Buying Plane Tickets

A plane ticket is issued in the name of the traveler, who may or may not be the same as the person who pays for them. It is possible to buy a ticket for someone else. They would receive an e-mail with links to download and print out their boarding pass, or they would simply show up at the airport, present their passport or other ID at the check-in counter, and receive their boarding passes there.

The last time I saw (and was required to receive and use) a paper ticket such as you are probably referring to was when I had a domestic flight within Guatemala. My flight to Guatemala City was electronic, just like every other flight I've taken since, oh, I can't remember when. However, the tickets to and from Flores (near Tikal National Park) were delivered via Fedex. (And I had to pay a surcharge for delivery!)

That's been my experience. I am sure that variations of this exist and others will chime in.

I don't know how the mailing would work but tickets for yourself go under your name. You'll get a confirmation number when you buy them. Once you get to the airport to check in they look you up by name and confirmation#, you show them your ID and they print you your boarding pass. It's pretty simple.

With one flight, I had a digital ticket on my iPhone. I showed my phone to the boarding agent and they let me on the plane. It was cool, except a smartphone is harder to keep in your pocket than a piece of paper. Normally, though, we print our tickets ourselves, or else have the ticketing agent print them at the check-in counter.

la-gamine said:

So, I've never been on a plane or even set foot in an airport. So I need some information regarding plane ticket purchasing. The main thing I need to know is if they are put under your name when you buy them? Or if they have some kind of record of ticket purchases? I also need to know if it's possible to buy a ticket for someone else in another country and mail it to them?

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Is this for international travel? Domestic travel within Canada? Or domestic travel in some other country?

Assuming you're asking about 2014 and not some other year, international travel requires that the tickets be in the same name as on the passport.

Domestic travel in the US is not as restrictive. Up to this year, I traveled with tickets in my diminutive name where my driving license was in my full birth name and that was fine.

That is *not* fine internationally lately, especially as the rules tighten more and more post 9/11. That's why, with a trip to London coming up and my passport expiring the month before I leave, I changed my legal name to the diminutive and now all my documentation matches.

Purchasing a ticket for someone else is no problem, at least here in the US. I buy tickets for my spouse all the time, including the ticket to London.

It's still possible to get paper tickets. But it's also dead easy to purchase an airplane ticket on line for someone else and send them an e-mail confirmation with all the information to either get a boarding pass printed on their own printer or pick up the boarding pass at the airport.

There will be a record of the purchaser buying the ticket (via the credit card company and company the ticket was purchased through if nothing else) and the passenger (through the airline). And also, if it's an international flight that involves the USA in any way, airlines are required to send a list of passengers to the US Government for pre-screening.

Also, if you buy tickets cash, it's a terrorism red flag.

If you buy expensive tickets only a few days beforehand, you are likely to have your credit card put on fraud lock (This happened to me when rushing home for a funeral).

Ditto others.

What they're all saying, la-gamine, is that these days you'd almost always purchase tickets online (you can do it for someone else, but they must then be the one to use the ticket) and you're emailed what is really an "itinerary"...even multi-stop return flights are usually all on one rather ordinary sheet that you print out. I've more than once not even bothered taking that print-outwith me for an international flight...they simply match my name on my passport with their system.

What you have in your mind as a "ticket" sounds more like a boarding pass, generated when you check in. Often more than one, if you have transits but the whole journey is one airline.

So back to your main question...I could buy you basically any ticket to anywhere in your name, using my credit card, and have it emailed to you. Of course it would be up to you to ensure you had visas (if necessary) etc. and could legally leave your country and enter the other.

Some tickets, usually the more expensive and only some airlines, are transferable but only by the original purchaser and through the relevant airline. But irrespective, who ever ends up being on their system as the traveller has to be the one who turns up at check-in.

Heck, it's pretty trivial to evade the no-fly list, if you really want to (at least for US domestic flights).

NinjaFingers said:

Also, if you buy tickets cash, it's a terrorism red flag.

If you buy expensive tickets only a few days beforehand, you are likely to have your credit card put on fraud lock (This happened to me when rushing home for a funeral).

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Not really pertinent to the original question, but this is why I always call my credit card company from my home phone and give them a heads up if I'm making an unusual and large purchase. It makes life easier than a frozen credit card.

MM

NinjaFingers said:

Also, if you buy tickets cash, it's a terrorism red flag.

If you buy expensive tickets only a few days beforehand, you are likely to have your credit card put on fraud lock (This happened to me when rushing home for a funeral).

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One to be wary of, and it's absolutely legal, sanctioned by the IA...whatever, and very commonplace...

On a third party site, an agency, (legitimate) you purchase a ticket for say $1500.

You then get an email saying that the ticket is no longer available at that price, but is now $1800.

Upon checking your account, you discover the $1500 original has been debited.

So you have two options...confirm that you want the ticket at the new price, and be charged again, the $300 difference...or cancel but it takes 2-3 days to appear again in your account. The $1500 is in neither your account nor the agency's, it's in a kind of "holding state" (can't remember the terminology) and the agency has to notify the bank that the transaction has been cancelled and to release the funds back to your account.

If you're not swimming in money and need tickets NOW it puts you in a real quandary. It happened to me once, and I negotiated a mid-point and bit the bullet. But infuriating at the time...totally legal and quite commonplace.

My admin assistant buys tickets for me for business travel all the time

la-gamine said:

The main thing I need to know is if they are put under your name when you buy them? Or if they have some kind of record of ticket purchases? I also need to know if it's possible to buy a ticket for someone else in another country and mail it to them?

Thank you!

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Flying on a commercial airline is one of the most traceable methods of travel ever.

Almost all tickets are bought with credit cards. Tickets bought with cash are flagged for extra screening.

Any passengers over 18 will have to have photo ID matching the tickets, and if traveling internationally, all travelers, regardless of age will need a passport matching the name on the ticket. For domestic flights, they're less strict about the name, but my dad once bought tickets for my mom accidentally using Shelley instead of her legal name of Cheryl, and the airline wouldn't issue her boarding pass. They had to pay $150 change fee in order to get a new ticket in her legal name.

The tickets are scanned at the gate when you get on the plane.

Basically, there's a computer record of who bought the ticket, what name is was purchased under, whether they showed up at the airport, and when they got on the plane.

I flew from Boston to Chicago, then on to Phoenix, AZ in 1984. We bought the tickets over the phone and they were mailed to us. We presented the tickets at the airport. Security, compared to today, was minimal.

In 1992 we flew to Florida. We purchased our tickets over the phone. They were mailed to us. Security was tighter. I will never forget my daughter getting sick in the airport. We used a paper bag (for her to vomit in) and as we went through security, they screened the bag. I remember saying, umm, it's full of vomit. They made a face and still screened it.

At some point internet transactions must have replaced the buy a ticket/get it mailed. Or buy a ticket at the airport. I've seen TV shows as late as the mid-1990's where people are buying their tickets, with cash, at the airport. (But that was prob. becoming a rare occurrence.)

Keep in mind this is 1988. As far as I know the digital options were not around them and if you lost your ticket getting it reissued was expensive.

la-gamine said:

EDIT: Somehow always miss mentioning this, the year is 1988. The flight is to and from France to Ireland.

Thank you!

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1988 makes a big difference. I wasn't flying a lot in that time period, and no international travel, but I recall flying within the US a couple of times in the late 80s.

My dad had to take out all of his keys, change, rings, belt, and still usually managed to set off the metal detecters at least twice because he'd forget his badge (fireman) was in his back pocket or something.

Everything went through the X-ray machine, but you didn't have to separate liquids. I remember once my bag got searched because of a curling iron. You'd think the screeners would see a thousand of those a day. But anyway...

Tickets were usually paper, and I think my dad usually bought them through a travel agent, rather than calling airlines himself. They would arrive by mail, or the one time he had to fly out on short notice, they were sent by messenger.

In 1988, no one would have thought twice about someone buying a ticket - even one-way - with cash. I bought a ticket one-way from Chicago to Denver around 1990 with a two-party check my grandmother sent me when I got stranded after a bad summer job. Nobody even blinked.

I assume, with no EU in the picture, you'd still need a valid passport to get from France to Ireland in that time frame.

You never needed a ticket or ID to go through security until after 9/11. One of my favorite low-cost outings for the day was to go to the airport with my son and wander around the gates, ride the trains, watch planes take off and land and wander the shops on the concourse.

Had to laugh about the badge setting off the metal detector. Hubby was flying out for some work related conference. Emptied his pockets, walked through the thing, buzzzzz. Came back, searched his pockets again, buzzzz. They used the wand on him and it set off at his back pocket. He was a probation officer, and had a badge.

MM

In 1988, the ticket may have been printed on cardstock or handwritten on a carbon ticket set. You could purchase a ticket for another person and have it mailed from the ticketing agency to the passenger, or they could show up in person and pick up the ticket. The ticket was like cash, so it wouldn't just be sent regular mail, but some secured method. Sometimes a reservation would be made, funds sent to the passenger via Western Union or bank transfer and the passenger would then pay for and pick up the ticket at the airport.

Not only would a cash ticket not set off alarm bells, it is quite possible that they would pay with a check (at least in the U.S.).

The ticket must have a name on it. It was exceedingly rare for ID to be checked on a domestic flight - I know someone who traveled on his mother's ticket as a 19 year old male. The gate agent simply glanced at the ticket and said, "You don't look like a Catherine." It was also very common to book tickets as "C. Smith," as that could be Catherine or Charles.

At that time, there were no (or very few) restrictions on underage passengers traveling alone. You *could* pay for an "unaccompanied minor" and have the child handed over at the final destination to another party. Most people just put their kids on the plane and told them not to talk to strangers -- even internationally.

As for travel between France and Ireland at that time - would you need a passport? Borders around the world were quite open, so it wouldn't surprise me if they just required simple ID. (At that time, US citizens could travel between the US, Mexico, Canada and the Caribbean with a driver's license. It was smart to travel with a birth certificate for a child, but not always a deal breaker.)

Baggage restrictions were also much looser. If you could cram it under the seat, or in an overhead, you could take it on the plane. (Excepting, of course, guns and knives with a blade over 4") My husband took a spearfishing gun as a carry-on in the late 80s without any issue. (No, it probably didn't meet the requirements at the time, but it was in the bag and no one cared.)

People didn't dress as nicely as they did in the early days of air travel, but you weren't likely to see adults in their pajamas. (Wow, that makes me sound really old...)

My family owned a travel agency for many years and I was blessed enough to do a lot of travel at that time. It really was a different experience than it is today.

Best of luck--

imjustj said:

As for travel between France and Ireland at that time - would you need a passport?

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You still need one - Ireland isn't part of the Schengen agreement, having explicitly opted out of it.

As to whether it would have been checked...quite possibly not. Certainly I went on several school trips to mainland Europe in the late 80s where none of our passports were ever checked, and I know at least one of my classmates had an Irish passport.

So I'm no expert by any means, but from experience:

The ticket is placed under the ticket holder's name.

A passport, in most places, is necessary to travel.

Tickets are received digitally and printed.