How good is ZED Light when it comes to swapping airlines?

**flyer146** · 12-Mar-2010, 04:16 AM

Okay, since I've apparently asked a very interesting question here, which got several conflicting answers and raised another few questions from others as well as myself, I've actually bothered to check with both MY airline (SN) as well as with LH's staff travel office and this is what they had to say on ZED:

1- you ALWAYS have to buy tickets for a flight on a ZED participating carrier at your own airline.

2- most ZED carriers require ZM, so this is the standard ZED fare, but occasionally some require ZH whereas the 'really good friends' (like LH+SN+LX or DL+AF for instance) are satisfied with merely a ZL from each others employees.

3- ZED tickets are valid on ALL participating ZED carriers, but only those which have an agreement with the airline issuing the ticket MUST honour it, the others MAY, but don't have to (provided the fare class and the zone is correct, obviously)

4- ZH will obviously always be honoured even by airlines requiring just ZM or ZL, but ZL will only be accepted by those airlines which have an agreement with your airline for this Low class in place, the others likely won't, but again, they may decide to do so. When traveling on a route which is operated by several airlines, some of which (but not all) accepting a ZL from your airline, you either have to buy 2 tickets (a ZL and a ZM) and get the unused ticket refunded, OR you can just use the ZM ticket, knowing you'll be paying too much in case you get on the ZL carrier's flight.

5- You can NOT pay up the difference to 'upgrade' from ZL to ZM or ZH, as this is ticket related and is thus the responsability of your own airline.

6- You can NOT pay up the difference to 'extend' your zone, as this is ticket related and needs to be done by your own airline.

7- you CAN pay taxes though, since a ZED ticket NEEDNT have the taxes included,
and this is where it get's interesting: you can ask for a ZED ticket to be issued WITHOUT specific destination and thus only pay for the milage zone. At the airport, you pay the exact taxes depending the destination you fly to. Alternatively and most commonly, you will have a destination mentioned on your ticket however, in which case taxes for that destination will be included, but you're still entitled to switch destination, so in case the taxes don't match, you can be asked to pay the difference, although most airlines won't bother.

8- since ZED isn't route specific, you can swith hubs (interesting for instance on LH, since it allowes switching from MUC to FRA and vice versa, which is BTW, latin for 'the other way round' as somebody had asked me) on condition switching hub doesn't cause a shift in milage zones on either of the stretches.

Now, the above matches how I understood it to be, and is also in line with how I've used ZED tickets before (notably on the fact i've already switched destinations), but it doesn't seem to match with all that was said by Mr767er, so maybe that's just his airline not wanting to bother with it and thus imposing stricter rules for its own employees, although they should still follow the above general rules for OAL employees if they are a ZED airline.

That's it in a nutshell. Looking forward to any imput from you all.

**jbear** · 12-Mar-2010, 07:41 AM

flyer, thanks for that detailed post.

Sounds like this is the only potential "gotcha"

on condition switching hub doesn't cause a shift in milage zones on either of the stretches.

**flyer146** · 12-Mar-2010, 08:10 AM

Originally Posted by jbear

flyer, thanks for that detailed post.

You're welcome.
Don't take it as some sort of a black market users guide, though.
Hopefully somebody here will write a real ZED manual for this site, because as this topic demonstrates, it is greatly needed!

Originally Posted by jbear

Sounds like this is the only potential "gotcha"

Yes, indeed, although realistically speeking you'll have more problems with this as the distance between the hubs increases.
For LH for instance, you'd have to have really bad luck to see MUC fall in another zone than FRA, as the distance between the 2 is less than 200nm...

**mrs767er** · 12-Mar-2010, 09:32 AM

I do believe this will be the "most read thread" here

**knyta** · 12-Mar-2010, 01:59 PM

Originally Posted by flyer146

5- You can NOT pay up the difference to 'upgrade' from ZL to ZM or ZH, as this is ticket related and is thus the responsability of your own airline.

6- You can NOT pay up the difference to 'extend' your zone, as this is ticket related and needs to be done by your own airline.

Just checked my CSA instructions about ZED - and there is written that my ZED ticket MAY be reissued to higher fare level (ZL to ZM or ZM to ZH) and zone extended (1 to 2-9, 2 to 3-9 etc...) by every carrier with bilateral ZED agreement and taxes/fare paid to reissuing carrier. BUT, here is my experience:

1) Royal Jordanian, flight from AMM to IST was full, had to fly to LON (which was one zone higher - ZM2 to ZM3) - RJ reissued my ZED ticket, collected 7 USD from me and I was allowed to fly to LON

2)I had ZED ticket SXM-AMS(ZM6)-PRG(ZM1) for KLM...flight to AMS was overbooked, after long discussion at check-in counter I was allowed to fly Air France SXM-CDG(ZM6 as well - same zone, fare level, airport taxes). But Air France CDG-PRG with KLM AMS-PRG ticket was bigger problem - different airport taxes at CDG and higer zone (ZM2 instead ZM1). Again, very long discussin at AF ticketing conuter, I asked them for ZED ticket reissue and paid taxes+higher zone...they said no...finally (I believe they were too lazy to reissue the ticket), they just took my ticket, stamped it and by pen re-wrote Amsterdam to Paris

and I got to PRG....without paying anything extra (although I sould pay)

3)Had ticket LCA-WAW (ZL3) - flight was full, asked Aegean and Olympic to fly LCA-ATH(ZL2), same fare level, same taxes, lover distance and zone - that means I should be allowed fly it...It's sad that nobody at LCA airport understood ZED tickets and what means word ZONAL..no reissue allowed...I was told there is Warsaw on my ticket and it is absolutely impossible to fly another destianation then Warsaw...Had to buy full fare ticket for 150 EUR to get to ATH...

It is pretty nice there are some ZED rules, but it very often dipends much more on airport ground staff, their knoweldge of ZED rules, their actual mood, their willingness to help you...

Originally Posted by flyer146

you can ask for a ZED ticket to be issued WITHOUT specific destination and thus only pay for the milage zone. At the airport, you pay the exact taxes depending the destination you fly to. Alternatively and most commonly, you will have a destination mentioned on your ticket however, in which case taxes for that destination will be included, but you're still entitled to switch destination, so in case the taxes don't match, you can be asked to pay the difference, although most airlines won't bother.

Wow, I have never noticed that such ticket may be issued...will ask our staffticket center about it...

**flyer146** · 19-Mar-2010, 02:08 PM

Originally Posted by knyta

Just checked my CSA instructions about ZED - and there is written that my ZED ticket MAY be reissued to higher fare level (ZL to ZM or ZM to ZH) and zone extended (1 to 2-9, 2 to 3-9 etc...) by every carrier with bilateral ZED agreement and taxes/fare paid to reissuing carrier.

Any ZED carrier willing to take you on one of its flight with a ticket which doesn't match the required category (ZH/ZM/ZL) or milage zone, MAY obviously ask you to pay the difference between what is needed by him and what you have on your ticket, but this is not something which you are automatically entitled to under the general ZED rules, if I understand them correctly.

That's also why you've been able to give 3 exemples of identical situations, all resolved differently.

Always good to hear such strories though.
My experience with AF has been the same: they are fairly relaxed towards ZED and don't seem to bother much about the 10 odd euro or so, which may occasionally be missing in case of a re-routing.

**aazed** · 16-Mar-2010, 10:31 PM

Originally Posted by flyer146

7- you CAN pay taxes though, since a ZED ticket NEEDNT have the taxes included,
and this is where it get's interesting: you can ask for a ZED ticket to be issued WITHOUT specific destination and thus only pay for the milage zone. At the airport, you pay the exact taxes depending the destination you fly to. Alternatively and most commonly, you will have a destination mentioned on your ticket however, in which case taxes for that destination will be included, but you're still entitled to switch destination, so in case the taxes don't match, you can be asked to pay the difference, although most airlines won't bother.

Ticket taxes MUST always be paid at the time of ticketing. If they are not your employing airline (which is generally the ticketing airline) is liable for payment of uncollected taxes at the time of settlement. This means that if the taxes weren't collected at ticketing, and even if the check-in agent caught the error and collected at them from the passenger at check-in, the airline that lifted the ticket has the right to bill for them from the ticketing airline. Also, every ZED ticket requires an origin and destination, this is an agreed standard . An airline cannot issue a ZED ticket for a mileage band and expect that another airline will lift the coupon without question.

Also, the ZED agreement does not state that the traveler can expect to change his origin or destination, only that an airline may, at its discretion, allow that. Some carriers will not accept that at all because of the additional cost and complications it places on their checkin staff. Other airlines will allow it under certain conditions (e.g., same or greater fare is collected and the taxes do not change).

Originally Posted by flyer146

8- since ZED isn't route specific, you can swith hubs (interesting for instance on LH, since it allowes switching from MUC to FRA and vice versa, which is BTW, latin for 'the other way round' as somebody had asked me) on condition switching hub doesn't cause a shift in milage zones on either of the stretches.

ZED tickets ARE route specific. As mentioned above, though, some airlines will accept a ticket on a different route, under specific conditions. Some simply have more flexibility in doing so. For example, a US carrier may allow different route/same zone on a purely domestic market because the taxes are the same. A UK carrier may not because the UB varies from departure airport to departure airport.

**flyer146** · 19-Mar-2010, 02:36 PM

Originally Posted by aazed

the ZED agreement does not state that the traveler can expect to change his origin or destination, only that an airline may, at its discretion, allow that. Some carriers will not accept that at all because of the additional cost and complications it places on their checkin staff. Other airlines will allow it under certain conditions (e.g., same or greater fare is collected and the taxes do not change).

In short: it seems that the more you deviate from what is stated on the ticket, the more airline dependent it becomes.

One thing is for sure, contrary to category upgrades (ZL -> ZM -> ZH) or zonal upgrades (1 -> 9), a simple route change within the same milage zone definitely is the easiest ticket 'deviation' of them all and I know of several airlines which have simply made it a rule to ALWAYS accept this.

I think much depends on the gate agent though: the more familiar he/she is with the concept of ZED, the more flexibility you will be allowed.
If he's unfamiliar with ZED, he'll likely be reluctant to deviate much from what is written on the ticket as he'll likely think of ZED as a kind of ID90, or so, but then airline independant.

A final hint:
try not to have the exact name of the airport mentioned and simply have the city mentioned (NEW YORK, LONDON, MOSCOU, etc): the least is written, the least can be deemed wrong.
For any other more radical changes from what your ticket says, it seems it all depends on the operating carrier's policy towards ZED as well as the gate agents familiarity with the system.

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