4-hour transit in Beijing on separate airline ticket

Question

I have read Transit in Beijing on separate airline tickets about transferring in Beijing on separate tickets, and it seemed that 1 hours and 50 minutes is no good. So I booked the flight ticket to have 3 hours and 55 minutes transit, CA 110 and J2 68.

However, I didn't realise that the flight CA 110 I am taking has a bad on-time performance (if I found it I would probably book one flight earlier), frequently delayed for hours.

1. If the flight is really delayed, how fast I can catch the second flight, assuming that:

   • A. I have hand luggage only

   • B. I have check-in luggage

2. If the 2nd flight is gone, how can I reach the destination within the same day? The route flying Beijing - Baku only have 3 departures a week.

Update: My ticket rule for CA110 is NON-END.RER.REBKG.REF.VLD ONCA OPT FLT , which means it is non-endorsable, but is it reroutable, rebookable or refundable?

Answer 1

You are having two international flights Honkong is considered international. If you have two separate tickets you will have two perform border crossing into China, take you luggage, check in and then go back through security and through the border crossing. I think you will be eligible for transit visa, but you should keep in mind that arrival border is very busy and have long queues. I think that this will take you 3-4 hours.

You should also keep in mind that Air China has very low performance. My last flight was delayed for just 3 hours.

So for safe transit I will recommend to have 8-10 hours between flights.

In some airports you can avoid border crossing if you traveling with hand luggage and has checked in online, but it seems that it is not possible in Beijing, as the online checking for international departures in Beijing is not possible (at least when traveling by Air China)