Obscene air ticket change fee for Malaysian Airlines

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Malaysia Airlines

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  derpdeder on 08/06/2014 - 13:04

  +6

  These are standard terms for the cheap, inflexible tickets you purchased. In addition, you purchased them through a travel agent so they add their change fee on top of the airline's fees. You could have paid more initially for a flexible fare and then the change fees would be less/non-existent, and booked them directly with the airline to avoid the TA change fee.

  My only advice is that sometimes cancelling the ticket and rebooking can be cheaper than the change fees. That might be another approach you could take given you're changing the destination city.

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  [Deactivated] on 08/06/2014 - 13:12

  Travel insurance claim depending on the situation, if you took it out prior to booking the tickets or if you bought with a credit card that has free insurance.

  Otherwise you are stuck. Book Air Asia tickets they are probably cheaper per person than the change fees

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  Settero on 08/06/2014 - 13:49

  +5

  did you ask them how much each of the , admin fee, fare difference and penalty are ? its kinda pointless to quote 460$ where alot of it could be just for the fare difference, as flight sales have very strict dates

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  The tiger on 08/06/2014 - 15:07

  Every airline works the same way; Malaysia Airlines is not different. They suck.

  • 

    StewBalls on 08/06/2014 - 17:39

    +1

    Virgin charge $35/ticket (plus fare diff), just FYI…

    • 

      RandomNinja on 08/06/2014 - 20:08

      That $35 may depend on the type of fare purchased. I had to change a name on a domestic Virgin flight recently, but because of the fare type the change cost was actually MORE than the new fare.

      Since the change couldn't be avoided, ended up keeping both bookings =/ If they'd charged me 50% to cancel, they might have been able to resell the fare and make more shrug

    • 

      derpdeder on 08/06/2014 - 20:08

      Not last time I had to change a flight with them. $80 per ticket + $35 call centre fee + fare difference. It was cheaper for me to book another flight and not turn up at the original booking.

      • 

        StewBalls on 09/06/2014 - 10:01

        What was the $80 for, if you don't mind my asking? Were you doing it last-minute?

        Virgin told me that the $35 call fee was the only service fee they charged…they had plenty of notice, so onselling my old tickets was never going to be an issue.

      • 

        derpdeder on 09/06/2014 - 13:12

        $80 was the change fee on the Saver Lite fare, the $35 is for the privilege of talking to someone to do it: http://www.virginaustralia.com/au/en/plan/fees-surcharges/do…

        Flexi fare for this particular flight was $220, Saver Lite $59. So rebooking it at $69 (it had gone up), I was still ahead of both the change fee and the Flexi fare. In fact, I could have rebooked it again and still been ahead compared to the Flexi.

        I would have cancelled the original flight out of courtesy but there is a cancellation fee of $110 and I did not want to test whether they would charge me this or I just forfeit the $59 fare, so I didn't show up and that was the last I heard about it. Hopefully someone got a empty seat next to them on my coin.

        This change was needed about 2 weeks out from the original flight so pretty last minute.

      • 

        StewBalls on 09/06/2014 - 14:53

        Cheers, that sucks! Mine weren't discounted fares, so maybe that makes the difference…that and about a month's notice.

        Did you know that regardless, you are entitled to the taxes component of your fares back at the very least, so even in the most dire circumstances it's worth knocking it on the head to get some back! :)

      • 

        derpdeder on 11/06/2014 - 09:06

        I am alright with the charges, if I look at my flying career I am still way ahead booking the cheaper fares with the occasional change fee.

        I asked for the taxes back and got this response:

        "In the event that a Guest No Shows for a Domestic flight and forfeits their fare, the taxes and levies on domestic flights are non refundable. All airlines pay the levies and airport charges based on reported seat sales and not from final departure numbers. Therefore, when a Guest No Shows the seat is still shown as sold and the airline is still liable for the airport surcharges and levies. Hence no refunding for these charges and airlines has no choice but to comply with these regulations."

• 

  barga in on 08/06/2014 - 18:54

  Inflexible ticket so can't get any refund if I cancel the ticket.
  I checked the breakup of all fees and fare difference was about $150 and rest is all charges

  Definitely Malaysian Airlines suck

• 

  barga in on 08/06/2014 - 19:00

  Did not take travel insurance either, I suck. Can I do it now and help myself with this problem?

• 

  grasstown on 08/06/2014 - 21:12

  You're lucky they can be changed at all. No insurance now wouldn't help, nor would it help if you had it before. You want to change dates and destination! Wow! 500 is very normal.

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  tghodkay on 09/06/2014 - 09:11

  hi Barga,

  Been in a similar situation last year for 2x tickets. Suppose, Travel agents big time opportunity to make a few extra $$. Any ways I by passed the agent and tried Malaysian airlines directly upon hearing the change quote ~$800.

  I received the same answer the first time. Realized agent was one of the human robots :),Didn't argue much but just found out full details and status.

  Tried Malaysian call center again think a couple of time or more until I found a "Human" consultant. Went through options/ alternative days that fares could be cheaper or in the same class etc and bang from $350 PP the total change price she offered was $50PP.

  That moment still holds my personal quickest Credit Card transaction time, to date lol.

  A bit frustrating but saved $600 … so suggest give this option a try.
  Good Luck

  • 

    barga in on 09/06/2014 - 20:24

    will try for sure….thanks

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  slewis69au on 09/06/2014 - 10:29

  +3

  This may sound rude but you obviously don't fly much.

  If you buy a cheap discounted non change airfare you pay a significant amount of money to change it - end of story. What you've been quoted is actually less than i would expect given the original price, especially considering you are actually changing your destination city as well!

  And next time don't book through a travel agent - unless you have a very friendly one or a complex multi part booking they don't make things any cheaper and sometimes they make them more expensive and they ALWAYS make them harder to change no matter who/how good they are.

  Malaysian airlines don't suck in this case. You would be charged the same and/or more by any other airline.

  • 

    barga in on 09/06/2014 - 20:26

    +1

    no offence taken

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  Krispy on 09/06/2014 - 11:12

  the other reason they add costs to changes is also because they 'pre-purchase' flights in bulk and get them cheap as a result. so changing the flight they originally offered is going to bear a cost they will pass on to you.

  Also, agree with the others, you buy a cheap / non-flexible fair for that reason…its cheap because you are not paying for potential changes. If you then want to change the 'contract' of your inflexible, cheap ticket, its only reasonable they treat this an an entirely new transaction.

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  DealzEddy123 on 16/01/2015 - 14:34

  lol this is dumb, obviously changing both dates and destinations would incur cost

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  travelwiz on 10/02/2015 - 15:06

  if you could buy a ticket at cheap time of travel ie. low season when airlines can never fill their flights & change it to high season, when airlines are always full, for only a small change fee, then no one would buy peak season fares & airlines would close down fast.

  Think about it.

  We had client recently who hurt her back. She asked about cost of upgrading to business class SYD/LAX. We got it for $2999 for her including change fee & she jumped at the chance.