Open jaw bookings are a fairly new term in airline travel. Although the process behind it has existed for much longer. It may sound absurd or complicated at first, but it is fairly simple to grasp when explained properly. And it does come very handy when planning one’s next business trip and having to hop to another city or two for more business travel or perhaps bleisure.
Open Jaw bookings are certainly a cheaper option than booking multiple airline tickets one after the other when one has to travel through multiple cities at once. Let us look at what exactly an open jaw ticket is and the different types of open jaw bookings that exist.
Open jaw flight meaning
Open jaw ticket bookings are bookings with a return ticket where the return destination is not same as the initial departure airport or the initial departure airport is not the final destination, or in some cases, both.
Different types of Open-jaw bookings
1. Destination open jaw
An airline booking is a destination open jaw ticket when the departure airport for their return ticket is different from their first destination. For example, a person traveling from New York to London and flying back to New York a week later from Paris. These are useful when one intends to travel locally or by road or rail after reaching a destination, whether for business or leisure.
2. Origin open jaw
Origin open-jaw refers to the open-jaw ticket when your final destination on your return flight is not the same as your origin. For example, an airline booking where a person goes from Mumbai to Delhi, and a week later takes his return flight from Delhi to Goa. These are useful to business travelers who intend to visit multiple offices or locations on a single trip.
3. Double open jaw
From the name and from the previous two types of open jaw bookings, I think double open jaw is quite straightforward to understand. Double open jaw refers to a booking involving 4 different locations, where the initial flight has two locations and the return flight involves two different locations. For example, someone traveling from Chicago to London and then a few days later traveling back from Paris to New York. Different airports in the same city usually do not fall under open-jaw bookings.
Suggested Read: 8 Tips To Get Best Deals On Corporate Flight Bookings
Advantages of open jaw tickets
1. Saves money
Booking a multi-city connecting flight, ergo an open jaw flight is significantly cheaper than booking many flights one after the other. Open jaw airline tickets also come along with the same discounts and rates as a regular airline ticket. Also when looking for a return ticket, tickets for a less busy airport are usually much cheaper than busy airports. So an open jaw ticket and a cab ride might cost much less than a direct return ticket.
2. Saves time
Faster, reliable, one-time booking. Does not involve multiple sessions of searching and researching different airports and tickets. Usually, booking a reliable and immediate open-jaw connection is quicker than trying to travel the least amount of miles to the closest connecting airport, which can involve long layover hours and waiting at airports. It also saves time in the way that, when traveling to faraway locations after reaching your destination, one does not have to travel all the way back to their initial destination to catch a flight back. With the help of a properly managed itinerary, an airline booking from a closer airport can be easily pre-arranged and save travel time and money.
3. Provides the ability to explore more
There are a lot of places to travel to or explore that are far away from your initial destination. If you are traveling to England, by the end of your trip, you are likely to be very far away from Heathrow Airport, London. To allow for that freedom and scope of exploration, booking an open jaw flight back from Glasgow or Manchester or Paris would be a much better option than having to make time for a journey all the way back to London.
Disadvantages of open jaw bookings
It is a complicated and expensive procedure to change bookings post-initial confirmation. Although the initial booking is cheaper than many multiple single-trip bookings, canceling or changing a single trip is also easier. It is not so with open-jaw bookings, which can be complicated and expensive, and the next best flight might be much further than anticipated or cost much more.
It is important to stick to the pre-travel itinerary that was decided because travel arrangements are made as per that itinerary and changing it may lead to missing the flight or having to go through the hassle of long travel hours or even changing the booking.
Conclusion
Airline ticket bookings give numerous options to customers to choose and buy as per their exact preferences. To that end, open jaw bookings are an excellent choice for certain travelers to make, for their business or leisure needs. It has provided travelers with a cheaper, and more convenient alternative to making and managing multiple bookings. Managing multiple bookings often can get overwhelming and may lead to some people or organizations taking the help of specialized agencies, which also adds another cost on top of it all. Open jaw airline bookings are therefore a positive step towards customer-friendly air travel, whether it pertains to business travel or leisure.
Suggested Read: What Is The Meaning Of Open Booking?
Open Jaw Tickets FAQs
What is an open jaw airline booking?
Open jaw ticket bookings are bookings with a return ticket where the initial destination is not the departure airport for the return or the initial departure airport is not the final destination, or in some cases, both.
What is an open-jaw booking destination?
A destination open jaw booking involves a return ticket where one’s departure airport/city is not the same as their initial destination airport/city.
What is an origin open jaw booking?
An origin open jaw booking is when a return ticket’s destination is not the same as the booking’s initial starting point.
What is a double open booking?
A double open booking is when both the origin and departure open bookings are involved. The return ticket’s departure airport is not the same as the initial destination and the return ticket’s destination is not the journey’s origin.
