I haven’t flown anywhere in years, so please excuse my ignorance here.
First, my airline has issued an “e” ticket. I guess that means that I say my name and present my I.D. at the ticket counter, at which point I’ll be issued my boarding pass. Trouble is, I have a connecting flight. Does that mean I get both boarding passes at the counter at SPI? Or do I have to check in again at the little station they have by the gate at STL?
Also, I’m purchasing what’s called a “web fare.” A travel agent I spoke to said that web fares are bad because if there’s an itinerary change the airline doesn’t notify me. I imagine that the travel agent was just trying to scare me into buying her (much more expensive) tickets. But if what she said is true, then does that mean that I have to call the airline each day and ask if any changes have been made to my itinerary?
You will get both boarding passes when show up at your first airport. As long as I have been going the e-ticket route, that’s how it’s always been for me: no second check-in necessary at the mini-gate or anywhere else.
Can’t help you with your second problem, though.
And, do make sure that your ID is up-to-date, otherwise it’s a nearly automatic flag to get searched both when you check your luggage AND when you board the plane!
Normally, when you show up with an e-ticket to check in and get luggage checked thru to your destination at the departure airport , you will get the seat assignments/boarding passes, including the connections, thru to the end of that trip (not necessarily the same state where your luggage actually ends up )
If actually making the flight as scheduled is important to you, it is always wise and usually free to check with the airline 1-800 phone or website for changes in the itinerary the day before, and again just before leaving the house to go to the airport. This applies to ALL flyers: web fares, TA fares, e-tix, paper tix, because flights can and DO get cancelled or rescheduled for any number of reasons. The airlines don’t notify each individual traveler of this – keeping you apprised of such situations IS one of the value-added servies a Travel Agent can provide. Used to be the TA could do that for no added cost over the airlines’ own fares – but in the last few years the airlines decided to cut the TA’s commissions to near nothing and force them to charge a mark-up. This applies specially if between your purchase and your travel date they (or your airport) have been having operating problems (e.g. Chapter 11, labor trouble, safety alerts) .
Random changes made to your itinerary? Um… no. When an airline sells you a ticket for a flight (through a travel agent, over the phone, over the web, whatever) and you pay for it and get a receipt, then no… the airline won’t just suddenly decide to put you on a flight to a different destination. (“You bought a ticket to L.A.? Thanks, we appreciate your business. By the way, we’ve decided to send you to Houston instead. Have a nice flight!”) And with the exception of bad weather or mechanical problems, neither do they suddenly decide to alter a flight’s itinerary.
Of course airlines overbook flights, but this is not the same thing as a “change of itinerary” and your travel agent knows it. Of course if they are oversold and you are the last person in line then yes, your itinerary might change (i.e. you might be the one left behind). To ensure this doesn’t happen arrive well ahead of time (1+ hours) to check in at the gate.
If on the way to the airport you notice dark storm clouds, hamster-sized hail, and someone building an ark then yes, your itinerary is about to change (i.e. they’re not going to take off in this weather). Also check the weather in the city you are flying to. Is it bad? If so your itinerary might be changing soon.
But you know what? Neither the airline nor your travel agent is going to call you with information that the flight is overbooked or possibly delayed due to the weather. Those are about the only two “itinerary changing” situations that happen with any frequency, and they tend to become apparent only at the last minute.
(Yes, the airline knows it oversold the plane a week ago, but they also know most of the overbookings will not actually show up. These people tend to be business travelers who booked two flights to be sure they made one, and will get a refund for the other.)
Sounds like your travel agent just wanted to sell you the tickets. Can’t blame them for trying, but I suspect they were inflating both the risks of buying online as well as the benefits of buying from them.
I think what the travel agent was talking about was an airline changing the departure time of a flight. When this happens, the airlines try to notify everyone as to the new time. So yes, airlines do indeed call you about flight changes.
This used to be more of an issue than it is today, because in the Good Old Days some people, especially business travelers, would show up only moments before a flight was scheduled to take off. Which would create an issue if the flight time had been moved back 15 minutes. Today, with everyone being told to show up way early, this is less meaningful.
You don’t have to call every day. This would be a waste of everyone’s time, since these decisions usually aren’t made until the last day or so. It remains true, however, that everyone should call the airline 24 hours before a flight to make sure that none of the times have changed, just in case you get into a time situation by cutting it too closely.
Exactly. Travelocity is a Travel Agency located in Dallas, affiliated to the SABRE reservations system, itself affiliated with American Airlines, and it provides travel-agent-type services.
A Travel Agency can offer added services like notifying individual clients of a change in exact departure times, but just because they would be likelier to be set up to do so, not that there’s anything magical about the tickets. But a simple 24-hr-prior call will cover virtually all possible cases.
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