Sounds like an odd concept, doesn't it? Well, imagine how many airlines have empty seats to various travel destinations. Now, is it better for them to leave that seat empty or offer a discount to travellers who book a flight? Long story short, they give out that discount. Well, it's funny because sometimes these discounts don't make much sense. It can end up being cheaper to fly across the country to say Florida than it is to fly a quarter of the way. Well, apparently if you do your homework you can make big savings taking advantage of these flights and their corresponding connecting destinations. Let's say you don't want to go to Florida or even Las Vegas, but you do want to go to one of the connecting locations that would be along the way. You can actually do just that. Now, there are a few areas of concern though. You can't have checked baggage as it will arrive in the final destination -- carry on only. Next, more-often the airlines don't like it when passengers do this so you don't want to do it too often or you may get flagged in the system. Outside of that though, you're usually good to go.
Honestly I haven't heard of this before. But I think this is a pretty brilliant idea though quite naughty. It has never occurred to my head, but I think very soon I am going to try and see it myself if it would do great work for me, if I would be able to save considerable amount of money.
If I understand what you're saying correctly, you're saying that you could book a flight to say...Vegas, that connects through New York, and then miss your flight to Vegas since you only really want to be in New York. Am I correct?
I think airlines are getting stricter these days and have done so many ways to avoid this. In my experience, they will always check with you when they think your flight route actually does not make sense, so I'm not sure if this particular strategy will be able to save me money. Overall, the best way to save on tickets is really to plan your trip early so that you can book early. Flights normally become more expensive the nearer you are to the date.
I heard a few years ago that airlines were "cracking down" on this. It's a great way for them to generate an extra revenue source to penalize people like you. They already have your Credit Card info, I think the information is buried in all that fine print as "failure to meet connecting flight..." so they charge anywhere from 30 to 50 percent of what your original ticket cost - even though they could easily charge someone a full fare and give away your seat which is already paid for by you. They're pretty crafty. Read that fine print and see what happens if you don't make that connecting flight and like, reschedule that same flight within 24 hrs. - there's a hefty fee. But, I am not sure if they do that for every passenger that misses a connecting flight. On the flip side, it should still be fine, as long as you don't plan to take the return trip, because if you no-show for 2nd part of your outbound journey, the rest of your reservation will be cancelled.
I've heard of people doing this, but like other people have said, I don't think it's worth the risk. I'd rather not be banned from an airline or airport. Airlines can make your life really difficult even if they don't ban you, by making sure that you have the lowest priority for everything. There's actually a hierarchy for determining who will get bumped off an overbooked flight, for example. Those who book through the airline are less likely to get bumped than someone who books through a discount site.
It sounds like cheating, but it is an interesting concept. I wouldn't want to risk being banned by an airline and have my points sabotaged, but it sounds like you can save money. Unfortunately, I don't think it would work for overseas flights.
Yes, from what I know they do charge a fee when you miss your flight. I'm not sure if that happens with every company, but I wouldn't risk it. Also, as you mentioned sometimes you could get flagged. I would never risk getting flagged and have problems with the TSA. I'm not mad to begin with even when everything goes smoothly. No, thank you!