Flight ease! Grrrrr

[Crusin-Suzan]

Flight ease let me book a flight in May from Amsterdam to Florida Premium economy!   I even have my seats!   Well now tried to pay it today and flight ease says I can’t have premium Economy for that price!   Grrrrr. Any suggestions who to contact to fix this problem or are we just screwed?

 

[FlorenceItaly]

48 minutes ago, Crusin-Suzan said:

Flight ease let me book a flight in May from Amsterdam to Florida Premium economy!   I even have my seats!   Well now tried to pay it today and flight ease says I can’t have premium Economy for that price!   Grrrrr. Any suggestions who to contact to fix this problem or are we just screwed?

 

Have you spoken to someone or is this a message you get on the HAL site?

[Crusin-Suzan]

My travel agent talked to someone but seeing I made the reservation, I think I will call them!

[Mary229]

Let us know what happens.  With airline fares increasing I assume sooner or later those flex fares will be “flexed”

[NCTribeFan]

If you book the flexible, the price isn't locked in until you pay.  It's like you have a "hold" on the fare but it can change.  I've only used the airline booking once in recent years, through Carnival (same booking engine) for my flight to Rome last October.  I booked the flexible fare and, thankfully, it did not increase between booking and making final payment.  Fare was less than half the going rate through the airlines.

 

If you book the other, you pay when you book and, obviously, price is locked in at that point.

 

Am I missing something?

[AncientWanderer]

1 hour ago, Crusin-Suzan said:

Flight ease let me book a flight in May from Amsterdam to Florida Premium economy!   I even have my seats!   Well now tried to pay it today and flight ease says I can’t have premium Economy for that price!   Grrrrr. Any suggestions who to contact to fix this problem or are we just screwed?

 

 

Crusin-Suzan, which airline was this?  It's interesting because they do say the prices aren't locked until paid for, but I've never heard of anyone having a problem with price increases before.  Maybe things are very different now.

[Crusin-Suzan]

1 hour ago, AncientWanderer said:

 

Crusin-Suzan, which airline was this?  It's interesting because they do say the prices aren't locked until paid for, but I've never heard of anyone having a problem with price increases before.  Maybe things are very different now.

Delta!

[Crusin-Suzan]

1 hour ago, NCTribeFan said:

If you book the flexible, the price isn't locked in until you pay.  It's like you have a "hold" on the fare but it can change.  I've only used the airline booking once in recent years, through Carnival (same booking engine) for my flight to Rome last October.  I booked the flexible fare and, thankfully, it did not increase between booking and making final payment.  Fare was less than half the going rate through the airlines.

 

If you book the other, you pay when you book and, obviously, price is locked in at that point.

 

Am I missing something?

Thank you!   Lesson learned!  We are retired airline people and very rarely use real paid for flights!   Lol.  But this was such a good price!   

[FlorenceItaly]

39 minutes ago, Crusin-Suzan said:

Delta!

I am so sorry to hear this.  What is the price difference?  We are already paid and ticketed for our Polaris Class(United) in June but we have some family members who JUST booked Delta back, premium economy for May 31.  We are all on the Zuiderdam TA.

Edited January 20, 2023 by FlorenceItaly

[ChinaShrek]

I always tell people to ticket as soon as possible. Prices can go up and Flight Ease can even forget to ticket your flights if you don't ask them! 

[Crusin-Suzan]

5 minutes ago, FlorenceItaly said:

I am so sorry to hear this.  What is the price difference?  We are already paid and ticketed for our Polaris Class(United) in June but we have some family members who JUST booked Delta back, premium economy for May 31.  We are all on the Zuiderdam TA.

No price difference as they say there is no PE available! I would have paid earlier!   My mistake as I did not understand!  

[FlorenceItaly]

Just now, Crusin-Suzan said:

No price difference as they say there is no PE available! I would have paid earlier!   My mistake as I did not understand!  

Oh no!  I thought you had your seats already!

[Mary229]

Just now, Crusin-Suzan said:

No price difference as they say there is no PE available! I would have paid earlier!   My mistake as I did not understand!  

Oh, I had this flying to Alaska last summer. American took the planes out of service configured for PE.  It was a 7 1/2 hours of a very cramped economy seat.  The plane did t even have business or first class and no food  either!    Geez, the times are a-changing 

[AncientWanderer]

45 minutes ago, Crusin-Suzan said:

Delta!

 

Well, that's disappointing to hear.  Gosh it's hard for a traveler to keep up these days.  

[Bostonjetset]

7 minutes ago, Crusin-Suzan said:

No price difference as they say there is no PE available! I would have paid earlier!   My mistake as I did not understand!  

Stuff like this sucks. However, if the plane was changed to one with no PE then it wouldn’t matter if you paid in full early so don’t get hung up on that piece.  You’d still be in a normal seat. This is more an airline issue it seems rather than a flight ease issue. 

[FlorenceItaly]

OP, was it a plane change?  Thank you for any information you are willing to share.  It is very helpful to others.

[Iamthesea]

35 minutes ago, FlorenceItaly said:

I am so sorry to hear this.  What is the price difference?  We are already paid and ticketed for our Polaris Class(United) in June but we have some family members who JUST booked Delta back, premium economy for May 31.  We are all on the Zuiderdam TA.

 

29 minutes ago, Crusin-Suzan said:

No price difference as they say there is no PE available! I would have paid earlier!   My mistake as I did not understand!  

OP, was your flight for the 31st, as well.  Do we know for sure that the flights equipment changed, or are all seats just sold?  Curious what date/time your flights were for? 

 

This thread has caught my attention because of what has happened, and because my DH and I will be flying Delta in a PE seat back from AMS on May 31st.  We booked independently and not with Flight Ease. 

[Torquer]

If HAL would ever start raising fares, after people booked a flexible fare, then I think that would be the end of FlightEase.  Almost everyone who uses FlightEase books the flexible fare because it is often cheaper than the regular fare, and it allows for changes up until final payment.  I know, HAL's wording says that prices can change until ticketed, but in all my years of reading Cruise Critic I never read of a single case where a fare actually increased.

 

I hope the OP will tell us the whole story when they get it.  As was speculated, I suspect the airline changed planes to one with no premium economy or fewer seats.  It could also be a mistake by HAL...we have had some weird stuff go on with FlightEase reservations, but after a call to HAL, they made good on the originally booked prices and flights.

[Native Floridian 26]

21 hours ago, ChinaShrek said:

I always tell people to ticket as soon as possible. Prices can go up and Flight Ease can even forget to ticket your flights if you don't ask them! 

My flights were cancelled a couple weeks ago by United presumably for non-payment.

[ChinaShrek]

48 minutes ago, Native Floridian 26 said:

My flights were cancelled a couple weeks ago by United presumably for non-payment.

This happened to a number of people last year. If I am happy with my flight arrangements, I pay for it and have it ticketed immediately. I assume that I am unlikely to cancel the cruise, however.

[mfanderso]

I just had something happen with my Flight Ease or I guess AA.  We booked Business Class tickets as soon as was available through Flight Ease.  We picked our seats and all was well.  Our flight is in March and the beginning of this month I asked my TA to have the fights paid and ticketed.  Everything was going fine. Friends that are going with us said there was a schedule change.  I didn't receive any notification so went into our reservation on the AA app and saw a slight change in times but I noticed that we no longer had seats.  It seems at the time that they had the slight schedule change they also had an equipment change.  The Business Class is now half the size it was and it appears we got bumped.  Our TA called AA and was told that Business Class was oversold and they couldn't guarantee Business Class seats for us and they recommended another itinerary  with a long layover (ours had been non-stop).  The next day she called Flight Ease and spoke to them.  They said we still had our original seats and give it 48 hours and everything would be fine.  96 hours later nothing had changed.  Our TA called Flight Ease back again and same story, we still have our seats. They are refusing to change to another flight and said we would get our seats at the airport which I am sure at that point will be economy as Premium Economy is also sold out.  If this had happened prior to final payment, I would have cancelled the whole trip.  I think we saved $300 by booking through Flight Ease.  Next time I will pay the higher price and book direct.

[Crusin-Suzan]

11 minutes ago, mfanderso said:

I just had something happen with my Flight Ease or I guess AA.  We booked Business Class tickets as soon as was available through Flight Ease.  We picked our seats and all was well.  Our flight is in March and the beginning of this month I asked my TA to have the fights paid and ticketed.  Everything was going fine. Friends that are going with us said there was a schedule change.  I didn't receive any notification so went into our reservation on the AA app and saw a slight change in times but I noticed that we no longer had seats.  It seems at the time that they had the slight schedule change they also had an equipment change.  The Business Class is now half the size it was and it appears we got bumped.  Our TA called AA and was told that Business Class was oversold and they couldn't guarantee Business Class seats for us and they recommended another itinerary  with a long layover (ours had been non-stop).  The next day she called Flight Ease and spoke to them.  They said we still had our original seats and give it 48 hours and everything would be fine.  96 hours later nothing had changed.  Our TA called Flight Ease back again and same story, we still have our seats. They are refusing to change to another flight and said we would get our seats at the airport which I am sure at that point will be economy as Premium Economy is also sold out.  If this had happened prior to final payment, I would have cancelled the whole trip.  I think we saved $300 by booking through Flight Ease.  Next time I will pay the higher price and book direct.

I can’t even find a number for flight ease!  I finally wrote to guest relations yesterday and have not heard!   Payment is due in 4 days!   We don’t want this flight ease if we don’t have premium economy!   

[mfanderso]

1 minute ago, Crusin-Suzan said:

I can’t even find a number for flight ease!  I finally wrote to guest relations yesterday and have not heard!   Payment is due in 4 days!   We don’t want this flight ease if we don’t have premium economy!   

The phone number that my TA gave us for Flight Ease is 1-800-628-4771. 

[Crusin-Suzan]

Just now, mfanderso said:

The phone number that my TA gave us for Flight Ease is 1-800-628-4771. 

Thanks I tried that and it’s just the reservation number!  

[mfanderso]

3 minutes ago, Crusin-Suzan said:

Thanks I tried that and it’s just the reservation number!  

Punch 3 after the prompts and that takes you to the air department