Around the world with multi-city bookings

Essi Horppila is a Product Manager in the Finnair.com flight booking experience team, which includes software developers, designers and testers. “This new multi-city booking experience results from seamless collaboration within our product development team. Our customers have highly requested and anticipated functionality, and now they can book their dream multi-city trips,” Essi rejoices.

Flexibility and versatility with multi-city bookings

A multi-city booking means that you can choose up to six different destinations within one single flight booking flexibly also for a longer trip. Thanks to Essi’s team, making a multi-city booking is now easy directly on Finnair.com, while previously, you needed to contact Finnair’s customer care team.

“Now anyone can book and explore the multi-city travel options, which enables flexible booking possibilities across Finnair’s entire route network. Since we also offer flights with our partner airlines, this brings new ways of travelling more easily available to our customers. You can book and combine different flights better and more widely than before,” Essi says.

Booking multiple destinations under one flight reservation also brings lots of flexibility to your travel planning and enables you to tailor your trip better. “For instance, you can leave for a trip to Asia that lasts altogether for two months and spend one week in one destination, three days in the next, and so on,” Essi explains.

According to Essi, the possibility of a multi-city booking has been one of the most requested and eagerly awaited features for Finnair.com. Customers have been excited to try the new feature and have been making multi-city bookings ever since it became possible. Similarly to one-way and round trip reservations, you can pay for your multi-city reservation with Avios.

Stopovers are also available. When you wish to spend a day or two in a destination on your journey, it’s now easier than ever. For example, you can fly from Helsinki to London, spend a weekend there, and then continue to your primary destination, New York.

Popular combinations with multiple destinations

Essi says that right after the launch, she can identify customer favourites within the multi-city bookings. “For example, Helsinki, Kittilä and Ivalo have been extremely popular. Our customers travelling to Finland from Asia or Europe often wish to spend their holiday in multiple places in Finland. It is now effortless, as you can have different destinations with one flight booking.”

So far, the most popular multi-city bookings have been combinations of three destinations. According to Essi, it’s impossible to name the most popular combination – and perhaps the endless possibilities to combine different routes are, in fact, the beauty of the whole product.

Essi reveals some interesting route combinations favoured by our customers. One such example is a multi-city booking of Hamburg–Hong Kong–Brisbane–Singapore–Hamburg, in which the journey begins in Germany, includes two different Asian destinations and one Australian destination, and ends back in Germany. In another example, the trip starts in Hong Kong, and the customer flies to Reykjavik and, on the way back, has a stopover in Helsinki before returning to Hong Kong.

Multi-city bookings also enable diverse exploration of the destination continent. You can head to Asia and combine several Asian destinations into one trip, or travel to America with the same idea. If you wish to use other means of transport within your trip, you can include the so-called “independent connections”. For example, you can fly to San Francisco, then enjoy the stunning scenery of the Pacific Coast by driving down the highway with a rental car and then continue your trip by air from Los Angeles.

Thus, independent connections mean commutes by, for example, train, bus or car, and they count as part of the six destinations you can include in a multi-city booking. An example is in the “Two multi-city journey styles” section.

Tips for making a multi-city booking

Where should you then travel with a multi-city booking? Anywhere – you can choose from over 1,000 destinations in 150 countries worldwide. It’s good to note, however, that the availability of a multi-city booking depends on what Finnair and its partners offer, which weekdays the routes are operated, and whether they have availability. “If you’re planning a multi-stage trip with less frequently operated routes, it’s worth researching several travel days, as it may be more difficult to find availability for more exotic combinations,” Essi advises.

Moreover, the destinations should be in a forward sequence, which means that you can’t plan a multi-city trip where you travel in “zigzag” between the destinations, so, for instance, Helsinki–Lisbon–Berlin–Rome–Helsinki search will not give you any options to book. You can learn more about the rule under the “Key information about multi-city bookings” section. However, your trip can end in the same destination where you began your journey from – or anywhere else.

When you have chosen your dates and destinations but can’t find any available options, Essi suggests trying different dates and even different destinations when possible. More frequently flown routes have more options. On the other hand, not all routes are operated every day. In some cases, it is also worth checking alternative airports for the destination, which may offer additional flight connections in major cities such as Tokyo.

If one or several of the flights included in your multi-city trip search are not available by Finnair or our partners, you won’t be able to make the booking. If you’re struggling with finding options for your searches, you can always contact our customer care that might be able to find you options for specific dates or routes. Through our customer care, you are also able to make multi-city bookings with more than six destinations if needed.

Still looking for inspiration and pondering with your travel plans? Essi recommends starting from Finnair’s destinations pages. “I use quite a lot of our destination pages for dreaming about different types of travel destinations and getting inspired by Finnair’s route network. In addition, our Route timetables page can help you discover what kind of routes we offer and how frequently we fly them.” You can also check out Finnair’s Blue Wings stories for more travel and destination inspiration.

When asked about Essi’s dream trip, she answers: “My dream multi-city journey would include a combination of city and beach vibes in very distinct destinations. I’d start by flying with Finnair to Singapore, then visit Australia, and perhaps return home via Bangkok. Within my trip, I would also take advantage of the independent connections and travel some parts with other transport modes. Whenever possible, I would take advantage of local transportation and then fly the longer ways.”

What would your dream holiday look like? Explore and book your trip on our Multi-city bookings page.