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Are there EZAir cons or negatives?


styme123
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If you are using EZAir and re-fared at a later time, did Princess let you? When I spoke to PCP they said if I booked the ticket under a promo for $ off EZAir and ticketed my flight, I could not take advantage of new promos. So if the overall price of my cruise drops later on I'm out of luck and can't change it. The cruise typically has dropped in Feb/March by at a few hundred dollars.

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2 hours ago, styme123 said:

I called BA about assigning a seat and they said they couldn't assign me a seat until I paid for the ticket in full. The problem is BA charges to pick your seat. So the price of my EZAir is not really the say $330 that I booked it for but more like $600. It was $150 to increase the economy class to just have the option to choose and $34 to pick and $84 to pick the actual seats I wanted in economy. I wish EZAir bundled it all together instead of me thinking that was my end price. Then I can see if it's still a good deal.

That was not our experience. Ours came with assigned seats.

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12 hours ago, caribill said:

Biggest advantages of EZAir:

o A flexible fare can be changed or cancelled up to 45 days before travel begins.

o Fares of overseas flights are significantly less than other ways of booking.

 

Biggest disadvantages of EZAir:

o Not all airlines are included.

o Not all flights are included on included airlines.

o Need to watch connection times. "Legal" connection times may not be practical connections.

I agree with most of the comment here. We are getting pretty long in the tooth and wife has some mobility problems, so coach simply doesn't cut it anymore for us on overseas flights. Connection times can really be a nightmare. We don't cruise international unless we can get business class. EZ Air manages to negotiate some pretty decent rates for B.C. recently.
 
One thing we have to be careful of is the connections. Since we live in Alaska we usually don't want to leave here and travel all the way to Europe or Asia without having an overnight, hopefully in SEA, however EZ Air won't allow that. Also, they try and work it out when we use ANC as our Gateway airport that we originate with an airline that is partnered with other carriers all the way to our destination, say United. United may have only one flight out of ANC a day, whereas ASA might have 10, so we usually do all our domestic travel on Alaska making SEA our Gateway where we go a day early to and stay overnight.
 
Usually we can work with EZ Air in arranging a lot more time than a couple of hours at  connecting overseas airports in attempts to avoid the horror show we more often than not run into at London or Paris.  Sister-in-law made the mistake of using Phoenix as her Gateway a year ago for Venice, they insisted that a 45 connection was legal at SEA. She got to Venice 24 hours late due delays at SEA.  
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4 hours ago, styme123 said:

I called BA about assigning a seat and they said they couldn't assign me a seat until I paid for the ticket in full. The problem is BA charges to pick your seat. So the price of my EZAir is not really the say $330 that I booked it for but more like $600. It was $150 to increase the economy class to just have the option to choose and $34 to pick and $84 to pick the actual seats I wanted in economy. I wish EZAir bundled it all together instead of me thinking that was my end price. Then I can see if it's still a good deal.

I booked BA flights yesterday using EZAir and was able to select seats for all legs of our trip, no extra charges.

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21 hours ago, styme123 said:

I've never used EZAir and am thinking about using it for international flight from NY to London for summer BI cruise. Has anyone had negative experiences with it? I've been hearing positive ones mostly.  When I was speaking to a PCP they did say that if I ticketed my flight and a good refare price came up I wouldn't be able to use the promo. Also that the ticket is not really mine until I pay for it, more of just holding it for me, so seats aren't always guaranteed. Some of the airlines also charge for seat assignment which is not factored into the price. That price could be as much as $120 (Brit Airways).  TIA

We have used Ezair for several years and have not had any problems.  I only use restricted fares and pay for the tickets when we book. Princess sends me a confirmation as well as the airline.  I usually book Jet Blue and get my Jet Blue confirmation within a day of booking.

The res

As on we use Jet Blue is the leg room provided in standard coach at NO extra charge, also they have more non stop flights from Boston Logan AP.

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15 minutes ago, styme123 said:

Was it in economy?

Yes, I ultimately booked economy class, but also did a dummy booking on first class just to compare prices, and it let me select seats for that booking as well.  I went so far as to pull up Google images from the specific plane's first class seating arrangements, as well as SeatGuru.com, to select which configuration would be the best for 2 people flying together.  Maybe it depends on how the flights are code sharing, but my flights reflect BA as the carrier.  

 

 

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3 minutes ago, Paula_MacFan said:

Yes, I ultimately booked economy class, but also did a dummy booking on first class just to compare prices, and it let me select seats for that booking as well.  I went so far as to pull up Google images from the specific plane's first class seating arrangements, as well as SeatGuru.com, to select which configuration would be the best for 2 people flying together.  Maybe it depends on how the flights are code sharing, but my flights reflect BA as the carrier.  

 

 

When I spoke to BA and Princess they said they will charge you when you are ticketed (pay for the flight). Right now you are basically "reserving" the flight and seats. Until you are ticketed they can't tell you how much your seat will cost extra. When I did a sample flight trough their website is when I saw the fees I was talking about before. 

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2 minutes ago, styme123 said:

When I spoke to BA and Princess they said they will charge you when you are ticketed (pay for the flight). Right now you are basically "reserving" the flight and seats. Until you are ticketed they can't tell you how much your seat will cost extra. When I did a sample flight trough their website is when I saw the fees I was talking about before. 

Gotcha -- well my flights are still 10 months away so there's no way I'm going to ticket it right now.  That's the whole appeal of EZAir for me -- being able to keep checking and re-fare if something better pops up.  

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4 minutes ago, Paula_MacFan said:

Gotcha -- well my flights are still 10 months away so there's no way I'm going to ticket it right now.  That's the whole appeal of EZAir for me -- being able to keep checking and re-fare if something better pops up.  

I know that's the tricky part. You don't know till then. My cruise is 10 months away as well.

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On 11/8/2019 at 10:28 PM, frugaltravel said:

The biggest negative of EZ Air tickets is that they are not normal airline tickets. Princess purchases them in bulk, thus they are called "bulk" tickets. If everything goes as planned there is not an issue. But if there are issues with the airline operations the bulk tickets usually get last choice of rebooking. It does not happen often but it is something people should consider more often before purchasing such tickets.

My current experience with an upcoming flight in January is that my return flight (connecting through Atlanta) had a reschedule by Delta and I would not make my connection in Atlanta (that was the last flight of the night).  I called Princess and they only could offer me a "red eye" flight with an additional connection  and leaving my original departure city much later meaning I would have to hang around for several hours. I called Delta directly and they were able to confirm another flight that was more satisfactory than what Princess was offering.  (This was after asking for a supervisor at Delta). Delta said they would call Princess and advise them and Delta sent me the new confirmation.  Princess still has the old flight info on my travel page.

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1 hour ago, silversneakers said:

My current experience with an upcoming flight in January is that my return flight (connecting through Atlanta) had a reschedule by Delta and I would not make my connection in Atlanta (that was the last flight of the night).  I called Princess and they only could offer me a "red eye" flight with an additional connection  and leaving my original departure city much later meaning I would have to hang around for several hours. I called Delta directly and they were able to confirm another flight that was more satisfactory than what Princess was offering.  (This was after asking for a supervisor at Delta). Delta said they would call Princess and advise them and Delta sent me the new confirmation.  Princess still has the old flight info on my travel page.

 glad that it all worked out but I am not sure how that relates to what I posted. What I posted refers to operations on the day of flights.

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Can anyone comment on if fees were added on after at the time they were ticketed? Trying to get a sense if that is pretty common or just depends. If they were added what was the average amount? I asked PCP and they said they had no way of knowing what the fees would be. 😏

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20 hours ago, frugaltravel said:

TSA PreCheck is not a benefit of a business class ticket. If you get it and you are not enrolled in global entry or pre-check then it is something random that the TSA gives to you.

Well, I guess I named it wrong.  My last three flights I have not had to wait in the regular line. I have had "priority" security each time.  Guess I just lucked out!

 

P.S.  Yes, I guess I am "old"!!!!

 

Pooh

Edited by PoohUnderstands
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1 hour ago, styme123 said:

Can anyone comment on if fees were added on after at the time they were ticketed? Trying to get a sense if that is pretty common or just depends. If they were added what was the average amount? I asked PCP and they said they had no way of knowing what the fees would be. 😏

I cannot comment on after, but since British Airways assigned the seats as soon as they were booked on EZ Air, I do not see how they can then add a fee for picking seats unless we wanted to upgrade our seats.

 

I called both BA and Virgin Airways to ask for vegetarian meals. Virgin at the time of the booking said that seats could not yet be assigned. When I called about the meals (well after booking but still many months before the flights), I asked the Virgin Airways rep about seats and he got us seats assigned, again no fee.

 

I do not know if it makes a difference, but I used our TA as a middle man when we booked the flights.

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Unless you have status BA, they will charge for a seat reservation, unless you are in First Class, or you are booked into a full fare bucket, then no fee applies, though as has been pointed out on this thread, sometimes EZ Air will allow you to pick a seat. If you are on a codeshare flight, marketed by BA, but operated by AA, then there will be a corresponding AA PNR. You can use that PNR on the AA site and select a seat without fee (unless you opt for a main cabin extra (MCE) or premium seat) as AA don’t charge for seat reservations. -If you have the right status on American, then you can also select the MCE, or premium seats without a fee.

 

I had an EZ Air reservation on AA from LAX to YVR (Vancouver) last month. Even before the ticket was fully paid for, I was able to select my seats in MCE and also put in a request for a complimentary upgrade to first class. As we got closer to departure and the flight was fully paid, I opted to switch to a miles and copy upgrade request as the first class cabin was filling up pretty fast, which cleared immediately.

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29 minutes ago, polmcs said:

Unless you have status BA, they will charge for a seat reservation, unless you are in First Class, or you are booked into a full fare bucket, then no fee applies, though as has been pointed out on this thread, sometimes EZ Air will allow you to pick a seat. If you are on a codeshare flight, marketed by BA, but operated by AA, then there will be a corresponding AA PNR. You can use that PNR on the AA site and select a seat without fee (unless you opt for a main cabin extra (MCE) or premium seat) as AA don’t charge for seat reservations. -If you have the right status on American, then you can also select the MCE, or premium seats without a fee.

 

I had an EZ Air reservation on AA from LAX to YVR (Vancouver) last month. Even before the ticket was fully paid for, I was able to select my seats in MCE and also put in a request for a complimentary upgrade to first class. As we got closer to departure and the flight was fully paid, I opted to switch to a miles and copy upgrade request as the first class cabin was filling up pretty fast, which cleared immediately.

I asked this question on Cruise air forum but since you mentioned the code sharing here maybe you know the answer to this as well. Is there any benefit to using a code shared flight? Sometimes the price is different for the same flight. So for example say a BA stand alone flight at 10:00pm is $550 but a code shared one with AA is $350 with being operate by BA? why the difference in price. If you want to change or upgrade which carrier do you contact?

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31 minutes ago, styme123 said:

I asked this question on Cruise air forum but since you mentioned the code sharing here maybe you know the answer to this as well. Is there any benefit to using a code shared flight? Sometimes the price is different for the same flight. So for example say a BA stand alone flight at 10:00pm is $550 but a code shared one with AA is $350 with being operate by BA? why the difference in price. If you want to change or upgrade which carrier do you contact?

I'm booked on Lufthansa thru United and I contacted Lufthansa to select my seat.

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2 hours ago, polmcs said:

Unless you have status BA, they will charge for a seat reservation, unless you are in First Class, or you are booked into a full fare bucket, then no fee applies, though as has been pointed out on this thread, sometimes EZ Air will allow you to pick a seat. If you are on a codeshare flight, marketed by BA, but operated by AA, then there will be a corresponding AA PNR. You can use that PNR on the AA site and select a seat without fee (unless you opt for a main cabin extra (MCE) or premium seat) as AA don’t charge for seat reservations. -If you have the right status on American, then you can also select the MCE, or premium seats without a fee.

 

I had an EZ Air reservation on AA from LAX to YVR (Vancouver) last month. Even before the ticket was fully paid for, I was able to select my seats in MCE and also put in a request for a complimentary upgrade to first class. As we got closer to departure and the flight was fully paid, I opted to switch to a miles and copy upgrade request as the first class cabin was filling up pretty fast, which cleared immediately.

That is not what happened with us. BA flight, no codeshare, a seat assignment was made without any charge or even us asking for it.

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3 hours ago, styme123 said:

I asked this question on Cruise air forum but since you mentioned the code sharing here maybe you know the answer to this as well. Is there any benefit to using a code shared flight? Sometimes the price is different for the same flight. So for example say a BA stand alone flight at 10:00pm is $550 but a code shared one with AA is $350 with being operate by BA? why the difference in price. If you want to change or upgrade which carrier do you contact?

I am not the poster you asked this question to :-).  Code sharing is a huge scam.  Generally I try to book a flight using the flight number of the operating carrier.  Booking a code share is no issue.  The reason fares are different is that for most flights/routes there can't be cooperation/collusion so they each price the flights separately.  So AA might price a flight cheaper than BA for the same flight (or v.v.).  Generally, until flight departure time you contact the airline who issued your ticket for changes.   But for seat assignments it is always best to contact the airline operating the flight.  For upgrades, it depends on various factors including if you have status with an airline and how you are trying to upgrade - using status, miles, cash?

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4 hours ago, styme123 said:

I asked this question on Cruise air forum but since you mentioned the code sharing here maybe you know the answer to this as well. Is there any benefit to using a code shared flight? Sometimes the price is different for the same flight. So for example say a BA stand alone flight at 10:00pm is $550 but a code shared one with AA is $350 with being operate by BA? why the difference in price. If you want to change or upgrade which carrier do you contact?

As stated, sometimes a particular codeshare flight might be cheaper booking through one airline vs. another, even though it is ultimately on the same metal.

 

I always book a BA flight back to the UK over Christmas and New Year, but always book it through AA. I have an AA frequenter flyer account and I get more benefits/rewards by having an AA flight number on the reservation. Even though the flight is booked through AA and is operated by BA, the AA rules apply as AA is the marketing carrier. I had a situation earlier this year where in one direction, the first class fare dropped dramatically and ended up only being a few hundred dollars more than the business fare I had originally booked. Had I booked through BA, they would have charged me the fare difference, plus a change fee. AA allows an upfare with no change fee, so all I owed was the fare difference. 

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I’ve booked using EZ air for the first time for my flight in December from Miami to Inverness, the flight is business class with AA from Miami to Heathrow and a code share with BA from Heathrow to Inverness Scotland. I was able to select the seats on AA  when I booked and I rang BA and got my seats assigned for free with them.

 

I’m now 36 days from my flight, the flight was ticketed a while back and although I’ve had emails from HAL I’ve had nothing from AA, I can see my booking online on the AA website but haven’t received an email or anything from them, is this normal? I can’t check in online until 24 hours before the flight.

 

Edited by DebbieMacG
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