Review of Air France flight from Paris to Brest in Economy

Attention! Attention!
War School Strategy Course

Bonus: ma que no show?
Well, come on, I promised you, I'm giving you a secret: how to turn lead into gold… well almost?
I would just like to treat you to the AVgeek Philosopher's Stone and reveal its secrets.
I apologize if the explanations that follow may be arid but I will try to popularize as much as possible (a little like when I have an amphitheatre ofsmurfs uh of first year students leaving the bac in front of me).

1°) The contractual framework

As you all know, most carriers require sequential use of flight coupons unless otherwise provided by contract.
This means that if you have a ticket with 4 flights on the outward journey and 3 on the return journey, you must take all flights (all 7) in the order indicated and without being able to skip any.
Otherwise, the ticket is considered lost or irregular with the consequences and tragedies that this may cause….
2°) Market segmentation
This "practice" is by no means legally mandatory, but it is generally followed because it allows sellers to modulate their offers according to their customers (Air France overcharging travellers from Paris to certain destinations and conversely providing them with better fares on others).
The only tickets that do not meet these constraints are either the most flexible fares (and therefore the most expensive), or fares subject to derogatory regulations (military or parliamentary tickets, for example at AF) or group framework contracts that are negotiated.
It is all the added value ofYield Management to segment markets to fill aircraft… and in this game Air France is rather "good"…
This is why many contributors to the site sometimes leave Brussels (or elsewhere) in order to benefit from lower fares or better travel conditions (the J at the price of the Y for example).

3°) The legal framework

Now we are going to enter into constraints that are imposed on carriers: the law!
Contract law includes what are known as "public policy" rules that are binding on everyone and cannot be reversed by any contract.
It is in this respect that in France, for example, the assassination contract is illegal (there is no need to go to court against Tonio because Dédé la schnouf is still alive and this causes you unacceptable moral prejudice?
A distinction is made between these rules of public policy and the so-called suppletive rules, which are intended to apply in the absence of a contrary clause (generally to provide for the case where the contract has not provided for anything).
In other words, to circumvent this contractual rule, a law would have to prohibit such a clause. This is not the case in France!

4°) The "Forum shopping"

The barbaric and frenglish term"Forum shopping", aims to designate the technique of choosing your jurisdiction and therefore the applicable law.
In the European Union, there is the right to freedom to provide services, the right to the free movement of goods, persons and capital… in short you can freely do forum shopping.
The technique is not unique to the European Union, but it is within the European Union that it is most effective. Think that you will be able to use the same advantages as Amazon and its Luxembourg tax system, Apple and its love for Ireland, etc.
In other words: any European can buy what he wants in any country of Europe freely and <beep according to Cambronne> from others :)
The only exceptions are public health (no "special" cigarettes are brought back from Amsterdam to France), criminal law (no new collection of rented revolvers is brought back) and excise duties (certain fees must be paid for regulated products in certain cases: tobacco, petrol, etc).
In short, you can choose to buy a bottle of French water in a Belgian supermarket, a subsidiary of a Maltese group, which will deliver it to you by a Spanish service provider by paying a Cypriot bank with your Danish card….
But the advantage of this is that the consumer can also choose where, legally speaking, he contracts. A Paris -> Milan ticket (follow my eye) can be bought in France (and will therefore normally be subject to French law) or in Italy (Si applica la legge italiana !)… or elsewhere (Estonia for example).
The choice of its "jurisdiction" generally does not change the price for the end user and is therefore of no interest in most cases! Except that the neighbour's right is sometimes nicer than yours.
With the Internet, things are easier (airfrance.fr andairfrance.tk are not the same thing)… think of those who buy AF tickets in Turkish pounds right after its fall: you can earn 10-15% of the ticket price!
French law is very protective of the consumer but, sometimes, there are better…

5°) E viva italia !

TheCodice del Consumo (Italian Consumer Code), which results in particular from Decree-Law No 206 of 6 September 2005, introduced a number of consumer protection rules, one of which is that an independent administrative authority may establish that certain practices may be abusive and punish offending companies.
French law provided for this long before, but we are (too much!) shy if not timid.
TheAutorità Garante della Concorrenza e del Mercato (Italian Competition and Market Authority) has thus sanctioned the practice of automatic no-show as abusive because it does not correspond to any economic logic.
This position of principle was adopted in 2013 (deliberation n°24586 of 29 October 2013, n°PS7771) and made it possible to sanction BA, AF, AZ, etc.
Needless to say, this position was contested by the interested parties before the Regional Administrative Court and then, on appeal, before the Italian Council of State.
Las, the Consiglio di Stato definitively dismissed the appeals (judgment No. 8569 of 2015)…
The companies did not comply and since they are working seriously in Italy, the fine was one million euros to calm the situation. Since then, it's been strange, the GTCs have evolved…
The no-show rule is therefore inapplicable under Italian jurisdiction unless the consumer is duly informed of how to circumvent it… at the time of sale!
6°) How to place yourself under Italian jurisdiction?
Either you're going to Italy?
Either you go through an Italian travel agency… even from home!
Either you choose a company selling under Italian law!
For example: www.airfrance.it
Moreover, the applicable GTCs are as follows

Be careful the site airfrance.it does not sell all the combinations directly… for the rest you have to use a good old phone.

7°) Is it reliable?

Yes… even if I decline any responsibility in this matter (not being absolutely competent under Italian domestic law)!
Except that facing an "australopithecist" behind his counter armed with his certainty and his stamp of head teller-who-decides everything, it's immediately more complicated!
Go explain to an Australian agent that a Frenchman travelling on a pre-Brexit British airline with an Italian ticket paid for by a Luxembourg card is not subject to the no-show rule…
In short, if you want to use this possibility, take a ticket with a company whose Italian GTCs comply with local law or take the risk of having to go through a long process behind (check especially if your credit card pays the legal fees in this case)