Airline rebooking fees

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I had planned to visit our son and DIL on my spring break but was unable to go. Now I have to pay a $150 fee plus the difference in ticket price to go see them. The ticket was $250 and I’m looking at having to spend another $400+ to be able to use it.

Is the $150 rebooking fee “real”? I mean, does it actually cost an airline that amount of money to put me on another flight?

I’m considering just not using the ticket . . . if I do that, I lose $250. If I go, I spend another $400.

My husband uses Southwest Airlines all the time and can rebook w/o fees. Guess what airline I’ll use next time?
 
The airlines that I usually fly offer two types of tickets for the same flight: refundable or non-refundable. The refundable tickets cost more than the non-refundable tickets for the same flight, but they have no rebooking fee - in fact, you can get all of your money back if you decide not to take the flight. It’s up to each consumer to decide whether the higher cost of the refundable ticket is worth the extra flexibility in changing their travel plans.

It sounds like Southwest Airlines has taken this choice out of the consumers’ hands, and has decided to offer only refundable tickets.
 
$150 re-booking (ticket change) fee? That is a little steep. Before 2002, the fee was generally $50 for a non-refundable ticket. After that, it went to $100. I have not heard of a $150 fee.

But yes, there really is such a fee. That is why some people opt for the more expensive refundable ticket, if their travel plans may change. The vast majority of arline tickets sold are non-refundable. There are some serious restrictions on non-refundable tickets.

Here are some of the restrictions changing a non-refundable ticket.
  • The airline can arbitrarily refuse to change it. (Very rare!!)
  • You cannot change the person on the ticket. Once purchased, the ticket is permanently associated with a person.
  • You must change the ticket before the leg you wish to change begins boarding.
  • A fee, generallyy $100, is charged for each ticket change.
  • You will not be given a refund if the flight you are changing to is less expensive.
  • You must pay any difference in price if the new flight is more expensive.
Sometimes it really is more expensive to change a ticket than to just throw it away. Airlines count on this.
 
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Just_Lurking:
It sounds like Southwest Airlines has taken this choice out of the consumers’ hands, and has decided to offer only refundable tickets.
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A benefit of SW is that they will put you on another flight if you have to rebook. No fee, no paying the difference in cost.

My friend had to change a flight on SW and the service rep joked “oh, we never give you your money back”. But they do painlessly put you on another flight.

Refundable tickets do have lots of strings attached. When I bought the ticket, of course I had no idea I’d be having surgery that day instead 🤷. Just a chance I took going non refundable.
 
I just had to cancel a flight on continental because I had surgery top repair a tendon in my thumb. The rep that I talked to said that when I re-book if I had a note from my doctor on his letterhead said I had to have surgery, then they would waive the $150 fee. I haven’t rebooked yet, but I plan on trying it in either Aug or Sept.
 
Just as a side note, that’s why I’ve started getting trip cancellation insurance. That way if something happens to cancel your trip, you’re not out a bunch of money.
 
KCT said:
Is the $150 rebooking fee “real”? I mean, does it actually cost an airline that amount of money to put me on another flight?
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It does cost the airline money to put you on another flight. First, between the time you bought a ticket and the time you “rebooked” the ticket, other passengers may have been turned away. Second, based on the assumption that you’d be on the plane, the airline calculated the supply-demand trade-off and established ticket pricing, which turned out to be incorrect (too high) because you didn’t get on the flight. Third, the airline allocated resources for the flight (food, fuel, space) to accommodate you that are now inoptimally distributed within the network.

And just because the plane wasn’t full doesn’t mean your seat cost nothing - the profit maximizing decision on most flights is to be around 80% capacity. When the plane is at 100% capacity, the airline actually lost some money.
 
FastLearner said:
It does cost the airline money to put you on another flight. First, between the time you bought a ticket and the time you “rebooked” the ticket, other passengers may have been turned away. Second, based on the assumption that you’d be on the plane, the airline calculated the supply-demand trade-off and established ticket pricing, which turned out to be incorrect (too high) because you didn’t get on the flight. Third, the airline allocated resources for the flight (food, fuel, space) to accommodate you that are now inoptimally distributed within the network.

And just because the plane wasn’t full doesn’t mean your seat cost nothing - the profit maximizing decision on most flights is to be around 80% capacity. When the plane is at 100% capacity, the airline actually lost some money.
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I was serious when I asked if it really costs the airline money to rebook me. This is the kind of info I was looking for.
 
Nowadays, the price of an airline seat has more to do with what you’re willing to pay than with *how much it costs the airline *to fly you.

In fact, the majority of passengers pay LESS for their seat than it costs the airline to fly them. The airline recovers their money and makes a profit from passengers who have little flexibility – namely, those who need specific flight times, those who book at the last minute, holiday travelers, and passengers who need to change their ticket.

Most of the time, this works out great for ordinary travelers (despite the howling over “price-gouging” every Thanksgiving and Christmas). You can usually get a seat for less than what it costs the airline to fly you, while the business travelers make up the difference.

On the other hand, if you do end up in a situation where you must pay fees or high ticket prices, it doesn’t feel good at all…
KCT said:
I was serious when I asked if it really costs the airline money to rebook me. This is the kind of info I was looking for.
Click to expand...
 
Most of the cost for air travel is sunk fixed cost, so when calculating your cost to the airline to fly on a given plane, the variable cost that they consider is small. That’s why you can sometimes find flights for $14.

When you change your flight, however, there’s a lot of cost you don’t see. Airlines operate using giant mathematical models to optimize everything from where a specific crew member should be to which gate should be used by which plane to how many sodas to have on any given plane. The problem with these models is that they’re often unstable. So something as small as you not getting on a flight can change how the model solves (maybe if you never booked the plane, less fuel would go into that plane, which would allow more cargo to go on the plane, which reduces the cargo load on another plane, allowing that plane to take passengers from another flight, and that allows you to cancel a flight - in which case your one seat might have cost the airline $10,000 in fixed cost).

This is also why airlines will sometimes charge less to go farther (a ticket from New York → San Francisco connecting in LA might cost less than just buying the NY → LA leg). People complain about that all the time, but the models might be able to lower the airline’s overall cost by having a plane in SF instead of LA, and the the only way to get people to go to SF is to charge them variable cost only.

Then there’s the “what you’re willing to pay” argument of revenue management that was previously discussed.
 
I work in the travel/hotel industry and run into this all the time. It’s really not the airline’s fault…you booked a ticket with inflexible terms and conditions re: cancellation/re-booking fees. It’s all about the kind of ticket you buy. Next time just book a more flexible ticket (with any airline) and make sure you read and understand ALL the terms and conditions.

But I feel for ya…$150+ is a lot of money to just have to “eat”… :ouch:
 
A few options you can try:

Ask them to waive the fee. Be friendly, strike up a conversation, ask them to “help”…that word goes a long way, and makes them feel good about doing you a favor. Sometimes it works, sometimes not.

If your not fixed in stone on your trip, you can often fly standby without paying any change fees. This may mean sitting in an airport all day going from gate to gate. Of course the real risk here is that you get where your going only to not get a flight home.
 
When I called to rebook, I asked if there was someone who had the authority to waive the rebooking fee. I told the rep that I missed the trip for medical reasons beyond my control.

She asked for my Drs name, address and phone, then came back on the line and said the fee was waived 👍.

Now I’m looking for flight insurance.
 
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