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Turkish Air Code Share --- This time, not such a good deal

Posted by (Magyarország / Rep of Texas ) on

Tonight I was booking my flight for a fishing trip. The itinerary was from my home town to Houston to Istanbul to the final European destination.

The initial flight and the last flight on the return would be code-share with United. Booking it all through Turkish Air was $325 more than booking the United flight separably with United. I've had this happen in the past so I pick the trips apart and check rates independently. For $150 I would book through Turkish Air for the security of one ticket, but for $325 I will just take an earlier flight with for peace of mind.

The Turkish Air website also had some flight times on their own flights wrong on their website. My last leg there are two flights a day, one in the early morning and one in the evening. The two flight numbers were shown, but the departure time for both was shown at the earlier flight time. Not too reassuring.

Posted by
8164 posts

James,
I have never flown with Turkish Air, but I frequently see their rates on Kayak.com are always competitive.

Have you called the airline, perhaps someone could clarify your concerns. I personally would not book flights without knowing the proper departure and arrival times.

Did you check with the Turkish Air website or were you using Kayak.com or another site like Travelocity?

Posted by
2854 posts

Several years back we flew Istanbul to Budapest, via Turkish Air. Amazingly, these tickets were 30% less on Orbitz rather than through Turkish. No idea why, and we had no problems with the Orbitz purchase.

Posted by
1588 posts

I experienced a similar situation when I flew round trip to Istanbul. Adding a connection from Akron or Cleveland to Chicago nearly doubled the price. It makes some sense because TA is adding risk by being responsible for another airline and connection if something goes wrong.

I paid the fare because I did not want the extra worry if something did go wrong. I didn't want to miss the connection and then have to pay for another transatlantic fare.

Posted by
19963 posts

While the flights I needed were all available individually, when I pieced them together two thirds of them disappeared and Turkish Air gave me on possible departure date and one possible return date for the entire month of September; with nothing but Turkish Air flights. It was maddening. Oddly enough the dates worked so I booked it. I will just drive to Houston. The cost of parking is a bit cheaper than the flights...

Posted by
8164 posts

James,
Glad it worked out for you.
Regarding driving a bit to an airport, we prefer flying out of Jacksonville, Florida, which is 75 miles from our home in Georgia. However, I have learned to check the cost of flights from other airports that require a longer drive. Twice, I saved over $500 per ticket by driving to Orlando (2.5 hours more driving) to fly out. Both times we had to stay in a hotel, but the overall cost savings were huge.

Posted by
19963 posts

I understand. I usually have 2 choices with direct international flights: Austin and Houston. Both a fair drive from home.

Posted by
19963 posts

Good question. Travel time is a bit longer, but the cost is the same or less ... even with the flight cost. Airfare, ground transportation and hotels on this trip run about $1600 for eight nights (11 with travel). Its a beautiful hotel on the side of a mountain river full of trout and grayling. Cant do much better anywhere in the world. My US choice would be Colorado, and the hotel for 8 nights would be almost $1500 then another $300 to $400 RT to get there + rental car ..... etc.....

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