Quick Painless Way to Cancel Your Flight

[AF-1]

Hello everyone.  I wanted to pass along info on cancelling your flights.  This may not work for everyone but it worked for me and it was fast and painless.  I had booked directly with Delta Airlines.  I used cash and miles.  Cash for ticket and miles for upgrade.  When my AMA river cruise officially cancelled on Friday I took to Delta's twitter feed.  I contacted Delta and asked if they could help me cancel my flight and put the money back into my account.  In less than an hour on twitter, the Delta agent cancelled my wife and my tickets, put the money back into our account as an e-credit, and since they could not put my skymiles back they gave me a dollar amount for what they were worth.  Below is what happened

1. Delta Agent cancelled two tickets

2. Issued two e-credits, one for my wife and one for me

3. E-credit includes both original ticket price; plus dollar amount for skymiles

4. E-credit is good until May 2021

 

If you would like to try this with your airline here is how it is done.  Log into your airlines account.  go to the bottom of the webpage and you should see both facebook and twitter. You can contact the airline via facebook or twitter.  Once you have an agent they will private message you to set everything up.   It may take up to 15 min for them to  contact you; they private message you to set everything up.  I had read many threads both on this site and other airline sites about the long wait time via phones.  I also heard about people logging on to airline websites to modify or cancel on their own; and when they hit send; they got an error message or an 800 number to call.  Hope some of you take advantage of this.  

[CruiserBruce]

Hmmm....not sensing this is a great deal. We had flights on United for May SFO-FCO, and  VCE-SFO, all on miles. I canceled about 10 days ago. Took about 15 minutes on phone. All miles were totally refunded, and I will use them for next year's proposed same itinerary. As these were business class seats, with a cash purchase price of around $5Kpp, I think giving you $$ for the miles doesn't work in your favor.

[FlyerTalker]

Really interesting, as the agent could have easily credited SkyPesos to your account with little difficulty.  I wonder what the rate was that they made the exchange.  The good news is that you only paid for the upgrade (unknown what kind) and not the whole thing with SkyPesos, so you did get back your cash outlay 1 for 1 in credits.

[AF-1]

If you are not familar with skymiles.  Delta is the worst airline for skymiles; meaning their value is normally worth 1 cent per mile and sometimes a little more.  I think I got back a decent price for my skymiles.  Every airline handles their miles differently;  Cruiser Bruce, I am happy you got your united miles back; I did not lose any money by getting cash credit for my skymiles.  I will use the entire amount when I fly out in October for our med cruise.  Delta is waiving all fees for future travel if you buy a new ticket by 31 Mar.  I plan on booking my flights by next week

Edited March 23, 2020 by AF-1

[Mr. Click]

United has issued a travel waiver for all purchased flights from now until May 31, 2020. You can go online, log into your account and change or cancel  your flights for full future travel credit.  I just saved 4800 in change fees and it ook 2 minutes to get it done.  Travel credit is good for one year and is listed under your canceled flights tab.

[AF-1]

Mr. Click;  good for you. Have fun out there

[mom4mom]

10 hours ago, Mr. Click said:

United has issued a travel waiver for all purchased flights from now until May 31, 2020. You can go online, log into your account and change or cancel  your flights for full future travel credit.  I just saved 4800 in change fees and it ook 2 minutes to get it done.  Travel credit is good for one year and is listed under your canceled flights tab.

Thanks for posting this information.  I've been watching for them to move it to include flights through the end of May.  Yesterday it was still through end of April.  Now I can notify my group that they can safely cancel without losing any money.  What a relief!

 

[Mr. Click]

I keep reminding myself that patience is a virtue mom4mom.   Now I just need to be more patient about what Celebrity will do with this cruise.  

[mauimary]

On 3/22/2020 at 8:18 PM, Mr. Click said:

United has issued a travel waiver for all purchased flights from now until May 31, 2020. You can go online, log into your account and change or cancel  your flights for full future travel credit.  I just saved 4800 in change fees and it ook 2 minutes to get it done.  Travel credit is good for one year and is listed under your canceled flights tab.

Mr Click. Is that one year from today’s date or one year from purchase. We purchased last Dec. can’t possibly fly to Europe by this Dec?

Edited March 25, 2020 by mauimary

[FlyerTalker]

3 minutes ago, mauimary said:

Mr Click. Is that one year from today’s date or one year from purchase. We purchased last Dec. can’t possibly fly to Europe by this Dec?

 

Doesn't have to be for a flight to Europe.  If you get dollar-amount travel credits to your account, they can be used for any flights being sold by that carrier.  Note the sold part - you can often get tickets operated by a different alliance/partner carrier.

 

As for the UA rules -- rather than pass along information, the best source for the current situation would be....tada....the airline website itself.

[Mr. Click]

7 minutes ago, mauimary said:

Mr Click. Is that one year from today’s date or one year from purchase. We purchased last Dec. can’t possibly fly to Europe by this Dec?

The way I read it is we have until a year from the original issue date to use the credit to book something. Then anything we book has to start with in one year of our original travel date.  

 

Keeping in mind what FlyerTalker said, I have emailed United's customer care team and when I get a reply I will post something back here.  The auto reply said 5 to 7 days and taht is not a problem since we are months way from the actual original travel dates.

[candydane]

Please post what you learn.  I hope you're right.

[AF-1]

I just cancelled my Delta flight for May;  Delta gave me e-credits which are good until May 2021.  I have already booked another flight to europe for end of Oct.  Delta is waiving all fees; so if I decide to cancel or change my Oct trip there will be not fees to change or modify this trip. 

[Kellie in Texas]

I just tried the Twitter trick with Alaska Air.  Flights were June 13, 2020, and return June 23, 2020, from Austin to Vancouver, BC.  It was just a minute or two before I got a reply via direct message.  As of today, Alaska Air only has the cancel waiver to May 31, 2020, but the agent said to keep checking their website because it might be extended.  

[AF-1]

Kellie in Texas;  glad you used the Twitter feed.  Hope all works out for you.  Cheers

[Edgewater601]

On 3/22/2020 at 4:37 PM, AF-1 said:

Hello everyone.  I wanted to pass along info on cancelling your flights.  This may not work for everyone but it worked for me and it was fast and painless.  I had booked directly with Delta Airlines.  I used cash and miles.  Cash for ticket and miles for upgrade.  When my AMA river cruise officially cancelled on Friday I took to Delta's twitter feed.  I contacted Delta and asked if they could help me cancel my flight and put the money back into my account.  In less than an hour on twitter, the Delta agent cancelled my wife and my tickets, put the money back into our account as an e-credit, and since they could not put my skymiles back they gave me a dollar amount for what they were worth.  Below is what happened

1. Delta Agent cancelled two tickets

2. Issued two e-credits, one for my wife and one for me

3. E-credit includes both original ticket price; plus dollar amount for skymiles

4. E-credit is good until May 2021

 

If you would like to try this with your airline here is how it is done.  Log into your airlines account.  go to the bottom of the webpage and you should see both facebook and twitter. You can contact the airline via facebook or twitter.  Once you have an agent they will private message you to set everything up.   It may take up to 15 min for them to  contact you; they private message you to set everything up.  I had read many threads both on this site and other airline sites about the long wait time via phones.  I also heard about people logging on to airline websites to modify or cancel on their own; and when they hit send; they got an error message or an 800 number to call.  Hope some of you take advantage of this.  

I found your experience interesting because it sounded exactly like my situation only you had a different outcome.  I had cancelled an international flight  that I had paid cash for--2 tickets.  In addition, I had upgraded our seat assignments from economy to comfort plus using skymiles for that upgrade transaction.  The cost of my refundable tickets was returned but I was told that skymiles for the upgrade would be forfeited and that the miles could not be returned to my account.  Nothing was said about being able to get a credit on an e-ticket for the forfeited skymiles.  I think I lost about 33,000 skymiles on that one.  My question is if this e-ticket for a cancelled skymiles upgrade is something new or has that always been their policy and I just didn't know about it?  Thanks for any info anyone can provide.   

[AF-1]

Edgewater601;  sorry I just saw this post from you.  I would contact Delta again about the loss of skymiles.  I too used Skymiles to upgrade my int'l ticket.  My flight was for May.  When I contacted Delta via Twitter; they gave me e-credit for both the cash and the skymiles I used.  There is no way you should have to forfeit the 33,000 skymiles.   Tell them to refund the skymiles as an e-credit or put them back into your account.  I just cancelled a trip to Denver this week.  I used skymiles for this trip.  When I cancelled online; my skymiles were put back in my account within a minute.  

Edited June 2, 2020 by AF-1

[Edgewater601]

5 hours ago, AF-1 said:

Edgewater601;  sorry I just saw this post from you.  I would contact Delta again about the loss of skymiles.  I too used Skymiles to upgrade my int'l ticket.  My flight was for May.  When I contacted Delta via Twitter; they gave me e-credit for both the cash and the skymiles I used.  There is no way you should have to forfeit the 33,000 skymiles.   Tell them to refund the skymiles as an e-credit or put them back into your account.  I just cancelled a trip to Denver this week.  I used skymiles for this trip.  When I cancelled online; my skymiles were put back in my account within a minute.  

Thanks for the reply.  One flight I had purchased with miles Delta did immediately put those back in my account when I cancelled.  But the international flight that I had upgraded seats with miles refused to give me my 33,000 miles back when I cancelled.  After your post, I called Delta again.  They said they would review it and let me know.  I am now waiting on a refund from another Delta flight and returned miles for that international flight.  We will see if I get any of it.  Thanks!!!!

[FlyerTalker]

Perhaps too many folks took this kind of advice -- effective now, DL will not offer any customer service assistance through either Twitter or Facebook.

 

Guess those are back to being fluff marketing experiences.