Today’s post comes from reader Andie, who writes in with a dilemma that her family of 7 is running into. She says:
I bought an itinerary with Alitalia and Egyptair a few weeks ago through an OTA. I received my 7 etickets for my fam and my Alitalia confirmation code and thought all was good. Well, the Egypt air portion of the outgoing flights was cancelled. Only that flight. It seems they aren’t flying on Saturday anymore, but on Sunday. OTA was supposed to re-ticket us for Sunday because I chose “affirmative” in their email. However, I haven’t received anything from them with new itinerary yet. Our Alitalia confirmation shows that one flight as completely missing and us ending up in Cairo rather than our final destination of Johannesburg. (But we have complete return tix from Jo’burg). Egypt air tells me they can’t help because Alitalia issued the tickets. Alitalia tells me they can’t help (though I bet they CAN) and to call the OTA.
I am stuck in a triangle. How would you handle this situation? I really believe Alitalia could probably help if they wanted to since they issued but maybe I am not understanding how it works.
My thoughts
My understanding on tickets is that the issuer “owns” the ticket up until the day of travel. At the day of travel, then it becomes the airline that you’re actually flying on. In many cases for “normal” people, these are all one and the same, but for those of us who are more “extreme” travelers, it is not uncommon to book using the miles of one carrier to fly on a totally separate carrier.
In Andie’s case, I believe because she booked through an OTA, then it’s the OTA that should help her. I believe EgyptAir (who is the airline that is actually flying the flights in question) is correct in that they can’t do anything. I do feel like Alitalia might be able to do something, but I admit that I am not 100% clear on the relationship between OTAs and airlines in this case
Note that as I mentioned earlier, this would be different if this was an on the ground / day of travel situation – for example if they were in Cairo and ready to board when they found the flight canceled. In that case, EgyptAir would be responsible for getting this family down to Johannesburg. That would be similar to the situation I found myself in when our business class flight from Boston to Dublin was canceled while we were sitting on the tarmac. I had booked using British Airways Avios to fly on Aer Lingus, and because it was the day of travel, it was Aer Lingus that was responsible for rebooking us (they ended up booking us into economy on a flight the next day)
After MONTHS of following up I finally got compensation – $1306 from Aer Lingus due to EU261 rules and 25,000 Avios from British Airways for the downgrade from business to economy.
Now it’s your turn – any suggestions to help?
If you have any suggestions for Andie and her family – leave them in the comments!
Points With a Crew has partnered with CardRatings for our coverage of credit card products. Points With a Crew and CardRatings may receive a commission from card issuers. Responses are not provided or commissioned by the bank advertiser. Some or all of the card offers that appear on the website are from advertisers and that compensation may impact on how and where card products appear on the site. Any opinions expressed in this post are my own, and have not been reviewed, approved, or endorsed by my advertising partners and I do not include all card companies, or all available card offers. Terms apply to American Express benefits and offers and other offers and benefits listed on this page. Other links on this page may also pay me a commission - as always, thanks for your support if you use them
User Generated Content Disclosure: Points With a Crew encourages constructive discussions, comments, and questions. Responses are not provided by or commissioned by any bank advertisers. These responses have not been reviewed, approved, or endorsed by the bank advertiser. It is not the responsibility of the bank advertiser to respond to comments.
Dan Miller travels with his wife and 6 (SIX!) children. He loves to help families travel for free / cheap, especially larger families. If you are looking for help, drop him an email at 
I’d contact the OTA immediately. They are in charge of the ticket and if it were a schedule change, then EgyptAir will have procedure to move you onto another flight while keeping your same fare, even if it isn’t available. The OTA should be able to add the Sunday flight into your reservation at no charge as long as you can prove that you didn’t ask them to cancel/refund that portion
Yup OTA is the first place to try.
Prior to day of travel, the travel agency is responsible for rebooking of any schedule changes. They are supposed to contact the affected airlines and work out an alternative.
I have booked two or three trips since OTA really began with lousy results and frankly would not use them again. This is where having a solid CC such as Amex comes into play let alone their travel department which would have taken care of this on the spot.
Just saying
I had a similar situation… I tried getting it resolved in advance and it was a huge mess. Had I not been persistent.. I would have lost the entire trip. Kind of made me think it would be better to just play dumb and show up at the airport with the e-ticket and when they told me it was cancelled fight with the staff at the airport who at least have some control and responsibility. Of course, that’s a scary risk to take. But in my case I was dealing with representative in singapore about a flight in Africa with a european airline and me being in the USA. It was horrible with culture, language, time changes, etc… and it was all on christmas day!
Yes, OTA is responsible for sorting out, and should be contacting AZ (and MS) to work out options.
Irrops within 24hrs of travel, then yes, AZ/MS would need to take responsibility. Until then, it’s on the OTA to liaise and co-ordinate.
If MS try now, they can only exchange the CAI-JNB coupon, which will lead to secondary etkts that end up getting lost.
If either airline take over, the OTA loses control and service capabilities on the etkt