3 Weeks until flight - Vanished from schedule

[algae]

Hi all,

I have a flight on CX in 3 weeks as below:
29/4 - CX170 - PER > HKG
30/4 - CX828 - HKG > YYZ

Out of sheer curiosity I've just had a look at Cathay's schedules online.
That was a mistake.

Every single week in April, May and June, CX828 from Hong Kong to Toronto is flying on Sunday. CX typically has 3-7 weekly flights scheduled on this route.

For some reason my flight on Sunday the 30th of April, has now vanished from their schedule. To add to that, they only have ONE flight that entire week.

I booked this redemption trip 11 months ago and now I'm panicking as this Cathay flight is the start of a 1 month OWA reward trip with 12 business class flights for me and my partner.


My booking still shows on the Cathay website and I can pick seats (which oddly shows 90% full)

Does anyone have any insights on what on earth is happening here?

 

[Captain Halliday]

Does anyone have any insights on what on earth is happening here?

I don’t know for sure, but happy to offer a theory.

Both CX flights HKG-YYZ on 30APR are zeroed out.

In addition, both seatmaps on EF have many blocked seats implying both flights have a light load.

My theory is that they’ve stopped selling both flights and plan to consolidate two flights into one.

Just a guess though…

 

[algae]

I don’t know for sure, but happy to offer a theory.

Both CX flights HKG-YYZ on 30APR are zeroed out.

In addition, both seatmaps on EF have many blocked seats implying both flights have a light load.

My theory is that they’ve stopped selling both flights and plan to consolidate two flights into one.

Just a guess though…

Interesting guess! And good pickup that two HKG-YYZ flights were originally scheduled. Merging them seems plausible.

Unfortunately business on both flights appears >90% occupied, so my redemption seats are probably getting bumped down

Looking at the flights on other days, it seems like CX always shows unbooked economy seats as blocked?

 

[wandering_fred]

on 30 Apr CX 826 and 828 show zeroes in all classes. (expertflyer)
That is a lot of seats as both are A351s
Can that many people be wandering
Fred

 

[algae]

on 30 Apr CX 826 and 828 show zeroes in all classes. (expertflyer)
That is a lot of seats as both are A351s
Can that many people be wandering
Fred

What do you mean by "shows zeros in all classes"?

As in nobody is booked on those flights? Or they're not allowing new bookings?

 

[Flyfrequently]

Hi all,

I have a flight on CX in 3 weeks as below:
29/4 - CX170 - PER > HKG
30/4 - CX828 - HKG > YYZ

Out of sheer curiosity I've just had a look at Cathay's schedules online.
That was a mistake.

Every single week in April, May and June, CX828 from Hong Kong to Toronto is flying on Sunday. CX typically has 3-7 weekly flights scheduled on this route.

For some reason my flight on Sunday the 30th of April, has now vanished from their schedule. To add to that, they only have ONE flight that entire week.

I booked this redemption trip 11 months ago and now I'm panicking as this Cathay flight is the start of a 1 month OWA reward trip with 12 business class flights for me and my partner.
View attachment 322351

My booking still shows on the Cathay website and I can pick seats (which oddly shows 90% full)

Does anyone have any insights on what on earth is happening here?

Oh dear @algae, can only surmise CX are trimming their flights and rejigging schedules due to demand - no consolation for you and your stress levels though
CX178 from Melbourne has been daily, then 4-5 flights a week, now back to daily.
Hopefully this sorts itself out soon for your trip.
Is it worth looking up OW alternate flights to see what is out there just in case you need to get on the front foot?

 

[Mwenenzi]

I booked this redemption trip 11 months ago and now I'm panicking as this Cathay flight is the start of a 1 month OWA reward trip with 12 business class flights for me and my partner.

Booked with QF ff points?
Do not like your chances of resolution

 

[algae]

Booked with QF ff points?
Do not like your chances of resolution

Yep, booked with QF points.
No chance I'll be able to find 2x reward J seats from Perth to Toronto with 3 weeks notice on any other airline :/

 

[NM]

I suggest you watch your booking VERY closely and VERY regularly. If your original flight is not going to operate, CX will quite likely rebook you on an alternate flight/flights, but as the ticket is issued by Qantas, Qantas will need to re-issue the ticket. And as we know too well, if Qantas does not reissue it in a timely manner, CX can and will cancel the reservation as QF "failed to reissue in time".

So if you see any change to the reservations (different flight number, times, dates etc.) jump straight onto QF and insist that they reissue the ticket immediately before CX auto-cancel the booking.

 

[algae]

I suggest you watch your booking VERY closely and VERY regularly. If your original flight is not going to operate, CX will quite likely rebook you on an alternate flight/flights, but as the ticket is issued by Qantas, Qantas will need to re-issue the ticket. And as we know too well, if Qantas does not reissue it in a timely manner, CX can and will cancel the reservation as QF "failed to reissue in time".

So if you see any change to the reservations (different flight number, times, dates etc.) jump straight onto QF and insist that they reissue the ticket immediately before CX auto-cancel the booking.

Agreed! Not the first time I had this exact flight cancelled on me! It got changed by 1 day last month but fortunately the Qantas escalations team reticketed it quick.

 

[Quickstatus]

booked with QF points.

Qantas escalations team

Via this email?
[email protected]

 

[algae]

Via this email?
[email protected]

Yep. Genuinely a very good experience dealing with them.

Ridiculous that they're needed in the first place though....

 

[Helena5]

Hi Algae. Wondering if you managed to get this issue resolved? I’m in the same boat for a flight later in the year so I’m curious. Thanks

 

[algae]

Hi Algae. Wondering if you managed to get this issue resolved? I’m in the same boat for a flight later in the year so I’m curious. Thanks

As a bit of an update, I've been watching Cathays flight timetables and also their website to see if it allowed people to buy seats on my flight.
Over the past two weeks it bounced in and out of being there.
For the majority of the time it wasn't there, but yesterday it reappeared.
When it was listed on the timetable site, i was able to buy tickets (only business, no economy for some reason), and vice versa.

Looking at flightradar it seems all the CX828 flights have been operating on a perfectly regular schedule, leading me to believe that their timetable website is broken. OR, it may be that their timetable website doesn't show flights with 0 seats available and they've decided not to sell a lot of economy seats. Based on expert flyer business is basically full, but economy is very empty, with a lot of blocked seats.

As far as i can tell, my flight will be operating (fortunately for me).

Now to your situation, potentially it's the same as my situation. But if it's several months away, it might be the same issue i experienced earlier this year with these same flights: CX Avail PER-HKG - Dude where’s my flight

In summary: Cathay may have cancelled your flight, but for whatever reason waits MONTHS before actually notifying you and providing you an alternative. Fortunately for me they just moved me by one day. In that case the timetable website was accurate so i was expecting something from Cathay (cancellation/rebooking). They just left it very late, so i had to rebook accommodation etc.

Hope your situation also goes well!

 

[Helena5]

Thanks Algae, glad it worked out for you. That gives me hope! My flight isn’t until November (PER - HKG). It’s also a QX reward ticket so who knows how that’ll pan out. I’ll just sit tight for now….

 

[algae]

Thanks Algae, glad it worked out for you. That gives me hope! My flight isn’t until November (PER - HKG). It’s also a QX reward ticket so who knows how that’ll pan out. I’ll just sit tight for now….

Mine was a Qantas points redemption ticket, but I hope your experience will be positive!
If anything is expect CX to add more flights later in the year, so fingers crossed things improve.

 

[NM]

OR, it may be that their timetable website doesn't show flights with 0 seats available and they've decided not to sell a lot of economy seats. Based on expert flyer business is basically full, but economy is very empty, with a lot of blocked seats.

Don't rely on ExpertFlyer seat maps as any guide about how many tickets have been sold for the flight. Many airlines do not allow evry passenger to select their own seat and the airlines may not allocate seats to all ticket holders until the flight opens for check-in. So the seat map may look 50% full, but they could still have sold 100% of the tickets and just not yet allocated seating for 50% of the passengers. That provides maximum flexibility for ensuring family groups etc. can be accommodated together at check-in.

Often its only high-status FF members who can select seats prior to check-in.

The only reliable way to know if the cabin is indeed going to be full (sold out or possibly oversold) is to see how many Y seats the airline is still actively marketing (available for sale). If EF is showing Y0, then its a fair assumption that the economy cabin is indeed going to be full. If EF is showing Y9 (or Y7 for some airlines) along with similar availability in other economy fare classes, then its not full.

But you may be correct in assuming that the airline's web site may not show a flight that currently has no seats for sale.

 

[algae]

Don't rely on ExpertFlyer seat maps as any guide about how many tickets have been sold for the flight. Many airlines do not allow evry passenger to select their own seat and the airlines may not allocate seats to all ticket holders until the flight opens for check-in. So the seat map may look 50% full, but they could still have sold 100% of the tickets and just not yet allocated seating for 50% of the passengers. That provides maximum flexibility for ensuring family groups etc. can be accommodated together at check-in.

Often its only high-status FF members who can select seats prior to check-in.

The only reliable way to know if the cabin is indeed going to be full (sold out or possibly oversold) is to see how many Y seats the airline is still actively marketing (available for sale). If EF is showing Y0, then its a fair assumption that the economy cabin is indeed going to be full. If EF is showing Y9 (or Y7 for some airlines) along with similar availability in other economy fare classes, then its not full.

But you may be correct in assuming that the airline's web site may not show a flight that currently has no seats for sale.

100% agree, however the seat map looks like this:
Not selling ANY economy seats 3 weeks before departure seemed odd to me.
I assume the 'vacant' seats are for people who havent paid for seat selection.
But the ~9 rows of blocked seats at the rear is particularly strange (front would be for high status i assume).

 

[NM]

But the ~9 rows of blocked seats at the rear is particularly strange (front would be for high status i assume).

There may be several reasons for the blocking at the rear. They may have one or more group bookings (tour groups, school group, sporting team etc.). They may also be seeking maximum flexibility of available rows for seating passengers traveling together. So rather than allowing those who do pay/qualify got seat pre-allocation to take all the window or aisle seats, but blocking out a significant number of rows they can maintain flexibility at check-in to ensure families are not split between middle seats in multiple rows. Blocking seats is not only to save them for high status travelers.

And sometimes seats allocated for code-share partners can show as blocked on the operating airline. This is unlikely to be the case here. It depends on the nature of the codeshare agreement between the airlines. Normally when I have see this the blocks are in the middle of the cabin, not front or rear. It is not a common process as most codeshare agreements operate in a manner where the operating airline sees and manages the allocations.

What is EF showing in terms of fare class availability for Y and discounted economy fares for the flight? That is the only real way to understand fligth cabin "density" from publicly available data before check-in opens.

 

[RealtimeY]

I agree that seat maps are a bad way of gauging availability on a flight, and especially so on Cathay. I don't know why they block the front and rear, but they do it on all the flights I've booked with them until closer to departure. They also don't offer free seat selection to a lot of passengers.

Even more bizarrely, this is what the EF v MMB seat maps look like on an upcoming flight, where it looks like I can only choose the front seats as OWE.