Airline Code Shares Becoming Ridiculous!

[Guest fountainhall]

I reckon there’s something rather ridiculous about airports arrivals and departure boards being cluttered up with endless flights departing to/arriving from the same destination at the same time. Of course, they’re not, but that's what it looks like. No, they are code shares, where airline A has a block of seats on an aircraft flown by airline B, but the ticket has airline A’s flight number on it.

 

Just looking at BKK’s arrivals today, Bangkok Airways has an early evening flight from Trat PG308. But that flight also carries the numbers KL3736 for KLM, EY7731 for Finnair, AF8037 for Air France and AB5757 for Air Berlin!

 

THAI’s later TG flight from Melbourne also has Turkish, Scandinavian, Lufthansa and Austrian numbers. And its flight from Auckland has these plus Air New Zealand.

 

Confused? Etihad is as worse. It’s morning flight from Abu Dhabi has Vietnam, Alitalia, Bangkok Airways, All Nippon AND Air Berlin numbers! But its early morning departure to Abu Dhabi has some different code shares, including the Russian carrier S7 and Air Seychelles.

 

Experienced travellers know what to expect. But what, I wonder, does the occasional flyer make of it when he boards what he expects to be an Austrian flight and discovers it’s a THAI plane?

[TotallyOz]

Luckily, I have little problems with this as I do travel frequently but I do remember my first big trip years ago in Amsterdam and I could not find the right flight and was begging airport people to help me. I was so nervious. That has been many years back and I rarely travel on different airlines so I usually know exactly where to go.

 

I am sure that it is confusing for many when they see all of this. I was just talking to Delta last night and they were trying to tell me my flight would stop in South Korea. I thought odd and asked what airline and they said Korean Air. LOL They are the ones I wanted to book with initially but they were over 2k more than what I paid the last time. This time, I booked with Delta from a US airport other than LA (where the Korean Air originates) and I got the ticket for less than Korean Air sold to me last time and less than what they were asking for this time and I got a good flight out of my family area so it was a Win Win for me.

 

I will NEVER fully understand why all this is so complicated and difficult. I with it was so simple.

[Guest thaiworthy]

Delta Airlines flights in the US were noticeably code-shared with Vietnam Airlines on some legs leaving the US. Couldn't get over seeing departure boards alternating flight numbers with Vietnam Air leaving from a midwestern city. But then again, many refugees from Vietnam have immigrated here, so maybe not that surprising after all.