Last month, we saw the unprecedented move by the International Olympic Committee to postpone the Tokyo Olympics exactly one year. This was the right move for a number of reasons though it does leave many passengers with tickets wondering what will happen. Fortunately, Turkish Airlines is the first big airline to jump forward to assure their passengers in light of this move.
Turkish Airlines Will Let You Move Your Flight for the 2021 Tokyo Olympics
While I am sure that other airlines will eventually make similar moves, kudos to Turkish Airlines for acting so quickly on this. They are giving three options for customers holding flight reservations to Tokyo for the Olympics.
This is who these new waivers will apply for:
- As the Tokyo 2020 Olympics are now postponed to 2021, our passengers with flights to Japan are offered the privilege to change or return their tickets, or change their tickets to open tickets.
- You may use these privileges if your ticket was issued on or before March 24, 2020. The rights are valid
- Provided that you take action by July 31, 2020,
- For flights arriving in Japan between July 14, 2020 and August 9, 2020,
You can complete your personal and group ticket transactions for once, regardless of the fare rules.
Here are those options:
- Change requests – Provided that your new flight is the same fare class and in the same flight region, you can perform ticket changes for Turkish Airlines and AnadoluJet flights, until September 30, 2021, without any penalty.
- Return requests – You can return your ticket in accordance with the fare rules specified on your ticket.
- Change to open ticket – You can change your ticket to an open ticket, provided that the ticket is used by September 30, 2021, without paying an additional fee.
- Tickets can be changed via Turkish Airlines sales offices, our call center, and the agency from which the ticket was purchased.
So, if your ticket is allowed a refund according to the fare rules, you can go that option – nothing new there. But, you can also get a credit if you no longer plan on going to Tokyo.
The change requests and open tickets are similar except the open ticket will allow you to convert your current ticket to an “open ticket” and then book that ticket anytime later that you want. The change request will ticket the new ticket at the time of the call.
In both situations, you are able to book from any city in your departing region to any city in the arrival region – any city that Turkish flies to, that is. This is great news if you had purchased cheap tickets out of JFK, for example, but flying out of Toronto or Chicago is more convenient for you – no fee!
Also, if you decide you no longer want to go to the Olympics, you have 17 months that you can fly to Japan with your current ticket without paying a fee!
Bottom Line
As long as your flights were set to arrive in Japan between July 14 and August 9, you now have until July 31, 2020 to decide what you want to do about next year’s Olympics! This is really great since the schedule is not even out yet for flights yet you can know that you are guaranteed a ticket for your flight without worrying about it.
You just need to decide before July 31 as to which way you want to convert your ticket – an outright change, return, or convert to an open ticket to give yourself more time.
