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Round trip tickets seem much cheaper than setting up multicity one way in and one way out from a different city... It is looking like it is cheaper to buy round trip tickets going to/from my final exit city, then bail out onto another plane on the layover in the same country, much closer to the first city I want to go to, then end up in my exit city, taking the exit flight out. Has anyone done this before? Would having a flight arranged in the layover city attract any unwanted attention?

Edit:

I want to enter Beijing and leave out of Hong Kong. It looks cheaper to round trip it to Hong Kong and bail out in Shanghai on the layover.

Both tickets would be used, this is not a duplicate as suggested. I just didn't want to finish the entire first leg of the journey. Since the return flight would be canceled as in the answer I guess it won't work.

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  • I'm afraid I don't understand your proposed itinerary. Can you give a concrete example? – Nate Eldredge Jan 19 '16 at 2:20
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    Anyway, the thing that usually goes wrong in these schemes is that if you have an itinerary consisting of multiple flights, and you skip one of them, then the airline will typically cancel all your remaining flights on that itinerary, often without a refund. – Nate Eldredge Jan 19 '16 at 2:22
  • You might also like to have a look at your airline's contract of carriage - there is usually a long section on "prohibited ticketing practices". – Nate Eldredge Jan 19 '16 at 2:24
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    Possible duplicate of Is it fair to buy a return ticket I know I will never use just because it's cheaper? or travel.stackexchange.com/questions/11501/… or any number of similar questions in the related sidebar. Alternatively, it should be closed because it's not clear what's being asked. – chx Jan 19 '16 at 2:33
  • @NateEldredge Updated – RobC Jan 19 '16 at 2:46
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I have similar tricks done several times, and the airlines are not happy about it, but it works perfectly fine.

Be aware though that:

  1. If you check luggage, you might not be able to check it to an intermediate airport only (they might just not offer that - it is only good for exactly this trick)

  2. You lose all further legs on this ticket, without reimbursement. Yes, that includes your return trip. So you need to buy two round-trip tickets, one for each way, and repeat the trick each time (or take a normal one-way ticket for one of the directions if you can't make it work).

if these are not an issue for you, go ahead.

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  • you might be right, it is anecdotal. An airline employee once told me that they know the trick and don't like it, but yes, if you are not a FF, they probably wouldn't know, how could they. I removed it. – Aganju Jan 19 '16 at 4:25

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