Flight schedule changed? What else in your trip to check

When an airline changes your flight, do two things in order. First, decide about the flight itself: accept the new time, ask for a free change, or ask for a refund if the change is big enough. Then walk through everything you booked after that flight and check each item against the new time, one at a time.

This is written for trips on U.S. airlines, where the Department of Transportation sets the refund rules. It can't tell you what your particular fare allows, and it doesn't cover compensation for a delay.

Example: a 3 hour 15 minute change

Say the email arrives on a Tuesday. Your domestic flight, which was due to land at 14:10 on Friday, now lands at 17:25. Nothing else in your trip has been told. This is what was booked around it, in the order it happens.

What that flight was holding up

An illustration. The last column is what you'd do, and only the first three rows need anything.

Step one: decide about the flight

Before you touch the hotel, settle what you're doing about the flight, because everything else follows from it. You have three real options: accept the new time, ask the airline for a different flight at no charge, or, if you'd rather not travel at all, ask for a refund.

The refund option depends on how big the change is. Federal regulation 14 CFR 260.2 defines a significant change as a departure at least 3 hours earlier or an arrival at least 3 hours later on a domestic flight (6 hours on an international one), or a different airport, an added connection, or a downgrade in class of service. Our example flight, 3 hours 15 minutes later, meets the domestic line. If your change does, and you'd rather not fly, ask the airline in those words whether it's a significant change and whether you can have a refund instead of a credit. DOT has been revising parts of its refund rules, so check the current wording on its site before you rely on a number.

Step two: walk downward through what depends on it

Do this on paper or in a note. It takes ten minutes and saves the guessing.

1. Write the old time and the new time, side by side, with the booking reference and the name it's under.
2. List everything you booked that comes after the flight in time: the transfer, the check-in, the first night's dinner, a pickup, a rental car.
3. For each item, write the one thing it was built on. A check-in is usually built on a transfer, and a transfer on a flight.
4. Go down the list in order. For each item ask whether it still works with the new time. Often two of five are fine.
5. Fix one item, write the new fact beside it, and only then move to the next.
6. Tell the people who were counting on the old time: whoever was meeting you, and anyone traveling with you who's on a different booking.

Only walk downward. A later booking can depend on an earlier one, and not the other way around. A changed check-in doesn't move your flight, and knowing that halves the list.

Words for each call

Say what changed, then say what you need. Use these as written or change them.

What can go wrong

• You accept the change in an app before asking about a refund. Ask first if you might want one, because tapping accept can be treated as agreeing to the new flight.
• The flight moved earlier, not later. That's worse in one way: it can break your ride to the airport and a checkout, not just what follows the landing.
• Your connection was on a separate ticket. The airline that changed the first flight may not owe you anything on the second. See what to do when a delay costs you a connection.
• You cancel the wrong booking in a hurry. Cancel nothing until you've changed the thing that moved and written down its new time.
• The hotel took your late arrival note and still gave the room away. Get the name of who you spoke to, and read what to say when the hotel can't find your reservation.

Questions about a changed flight

Where a Companion helps

Travel Companion is built around this walk. When you add a booking, you say which earlier booking it depends on. Later, when you record the flight's new time with Record a change, it lists every booking downstream of it, with its current time, marked unchanged so far. It edits none of them for you, and it only knows the change because you typed it in. There's also a flight-problem walkthrough with an opening line you can use or replace. One catch: you choose what a booking depends on when you add it, so add the flight before the transfer, and the transfer before the check-in.