<p>My family has (had?) tickets for flights in May. This morning I learned that one of the flights has been canceled. After an hour on the phone with the airline, I have concluded that there really are no good options.</p>
<p>Our original flights included one stop (there are no direct flights) at pretty good times for us: depart our airport around noon, two-hour connection. The connecting flight is the one that was canceled. So now our options are: depart our airport at 6:50 am, nine-hour connection; or depart around noon with two connecting flights.</p>
<p>I would cancel and rebook with another airline but that would cost about $200 per ticket.</p>
<p>This is United Airlines, if that makes a difference.</p>
<p>I don’t think they will charge you a cancellation fee, since they canceled one of your flights. But if the alternative with a different airline is more expensive, I doubt you can change that…</p>
<p>Yes, you have identified the problem: I could cancel without a penalty but then I would have to pay more to buy the tickets on a different airline.</p>
<p>My sister suggested asking United for some kind of compensation–free checked bags or an upgrade of some sort. Has anyone ever tried this?</p>
<p>Another question: How long can I wait to decide what to do? Today there are no good options but since the flight was just canceled, perhaps in the next week or two something better will be available. I will check with the airline on this, but does anyone have any experience with this? Are there likely to be scheudle additions, or at this point are the airlines just canceling flights? And if I wait, is there any chance United could say Sorry, you missed your chance to reschedule your flight?</p>
<ul>
<li>Did you ask to speak with a supervisor? (they can give you perks - baggage, red carpet lounge passes, upgrades) </li>
<li>Are there other connecting flights on another carrier - ask supervisor to put you on them at United’s cost? (was there a Continental flight that they could put you on - they are in the process of merging)</li>
<li>How much longer will your trip be with the 2 connections?</li>
<li>Can you turn the 9 hour delay into a sightseeing opportunity? (we did this in San Juan a few years ago and had a great day). Some airports have places to check carryons for a few hours.</li>
</ul>
<p>As I re-read your original post, I’m confused - if you leave 5 hours earlier, you end up with a 9 hour connection, but you can’t make this with the noon flight? The math doesn’t work unless they have changed your connection city.</p>
<p>Not yet. I wanted to be better prepared before I talked to a supervisor.</p>
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<p>There is no other flight that would let us keep the first flight and connect on another airline. There is another carrier–Delta–that offers just about the same flights we had originally. Any chance United would book us on those two flights?</p>
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<p>The second stop adds about 4.5 hours from our original plan.</p>
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<p>The nine hours would be in Houston.</p>
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<p>This is because we can’t keep our first flight either, even though it was the connecting flight that was canceled, because there are no other flights leaving from our connecting city to where we want to end up. Originally we were connecting in Chicago. Now we can connect in Houston, or in Denver and Los Angeles.</p>
<p>^ Amesie - It’s clear from your post(s) that you’ve thought through your options thoroughly. There doesn’t appear to be an obvious “solution.” By all means speak to a Supervisor. But decide on which existing option you prefer BEFORE you call. JMHO, having been in your shoes a number of times.</p>
<p>NewHope, I have indeed thought about this thoroughly (and I have the headache to prove it). I guess we have been lucky never to have quite this problem (although we don’t fly all that often either).</p>
<p>The two things I don’t know are whether there is any point in waiting until next week to call (do airlines ever add flights or do they just cancel them??) and whether there is any real chance that United would put us on two Delta flights (and if they might, are there any magic words I should say to get them to do so?).</p>
<p>The problem with that is I have decided (I think) that if they won’t put us on the Delta flights, we will have to suck it up and take the two connecting flights. It makes me mad but if I cancel and rebook any other flights now, it would be about $200 more per ticket. To rebook the Delta flights that are the same time as our original flights would be almost $400 more per ticket. So I don’t want them to say, well, if our options are unacceptable, you can just cancel your tickets.</p>
<p>^ I have no magic words that will apply in every case. I tend to adjust my approach to the person on the other end of the phone. Occasionally the Supervisor will come through with something that really helps … like putting you on the Delta flight … or perhaps offering a free ticket or some cash back for your trouble. Most of the time you won’t be that fortunate (in my experience). DW uses Pizzagirl’s approach … but hands the phone to me if it looks like the Supervisor might actually help. (I’m the one who keeps all flight options in memory.)</p>
<p>You can cancel at any time before the flight, as far as I know. (A very similar thing happened to us a couple of years ago with Air Canada. We decided to suck it up - had no other choice… Then one of the kids got a scholarship to go to the same country, but the scholarship required flying on US carrier. We canceled the ticket only for that kid with no penalty, months after the changes to our flights were made. I would expect United to be the same in that respect.)</p>
<p>Can you try using an online flight search like kayak.com to see what itineraries are available on all airlines?</p>
<p>You can then know what is available when you call the agent to change, and specify the specific itinerary you want. Of course, the United agent will be most willing to rebook on a fully United / Continental itinerary (and may lead you to believe that that is all that there is available), but s/he may be more willing to rebook to an itinerary that includes a United partner airline like US Airways or Air Canada rather than one that includes unrelated airlines like American, Delta, or Southwest.</p>
<p>Another option is to see if +/- a day makes a difference in what is available.</p>
<p>If you don’t mind mentioning it, what origin, destination, and dates do you want?</p>
<p><a href=“do%20airlines%20ever%20add%20flights%20or%20do%20they%20just%20cancel%20them??”>quote</a> and whether there is any real chance that United would put us on two Delta flights (and if they might, are there any magic words I should say to get them to do so?).
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The both add and cancel flights. They’re always adjusting the flights to maximize their profit potential. They do this even more when times are tougher or fuel gets more expensive (like now). Sometimes one airline will cancel and another airline will step in with more flights. This is nothing you can predict or count on though.</p>
<p>I doubt they’d stick you on the Delta flights but it’s worth trying. They’ll sometimes put people on the competitor airline when it’s a more severe situation - like you’re in the middle of traveling when one of the segments gets canceled, but in your case you haven’t actually started the trip yet.</p>
<p>Is there another airport you could drive to shave time off the total trip (taking the road trip into account)? For example, I live 15 minutes from Newark, but had a flight cancelled at the last minute and drove to 2 hours to Philly to make my connection to the Caribbean.</p>