Will boarding a two-leg flight at the stopover airport cause any problems?

Will boarding a two-leg flight at the stopover airport cause any problems? - Photo of People Boarding Airliner

Recently, I purchased a two-leg plane ticket from New York City (LGA) via Philadelphia (PHL) to my final destination (which we'll call XYZ). I happened to be coming from a place from which it wasn't very much harder to get to PHL than to get to LGA. This being the case, I very much wanted to just purchase a ticket from PHL to XYZ and call it a day, but for whatever reason, the PHL-XYZ ticket by itself cost something like twice as much as LGA-PHL-XYZ, so I ended up buying the latter.

This brings me to my question: having purchased the LGA-PHL-XYZ ticket, could I simply forgo the LGA-PHL leg and head straight to PHL to catch my flight to XYZ? Would this cause any problems (e.g. with the TSA or whatnot)?






Pictures about "Will boarding a two-leg flight at the stopover airport cause any problems?"

Will boarding a two-leg flight at the stopover airport cause any problems? - People Walking Towards White Plane
Will boarding a two-leg flight at the stopover airport cause any problems? - People Walking Inside Airline
Will boarding a two-leg flight at the stopover airport cause any problems? - Aircraft



Can I board the second leg of a flight?

No. If you miss any leg of your ticketed itinerary, the airline will cancel all remaining legs of the flight. As a result, Skiplagged only shows flights where your destination is in the primary legs.

Can you board a flight at the layover?

In general, if you're on a domestic flight, once you land for your layover, you'll pass through a transfer area that will take you to the gate for your next flight without having to check in again. Your bags will automatically pass through to the next flight without you having to collect them.

Are you allowed out of the airport during a stopover?

Yes, you can leave the airport during a layover, provided your passport allows you visa-free entry to the country you're in and you have enough time between flights. In fact, some people intentionally book flights with longer layovers (which are often cheaper) so they get to see a new city.

Do I have to recheck my luggage with connecting flights?

If your flights were booked under one ticket, your bags will be checked through to your final destination. If your flights were booked under separate tickets, you will need to collect your bags and recheck them before your connecting flight.



A Basic Guide to Layovers




Sources: Stack Exchange - This article follows the attribution requirements of Stack Exchange and is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

Images: Longxiang Qian, Stas Knop, Markus Winkler, Kelly