does anyone here use the china airlines frequent flyer program and have problems with how your name is identified on your card?
Basically, the name in my passport is “[firstname] [middlename] [family name]” and the name on my credit card is “[firstname] [middle initial] [family name]”
But the name on my China Airlines frequent flyer card is “[family name], [FirstnameMiddlename]” (with no space between fisrt and middle names). This little difference in my name prevents me from buying a ticket online as the china airlines website cannot understand that it is the same name (there is a logic rule on their site that says the name buying the ticket must be the same as the one in your passport and on your frequent flyer card).
I can buy a ticket from a travel agent and the person at a travel agent can tell that it is the same name but the computer on the website cannot understand that it is the same name. But if I buy from a travel agent, then I don’t get the discount from buying it online.
I’ve had this problem before at sydney airport. The lady at the check-in counter couldn’t put my flight details onto the frequent flyer card because my name is different. She said that she could fix it and I thought she did but obviously she did not fix it. I don’t know if I got the points for that flight now.
I cannot change my name on the China Airlines frequent flyer web site.
Has anyone else had this problem, and if so, how did you fix it?
thats what i thought but i was hoping that there was some easy way to do it - ie online, without having to go and explain it to someone.
it appears to me that their system only caters for chinese names by automatically putting family name first and no spaces between the first and second name (ie like a chinese name written in characters). they should also cater for foreign names (this can be done by adding an extra few fields to their database and having a flag field for chinese name or foreign name, and then if that field is set then it changes the format of the name field).
I’m sure other foreigners must also have this problem.
As you wrote, everybody’s name is written in that “[family name], [FirstnameMiddlename]” form on China Airline’s frequent flyer cards. When I buy tickets from an agent, they always put my name in that “Chinese” form on it, too. Never had a problem, however, I never bought tickets online (for other reasons). Did you try simply writing your name in the same form when buying the tickets online?
You guys have it easy. My name is 31 characters long, including the spaces. Local banks, hospitals, airlines all start freaking when they try to enter my name into a space meant for Chinese characters.
I don’t register my middle name with airlines and frequent flyer programs, no problems so far to buy tickets or get miles awared.
(I am not with China Airlines though, but perhaps you can try to take your middle name out and avoid these kind of problems.)
Good luck, they had my address wrong and it took six months and 10 visits to get it sorted out.
Pretty much the same dog fuck “that is not my job” attitude there as everywhere here on this mecca of incompetence.
I wish you all the best with this one.
Keep us informed about the comedy of errors as it unfolds.
I have a China Airline Frequent Flyer card and they also mistook me when I first registered and it appeared in the wrong sequence. I only realised it when I got my card in the mail. I didn’t even bother to try correcting it online and just called the customer service hotline and explained it and they changed it in the system and I got a new card within a few weeks. I didn’t bother with a middle name either, too long and complicated. No major headache for me, just call the customer service hotline.
It is not just China Air. I have the same problem with United and NWA. When I got married I added my wife’s last name to mine as though it is my middle name. But my passport is still just my first middle family name. Recently it has become not just a frequent flier problem but can be a problem even getting on the flight.
I was told by a gate agent that they can personally be fined $10,000 US if a name on ticket does not exactly match the ID.
