To me, this reads that I can change my flights for no fee if I do so in the 14 days before takeoff.
I received an email today to say that I could change the flights, if I wanted, with no change fee, but encouraging me to do so before 14 days before takeoff.
Be aware, that if you wait until 14 days before takeoff, they will charge you £32 per person per flight (£128 in my case).
It actually says “up to”, not “within”. The key difference here being “up to” meaning, “do it before” 14 days.
To me they both say the same, which is you have zero fee if you move your flights up to the 14th day before your flight, any time after the 14th day before your flight, and you’ll be charged.
It’s ambiguous, but I’d personally read it the same as @michaelw90 (that is, at least 14 days before). Not ideal copywriting for a company as big as easyJet.
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Anarchist
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That’s what I initially thought it meant, because that makes more sense, but the more I read it, the more I convinced myself that it literally meant the opposite.
It depends where you start counting from, I suppose. Up to 14 days from now could be tomorrow.
This is an example of crap (or non-existant) copywriting.
To the person who wrote the line in the screenshot, it makes sense because they know what it means. They don’t see the ambiguity.
It’s entirely reasonable for the person reading the words to interpret them the wrong way, because they’re lacking the context the writer has.
Had this been properly copywritten, it would have been edited or rephrased to remove any ambiguity.
To be clear, the ambiguity is entirely in the words ‘up to 14 days’. To the writer, it’s clear to them that they mean “between now and when you get to the point where it’s 14 days to the day of travel”. But to the reader lacking this context, they can’t be blamed for thinking that the days are counted the other way - one day before travel up to fourteen days. That’s absolutely the wrong way, but I can’t blame anyone for thinking this is what Easyjet are saying.
tl;dr, not a scam, copywriting failure. Both options say “before 14 days before takeoff” when you read the website as the writer intended.
On the one hand, I agree you’re clearly correct with this assessment. On the other hand, the copywriter has clearly left the door open on this when they should have known better.
Putting my (somewhat rusty - it’s been years since I was lasy employed to do so) copywriting hat on, there’s no way I would’ve let the website example stand as is. I would’ve removed ambiguity by at least rephrasing
“you can transfer to any other flight with no change fee up to 14 days before departure”
to
“you can transfer to any other flight with no change fee from now to up to 14 days before departure (if your flight is outside of that time)”
That’s still clunky and requires a parenthesis to clarify, so given more time I’d search for a more elegant phrasing. But for a ‘fix this right now’? That’s where I’d go.
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Anarchist
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14
“You can transfer to any other flight with no change fee provided you do so two weeks or more before your flight departs.”
Do I get the job?
Anarchist
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I must be going insane because I literally can’t see how that’s not “you will be charged a fee if it’s less than 14 days before you depart”.
I guess I travel a lot, but anything by an airline staying “up to X time before departure” means anything less than X time before departure is too late.
Frequently an airline will say “You can check in up to 2 hours before departure” which clearly means to most people that if your flight leaves in 1 hour 59 mins you can’t check in. There aren’t scores of people confused by this.
To me it’s the same. But it’s hurting my head to try and think of it in any other way.
) I’d also add an example which illustrates the rule.