An ASA Curly – Fight Changes

[blueythecat]

Hi everyone,

I’m a long time lurker on these forums (both with and without an account) and have learnt heaps by just reading others posts. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find the answer to my current question anywhere so this is my first time posting!!

My wife and I are planning a trip to Europe in the middle of the year (along with half of oz of course!) and are looking at using our points to book some YASA fares (or some combination of ASA and OW paid economy fares). Now all this would be relatively easy, except for the fact we’d like some flexibility to change our flights as we are not sure of our dates – but want to lock in some flights before the prices goes through the roof. So what I was hoping to find out is how easy is it to change a YASA fare??

To give an example (which I’m guessing would help) – we could book CBR-SYD-SIN-LHR (16 Aug), then LHR-SIN (8 Oct) SIN-MEL-CBR (16 Oct) (ie LHR-SIN-MEL-CBR flight with a stopover) for 128k + ~AUD1146. The outbound fare is a red e-deal with a $60 change fee and the inbound a walkabout fare with a GBP100 change fee. If after we booked the flights, say in a couple of months time, we wanted to move them forward by a few weeks, would this be possible and if so how easy and expensive would it be? I’m going to guess it’s not as simple as paying the two change fees and popping into available economy seats on the flights of our choice (actually please tell me it is…..).

If the amount it costs to change depends upon the YASA price difference on the two days, is there any way to work out what it might cost or have other members had any experience doing a similar thing and if so how much did it end up costing?

Thanks for your help and hope everyone is having a good weekend!

 

[docjames]

Basically consider the yasa change the same as the fare class you have booked. Ie. book a yasa in the red e-deal fare bucket and you have the same flexibility as a red e-deal (very little). You can choose your fare level dependant on how much flexibility,

Do a dummy booking and look at the fare level conditions and it should be laid out to you the change rules/fees.

Note also when you change you pay not only the fee but also any fare difference (which close to date of departure, especially around Olympics, could be substantial).

Enjoy your trip.

 

[ozmille]

also I think if you book an award seat in X class and you wat to change the date there has to be X class availability to rebook into on the new date.

 

[Alanslegal]

Unless you have a mountain of points and can spend them freely I would rather look buying a revenue ticket. 128K + $1,150 is not good value to me.

Using the QF multi-city tool works out to be $2,350 all inclusive for the original dates you require.

 

[serfty]

The fare rules for changes are very available before committing to the booking.

Note this from the T&C's:

Fee Schedule - effective 17 May 2011

Service	Fee
Change Fee Changes may only be made in accordance with the applicable fare conditions	For Any Seat Award changes: Change and service fees are payable only in money and are disclosed in the applicable Any Seat Award fare conditions. For Classic Award changes: 3,500 Points per passenger. Where changes are made to Classic Awards via Qantas Telephone Sales, Service Fees (below) are payable in addition to the Change Fee.

Today at no cost I changed a JASA booked with "Business" rules. The Change rules are: (https://www.qantas.com.au/regions/amadeus/minirules/USANZBUS/index.html)

Business

Booking Changes

Changes can be made by calling your local Qantas office. Before / After Departure: Date and re-routing changes permitted with no penalty. Additional charges and taxes may apply, plus any fare difference.

I have another YASA booking- I am less likely to change it: (https://www.qantas.com.au/regions/amadeus/minirules/USAAUREDT/index.html)

Red Tail

Booking Changes

Changes can be made by calling your local Qantas office. Before / After Departure: Date and re-routing changes permitted at US$150 per person per transaction applies. Exception: Some fares are applicable for travel Monday to Wednesday only. Itinerary changes permitted. At the time of making the change, you must pay (per person per change): the itinerary change fee any fare difference Additional charges and taxes may apply, plus any fare difference.

 

[blueythecat]

Thanks everyone for the responses so far – from what you’ve all said, I think I’m pretty clear on what the T&C’s mean, however I guess what I’m more after is how does it work in practice. To aid with this maybe a couple of worked hypothetical examples might help – I’d appreciate it if anyone could comment on my logic.

Option 1:

I book a fully paid red e-deal for $2350, now lets say I want to change it come late May and on the new dates I want there are still red e-deals available, but they now cost $3600 (oh my god imagine that!). Is the cost to change the flights going to be $60 change fee plus $1250 to cover the difference in flight prices??

Option 2:

I book the YASA (red e-deal and Walkabout fares) as I original planned for 128k points and $1146, then I want to change it in late May (I sense a pattern appearing ) and there are still red e-deal and Walkabout YASA’s available on the new dates, but they now cost 128k + $2331. Is the cost to change the flights going to be $60 red e-deal change fee plus GBP100 fee to change the walkabout fare plus $1185 to cover the difference in flight prices??

As an aside one poster noted that they didn’t think the YASA’s were much value at the current rates; thus I probably should ask what is a good price for a YASA to Europe? Or do people generally not think international YASA’s are good value full stop – I fully understand JASA’s are “better” value but this assumes one has the points to book them….which unfortunately I don’t.

Another option could be some kind of Qantas return to Singapore and then Finnair Economy to Europe and back – the logical follow-up question is, has anyone had experience changing Finnair “Economy Special” (EUR100 change fee) tickets? I imagine the maths is much the same?

Thanks for the help again.

 

[sanne]

Sorry to highjack this thread but this could also be a scenario. If you had to cancel your YASA would you get your points back if the fare was non refundable.

 

[blueythecat]

Sorry to highjack this thread but this could also be a scenario. If you had to cancel your YASA would you get your points back if the fare was non refundable.

Not a hijack at all - rather a good question. One I reckon I can even have a go at answering - it seems to be listed in the T&C's for the relevant ticket. For the flights I had up it had the following listed:

"Qantas & Jetstar Any Seat Award: If this is a Qantas & Jetstar Any Seat Award and the money paid (if any) for the booking is less than the cancellation fee, or the itinerary has been partially flown, then a proportion of the money and points originally used to obtain the award will be refunded to the applicable Member. The proportion refunded will be the difference between the original ticket value (or remaining ticket value if the itinerary is partially flown) as allocated by Qantas and the cancellation fee, as a proportion of the original ticket value."

 

[Oneworldplus2]

What about a RTW, Y, 140k? (and taxes)

 

[serfty]

What about a RTW, Y, 140k? (and taxes)

I guess a clssic award is not really relevant to this thread.

 

[blueythecat]

Should I assume there is no simple answer my questions? I thought that might actually be the case

 

[serfty]

To be honest, I would never book a YASA expecting to change it. If there's not award availability, the cost to chneg can get get enormous as the points value is converted to a $ value at a very poor rate.

 

[blueythecat]

Last post on this topic I promise, but I take it my calculations for the two options I gave in Post #6 are wrong? Or no one knows the answer?

Maybe there should be a sticky thread on how the Qantas change fees work and costs associated with changing the different classes of Qantas tickets? Strikes me as though it could be something quite a few people are interested in. Or maybe others are a bit more organised than me and don't really change their flights.