Double check your flights...

[NavyCruiser]

Got email from my Aunt in MN saying that Viking cancelled their orig Delta flights to arrive Barcelona 2 days prior to debarkation, & auto rebooked them to arrive same debarkation day.  Won't work since the rest of our party still arriving 2 days prior & has hotels & tours already booked.

Checked our flights also, & found that our British Air flight from London back to TX changed from 4pm to 9am.

Viking Air Plus agent stated that Delta cancelled / changed over 30% of their winter flights, so she's busy making updates/corrections.

We were able to correct all details back to exact orig dates & almost orig times, & waived the $350 per person flight "deviation" fee.

Might make sense to spend 5 minutes to double check if you have flights coming up soon...

[Peregrina651]

Even if you booked your own flights, you must keep an eye on them.

 

We used Viking Air for our upcoming January cruise. I have been checking MVJ every day. We have already had two major changes since we booked the flights in May and I will not be surprised if there are even more changes before we leave. So far, Viking has been very good about fixing the changes that the airlines made to give us something that is a bit less rushed on the connections -- however, it does mean that we will be arriving at our final destination at 10pm at night, a lot later than the 4:30pm of our original flights. These days you have to be flexible and ready to compromise if you are flying.

 

 

[CDNPolar]

We tend to book flights 250+ days in advance, and generally we book them ourselves for better control.

 

It is in my calendar (and DNA) to check and recheck the flights every 3 to 4 weeks.  Some airlines have auto emails that come to you when an automatic change is made and some don't.

 

Shocking to me that an airline (or Viking) would take the liberty to move a flight by 2 days without consulting you.

[Moonlion]

8 hours ago, Peregrina651 said:

Even if you booked your own flights, you must keep an eye on them.

 

We used Viking Air for our upcoming January cruise. I have been checking MVJ every day. We have already had two major changes since we booked the flights in May and I will not be surprised if there are even more changes before we leave. So far, Viking has been very good about fixing the changes that the airlines made to give us something that is a bit less rushed on the connections -- however, it does mean that we will be arriving at our final destination at 10pm at night, a lot later than the 4:30pm of our original flights. These days you have to be flexible and ready to compromise if you are flying.

 

 

Our experience exactly.  Last year, we had our Viking flights changed by the airline 3-4 times, mostly without being notified by Viking or the airline.  Whether booking our own flights or through Viking, I compulsively keep track of the flights at the airline's website, which is the usually most accurate source of information (you can get the airline's confirmation number for your flight from Viking if not on MVJ).  It's especially important to make sure you are happy with your flights before ticketing.  In our experience, once Viking ticketed our flights (about 2 months before fight), they charged a $350 pp fee to modify the flight! 

[Peregrina651]

4 hours ago, CDNPolar said:

We tend to book flights 250+ days in advance, and generally we book them ourselves for better control.

 

It is in my calendar (and DNA) to check and recheck the flights every 3 to 4 weeks.  Some airlines have auto emails that come to you when an automatic change is made and some don't.

 

Shocking to me that an airline (or Viking) would take the liberty to move a flight by 2 days without consulting you.

 

I believe that in our case, it was the airline that moved the flight and not Viking.

 

When Delta cancelled our flight home last December they automatically moved us to other flight, which I then called and changed to something more managable (like when they put us on an 8am departure when the ship wasn't  schedule to dock until 7am).

 

[TayanaLorna]

5 minutes ago, Peregrina651 said:

 

I believe that in our case, it was the airline that moved the flight and not Viking.

 

When Delta cancelled our flight home last December they automatically moved us to other flight, which I then called and changed to something more managable (like when they put us on an 8am departure when the ship wasn't  schedule to dock until 7am).

 

That happened to us once.  American cancelled the AM flight and put us on an 11:30 pm flight the day before.  That was our final night on the ship so they changed it to actual debarkation day for no charge.  They only way i knew was watching it.   That reminds me...time to check our flights.

[katlew]

We booked our own flights & have had lots of changes too. They cancelled the afternoon flight from Mpls to Dallas & now we have an 8 hour layover before flying to New Zealand. On the way home they had us flying from Australia to San Francisco & then magically getting on a flight from LA to Mpls, without anyway to get to LA! We keep an eye on it, but American Express also contacted us about the weird change. 

 

I was reading an article that the airlines allow you to book way ahead based on the schedule published at that time, but at 100 days out they really start to firm up the real schedule. That is exact what seemed to happen to us, it was just about 100 days out.

[NavyCruiser]

We only book thru Viking, since we always book/take advantage of their "Free Air" promos.

One question I have is: Viking's $350 pp fee to modify the flight once ticketed (about 2 months before fight).

If it's the Airline's that making the unreasonable change/cancellation (not by us), then wouldn't be reasonable for Viking to help us to make update/correction back to near our orig planned flights without charging us the $350 fee?

Otherwise, once ticketed, we could make our flight changes/update/corrections directly with the Airlines, without involving Viking, since it's the Airlines that made the change?

[Ingnacious]

We went through Viking and had several changes, including being switched to completely different airlines, before final ticketing. We leave in 3 weeks. Hoping nothing changes between now and then! I don’t fault Viking, the airlines are constantly changing itineraries these days. Have had it happen with flights I have booked on my own several times in the last year.

[Moonlion]

4 hours ago, NavyCruiser said:

We only book thru Viking, since we always book/take advantage of their "Free Air" promos.

One question I have is: Viking's $350 pp fee to modify the flight once ticketed (about 2 months before fight).

If it's the Airline's that making the unreasonable change/cancellation (not by us), then wouldn't be reasonable for Viking to help us to make update/correction back to near our orig planned flights without charging us the $350 fee?

Otherwise, once ticketed, we could make our flight changes/update/corrections directly with the Airlines, without involving Viking, since it's the Airlines that made the change?

Not sure if it varies by airline.  For our United flight, we were not able to make any major changes (change of date or flight #) with the airline either before or after ticketing.  When I called United, agent said we needed to make flight changes through Viking. 

[mhb1757]

If the airline changes the flight by more than 2 hours (or less if it results in inadequate connection time) Viking nor the airline will charge you a change fee and they will work with you to find an acceptable alternative. Viking charges the change fee if you decide you want a different flight or date, etc. (not related to a change in the flight schedule) after the flights have been ticketed. 

[FlyerTalker]

6 hours ago, mhb1757 said:

If the airline changes the flight by more than 2 hours (or less if it results in inadequate connection time) Viking nor the airline will charge you a change fee and they will work with you to find an acceptable alternative.

 

Not correct.

 

Each individual airline has their own policy on time changes.  There is no blanket "2 hours" rule.

[PKNC]

Our outbound flight was just changed by Viking Air. We have Air Plus. I was told that Viking no longer has seats on Delta transferring through Amsterdam, although seats are available on Delta's web site. So, we now have a 5 hour layover in London, which we originally changed months ago, on AA.

Does it make sense to just get this ticketed now and call AA to try to upgrade? The flight is fairly full and with my Delta status, I was able to upgrade to better seats. Having status on Delta and a shorter layover is why we changed the original itinerary. 

This is a river cruise but posted here because there's more activity.

[FlyerTalker]

51 minutes ago, PKNC said:

Our outbound flight was just changed by Viking Air. We have Air Plus. I was told that Viking no longer has seats on Delta transferring through Amsterdam, although seats are available on Delta's web site.

 

Because the inventory available to Viking (or any cruiseline) can be different than the availability open to the general public directly from the carrier.  You are dependent on what's in the contract between the carrier and the cruiseline.

 

53 minutes ago, PKNC said:

Does it make sense to just get this ticketed now and call AA to try to upgrade?

 

Unless you know the fare rules of the ticket (and that's more than just the class of service), you do not know if the ticket can even be upgraded.  And what that upgrade might require.  Many contract tickets cannot be upgraded, either via miles or money.

 

55 minutes ago, PKNC said:

The flight is fairly full

 

If you are determining this through a seat map, you are going down the wrong path.  Seat maps are a poor guide to the inventory on a flight, as you have issues of both blocked seats and passengers not assigned to seats skewing displays in multiple directions.

 

 

[PKNC]

Now I’m wondering what else will go wrong. I requested “early ticketing” (we are 42 days out) and was told this would occur in 48 hours.  48 hours has passed and no ticket number. I’ll call again tomorrow, my concern is that we’ll lose our decent flight home. Any thoughts on why this is happening?

[FlyerTalker]

13 hours ago, PKNC said:

Any thoughts on why this is happening?

 

Could be anything in the range from a benign "it's further down the queue and is being handled in order" to "those seats are no longer available to you".

 

And there is no way to find out which.  Until ticketing actually occurs.

 

Ah, the joys of cruiseline provided air!

[shadowlover]

22 hours ago, PKNC said:

Now I’m wondering what else will go wrong. I requested “early ticketing” (we are 42 days out) and was told this would occur in 48 hours.  48 hours has passed and no ticket number. I’ll call again tomorrow, my concern is that we’ll lose our decent flight home. Any thoughts on why this is happening?

When we call and ask to be ticketed they do it while we are on the phone with them...We were months out and just told them to ticket us because we were happy with the flights and viking air said ok and did it.

[PKNC]

I called Viking Air just now, and they told me that they would re-issue the ticketing request and could not tell me why it has not been ticketed since my original request 4 days ago. This is after the agent told me this morning that it would be ticketed in a few hours. They could not tell me if there was a backlog or why it has not been ticketed. I am just over a month out from travel, and angry that since they switched my outbound flight (with no other choices now given to me), I can't even sit by my husband because the seats are taken. I'm not given any other options for an outbound choice even though many exist. 

 

This experience is completely different from my last cruise and it's been horrible service. I don't think I'll do Viking Air again. I guess if I'm not ticketed by two weeks before departure, I'll have to cancel and take a voucher because I feel like there's some kind of problem and no one is able to address it.

[Peregrina651]

1 hour ago, PKNC said:

I called Viking Air just now, and they told me that they would re-issue the ticketing request and could not tell me why it has not been ticketed since my original request 4 days ago. This is after the agent told me this morning that it would be ticketed in a few hours. They could not tell me if there was a backlog or why it has not been ticketed. I am just over a month out from travel, and angry that since they switched my outbound flight (with no other choices now given to me), I can't even sit by my husband because the seats are taken. I'm not given any other options for an outbound choice even though many exist. 

 

This experience is completely different from my last cruise and it's been horrible service. I don't think I'll do Viking Air again. I guess if I'm not ticketed by two weeks before departure, I'll have to cancel and take a voucher because I feel like there's some kind of problem and no one is able to address it.

 

Try contacting the folks at tellus@vikingcruises.com and see if they can help you.  Something as commonplace as air reservations  should not be this difficult. Be sure to include your booking number and your phone number.

 

Also, the only way you can cancel and get a voucher when it is two weeks out is to have booked under  a Risk-Free Guarantee. There were a variety of RFG offered with different cancellation deadlines; not all of them were 48 hours or two weeks prior. Before you rush into canceling, please make sure that you have the correct facts; you don't want to find that not only won't you be getting a voucher but also that your reason for canceling is not covered by your insurance.

 

 

[oskidunker]

13 hours ago, shadowlover said:

When we call and ask to be ticketed they do it while we are on the phone with them...We were months out and just told them to ticket us because we were happy with the flights and viking air said ok and did it.

I am already ticketed with klm and british air for March 20 cruise. Seats assigned in business. 

[CDNPolar]

51 minutes ago, oskidunker said:

I am already ticketed with klm and british air for March 20 cruise. Seats assigned in business. 

In all due respect - you may be ticketed but that does not mean that flights you booked will not be cancelled, changed, or an equipment change that will require you to interact again with either Viking or the Airline.

 

We have tickets that were ticketed 6 months ago, (not with Viking)  and we are still 3 months to using them and we have had 5 changes so far that impacted time of departure, time of connections, and seating.

[oskidunker]

True. All we can do is hope for the best

[CDNPolar]

I started flying when you could book and you were charged when you took the flight.  You could change and cancel without any penalty...  this of course was when an airline ticket had 15 carbon copies in a booklet kind of thingy...  was a dream to fly then.  Now, it is the most dreaded part of the trip - for me.

 

We book, give them CASH up front for months in advance and there is absolutely no responsibility to the customer at all.  

[Peregrina651]

1 hour ago, CDNPolar said:

I started flying when you could book and you were charged when you took the flight.  You could change and cancel without any penalty...  this of course was when an airline ticket had 15 carbon copies in a booklet kind of thingy...  was a dream to fly then.  Now, it is the most dreaded part of the trip - for me.

 

We book, give them CASH up front for months in advance and there is absolutely no responsibility to the customer at all.  

 

I remember those days.  And student standby, too. That was back in the days of government regulation. 

[PKNC]

Just an update - my air was ticketed late last night so I was able to go into the AA site today and pay extra for preferred economy seats (more leg room), although we're on aisles across from each other since other seats were gone in that row. I don't know what happened - if my request reached the top of a queue, or if the agent last night, who sent in the ticketing request a second time, did the trick. I also sent out an email to TellUs but don't think there was enough time for them to rectify the situation. 

 

Anyway, if anyone else has delays in ticketing, I would recommend that you call Air Plus and ask them to re-issue the request. I still have a bad taste in my mouth that we were left with the original flight with the 5 hour layover. Had I known better, I should have requested ticketing as soon as my changes were authorized 6 weeks ago. My preferred Delta flight has not been cancelled, Viking just took away the option for me. I am wondering if seats were given to others for some reason.

 

The other note with this ticket - I had the option to upgrade to Business Class on AA's web site but only on the AA portion of the trip. There was no option to upgrade to Premium Economy although seats are available. Just a FYI for others who may be interested in adjusting a Viking ticket with the airlines. I don't know if this is because I'm flying out AA and returning Delta or not.