Delta Fares

International Co-share flights, Who do you check in with?

Coming back from Prague to United States-had a glitch arriving there, all were Delta Flights, but last leg was operated by Czech Airlines. Want to make sure no problems getting back, have already spoken with Delta, Air France, conflicting information. Flight out is Air France flight #-states operated by Czech Airlines, check in the operating carrier. Do you go to Air France desk for tickets or Czech Airlines, will I receive all tickets back to states, ie , Prague to Germany, Germany to US(Delta Flight), Cinn, OH to Lex, KY (Delta flight operated by ComAir). Or will I have to check in with each operating carrier at each layover, baggage too? The airline companies are saying each other, some say check in each airport, some say will get all tickets to US, getting nowhere with the Airlines. Please help, as this is my husband and son doing the traveling, and just want them home safely, no glitches like the one in Zurich, which by grace of whomever let them on for the last leg.

Public Comments

1. Here's a tip: when you see or hear the words, "Operated by..." that means you have to check in on that operating carrier. Example: Delta Airlines operated by Northwest. You must check in at the Northwest counter. You ticket means, you paid Delta and it's validated on Delta but the actual plane that will bring you to your destination will be Northwest. In the airline/travel agency world, we call this, code-shared flights:) Hope this helps:)
2. You should already have your tickets. If they are etickets you should have a itinerary. You would check in with the actual carrier that you are flying on no matter what is on the ticket and they should check your bags and issue boarding passes for the whole trip.
3. Czech Airlines (CSA), Delta, Air France, and ComAir (Delta Connection) are all partners in the Skyteam Alliance (also with Northwest, KLM, and others). You can check in with ANY of these airlines. What happens, sometimes, is a final flight leg can't issue a boarding pass because the computer is down, or the airline is waiting to confirm a late aircraft substitution, or something similar. In that case, the check-in agent will tell you, "You must get your final boarding pass when you arrive at X airport. Go to the first gate agent or customer service agent you see." In other words, you won't have to leave security to go out and get the boarding pass--it can be printed from lots of points in your arrival terminal. Although rare, it does seem to happen to me occasionally when I have an itinerary with multiple flight legs.