much more. And FWIW, there are 43 listed "fares" between YYZ and MIA, just on Air Canada, ranging from USD$80 to USD$3155 each way. All different.

Thanks! This is good info.

We just booked two AirAsia flights and a NOK flight. We booked direct but we're not able to see the fare codes. Had the same issue on A long haul AiirAsia flight two years ago. We're we not looking hard enough, in the right places, or do some of the low cost carriers not use fare codes as such or not display them? This is for our curiosity only. The fare codes on these particular flights are not important to us.

ticket to Bangkok ..... We bought a Delta ticket instead.... The change fee on Delta was $200 which we happily paid.

That must have been some time ago. I believe the current change fee for international tickets on Delta is $350/ticket.

The tickets according to Princess are" flexible and fully refundable", .

Make sure you confirm whether that is your travel agent (in this case, Princess', who is acting as your travel agent for the purchase of airline tickets) terms or the actual airline's terms. Wouldn't be the first time a travel agent said "no change fee," meaning they would not charge an administrative fee to make a change, but the actual airline change fee still applied.

Yes, it was three years ago. We only care about the ability to change when going to SE Asia. We go for a few months during the winter. Unlike Europe, we find one way fares much more expensive to obtain. Hence we always book an airline/fare class that allows us to change. A change at $350 is typicall much less money than buying a one way home from Asia.

Yes, it was three years ago. We only care about the ability to change when going to SE Asia. We go for a few months during the winter. Unlike Europe, we find one way fares much more expensive to obtain. Hence we always book an airline/fare class that allows us to change. A change at $350 is typicall much less money than buying a one way home from Asia.

In additional to the change fee, Delta will also charge for any difference in fare. That difference could be anywhere from zero to $$$. On the flip side, if the new price is less than what you previously paid, they'll give you the difference in an e-credit to use toward a future flight. (For an international flight, that difference would obviously have to exceed $350 in order to net a credit.)

We were fortunate. We paid $200 CAD. We were on a plane from Bangkok the next day. I assume that there was no fare delta.

Have no issue with any fare delta. That is reasonable. The big benefit was being able to change the return portion of our low cost flight for whatt we thought was a reasonable sum. Had we purchased the other airline fare, with a more restrictive ticket, we would have been paying considerably more for a one way ticket.

The thing is we knew exactly what we were buying when we bought the airline ticket. No surprises, nor did we assume that the tickets could or could not be changed. We checked the far code. Even when we booked an inexpensive flight on Orbitz 18 months ago the fare code was displayed and we looked it up to make certain that we understood the T's and C's. This is something that a TA would have done for us years ago. Now we do it. It is not that difficult.

My only point is understand what you are buying. Take the time time because sometimes events can overtake you. Given the choice between a no change ticket and a changes allowed ticket we will always take the latter when travelling for an extended period of time. We like to know what we are buying-right down to the T's and C's.

We have learned a lot from Flyer Talk's comments/advice. We travel frequently and have benefited from it.

This thread has been so informative. I will be looking at using EZAir for the first time soon so am a newbie to all its in's and out's.

Not to make things too simple, but what I am getting from above is that going international, EZAir will probably be the cheapest and doing flexible to get the cheapest (if prices go down) is a nice point.

Now about seats. If you REALLY care about your seats, then you need to compare that need to cost savings with EZAir. If seats are really important, then book thru the airline to secure those seats early. If you don't really care, and will take what you can get, then go with EZAir. So if not care, book EZAir; wait until final payment of cruise (as I have been led to believe that airfare is paid by Princess to airline just after final payment date which is about 2 1/2 mos. ahead. Then go to airline and try to upgrade to premium economy or whatever you want to do and hope there are seats available. Do I have this right, basically?

Pooh

Not to make things too simple, but what I am getting from above is that going international, EZAir will probably be the cheapest and doing flexible to get the cheapest (if prices go down) is a nice point.

When the flight is one-way (for a crossing), often EZ will be the cheapest. But that is not hard and fast - many airlines are moving to one-way pricing models, plus there are many good deals to be found on TATL and TPAC flights. Research.

Now about seats. If you REALLY care about your seats, then you need to compare that need to cost savings with EZAir. If seats are really important, then book thru the airline to secure those seats early. If you don't really care, and will take what you can get, then go with EZAir. So if not care, book EZAir; wait until final payment of cruise (as I have been led to believe that airfare is paid by Princess to airline just after final payment date which is about 2 1/2 mos. ahead. Then go to airline and try to upgrade to premium economy or whatever you want to do and hope there are seats available. Do I have this right, basically?

Note that airline policies regarding seating are not uniform. One carrier may have one set of rules, another completely different. Also, any time your plan is to "try to upgrade", again know that each carrier has its own procedures and policies. If you are holding bulk/consolidator/negotiated tickets, you may not be eligible for any kind of paid upgrade or seating choices. It completely depends on the fare rules for your ticket - there are no blanket answers. Unfortunately, you may not be able to know what those rules are when buying through a cruiseline. Further, the statements made by a cruiseline agent selling you air has limited to no validity when it comes to the actual airline policy. They are merely acting in a sales capacity, not as any kind of representative of an operating carrier.

Finally, know that different "fares" (which is a word with a much different meaning than "price") have different restrictions and rules. Just because a ticket is on the same flight as what you would have bought from the airline direct does NOT mean that it's the same ticket. They could be the same, similar, or vastly different.

Caveat emptor.

We have learned a lot on this forum. The biggest learning is to understand exactly what we are buying when it comes to an airline ticket. Price, routing, and seat are only part of the equation. Don't assume anything.