Infants <2 years on International flights VERY IMPORTANT FOR PARENT

[brg72]

Please do not use priceline or hotwire if booking an international flight. According to Quantas, an infant ticket must be issued on all international flights. Priceline will not issue an infant ticket or has the tabs that you have a child <2. They only ask if the passenger is under the age of 18 and a whole ticket purchase is required regardless of age. Quantas will charge 10 percent of the purchase as a fee to allow your infant on the flight.

The story:

Quantas said that the booking agent i.e. Priceline must provide an infant ticket. They have no control of the ticket until the flight has departed. After several calls to priceline reps, they had no idea of an infant ticket and that we must purchase an entire ticket. I finally i conferenced quantas and priceline together on the phone. Priceline said there is no option for infant seats on the web portal and all transactions are through the web. No changes could be made by a priceline rep. Quantas then asked priceline to hang up and they would handle the matter. It took over an hour for them to take ownership of our booking and add our son. It was 300 dollars to add my infant. It was the same charge had i booked directly with quantas. In the future i will go directly through the airlines for an international flight with infants.

Lesson learned:

Customer reps for priceline only know their product that all tickets must be purchased regardless they are under 2 years if an infant ticket is required by the airlines. One rep admitted that since they were under 2, they should be treated like a domestic flight and no ticket is needed at all and cannot issue an infant seat without a full purchase. They simply do not have the capability on their web portal. Save yourself the headache.

[powerplantop]

Please do not use priceline or hotwire if booking an international flight.

Others on here have and saved a lot of money doing so.

I also do not see where you posted your winning bid to help others.

As per Our Rules and Policies:

While we welcome both positive and negative experiences, please keep in mind that the spirit of this message board is helping users.

If you have a complaint, problem, or question with a recent or upcoming Priceline/Hotwire stay, we will be happy to do what we can to help, but please be considerate of the board's primary goal of helping others and first post the details of your 'win.'

What I find amusing about your post is PL tells you that a ticket is required. When you went to make a bid you should have seen this:

How many under two did you bid for? If you click on Under age 2 you get a pop up that explains the PL policy.

Traveling with children?

Priceline does not offer children's fares. Each ticket will be priced the same regardless of whether you name your own price or select a flight from a list of disclosed fares.

Please note: all persons traveling internationally, including newborn infants, are required to obtain passports in their own name.

Children Under 2 Years Old

For domestic flights, infants (children under age 2) do not need their own ticket if they sit on an adult's lap. You do not need to provide us with the infant's name, but your airline will require the infant's name upon flight check-in.

If you do not want your child to sit on your lap, you will need to purchase a separate ticket, and you will be required to seat the infant in an infant car seat during the flight. You are responsible for providing the infant car seat.

The airlines permit only one lap infant per adult traveler. You'll need to purchase a seat for each infant exceeding the number of adult travelers.

On international flights, an infant must have a ticket, even if the infant sits on an adult's lap. In addition, full standard departure, arrival, passenger, airport and security taxes apply to all infants.

Looks to me that this situation is on you and not PL.

[brg72]

This board is to warn consumers and to help them. I am doing just that. PL is ripping off people with infants under the age of two. Perhaps you should call them and ask if they provide infants tickets at 10 percent of the standard fare that the airlines offer. After talking to 4 reps from PL 1) They were not aware of an infant ticket 2) According to PL a ticket purchase is charged as a regular price regardless of age on PL.

Rather than discredit my complaint, take time to realize that PL was charging 700 dollars more than quantas for the same infant ticket.

You obviously do not understand the price of international fares for infants under the age of two that priceline offers. While airlines charges a 10 percent fee of the adult fare for an infant ticket, priceline charges a full price. Obviously you never purchased an international ticket for an infant under the the age of two. If you did tell me if you paid the 10 percent of full fare. I am telling consumers to check with airlines directly for infants under the age of 2 for international flights prior to purchasing from third parties such as PL.

Priceline charges a full price ticket for infants under the age of 2. Going directly to the airlines, they charge only 10 percent of the adult fair. I think that is more than reasonable to help others with infants under the age of 2 on an international flight when purchasing tickets from priceline. Now priceline was charging me 1000 dollars for an another ticket for our 18 month old. Quantas for the same ticket charged 300 bucks.

[thereuare]

Priceline does not offer children's fares. Each ticket will be priced the same regardless of whether you name your own price or select a flight from a list of disclosed fares.

On international flights, an infant must have a ticket, even if the infant sits on an adult's lap. In addition, full standard departure, arrival, passenger, airport and security taxes apply to all infants.

brg72,

The point is that you need to understand the terms of the ticket(s) that you are purchasing. As you've chosen to ignore the Rules and Policies of this board (even after they've been pointed out to you), i can only assume you took a similar route when purchasing your ticket thru PRICELINE.

Does your situation suck... yeah it does, but it's not PRICELINE's fault that you chose to purchase these tickets at the price offered, without first seeing if this was your best deal.

If you wish to continue this discussion please adhere to our own policies and post our win/ticket information before continuing this thread.

[thereuare]

If you wish to continue this discussion please adhere to our own policies and post our win/ticket information before continuing this thread.

2x

[MayAroundtheWorld]

I was about to use Priceline bidding to book flights for myself, my husbandx and our two babies to Paris. I am soooo glad I found your post! I will not be usimg the Priceline booking for this, as there is no reason to pay $1500 for a 6 month old to sit in my lap. I found your post to be accurate, fair, and most of all, EXTREMELY helpful!!! All of yhe points you made were valid, and I found it to be excellent advice for parents who use the bidding service. As such, I also found your comments/posts to be abiding by the rules of this board. Thank you again for posting this information and advising fellow parent travelers on ways to experience "Better Bidding!"

[thereuare]

Welcome to BetterBidding!

Glad to hear you have already found the board to be useful even before ever placing a bid. :)

If you haven't yet, please read your messages.

We look forward to hearing about, and helping with, your future travel plans.