Hi! and HELP!

Hello everyone, I'm a first time overseas traveler and I've been in Southeast Asia for nearly 2 and a half months now. I made it out to my parents' homeland of Laos to discover my roots, while also visiting other destinations in the region( first chance to travel the world, might as well). I need to change my return date. My flight back home is quickly coming up in 7 days! But it will cost me more than an arm and a leg to change dates. My flight happens to be United and Expedia.com told me I had to deal w/ them directly. It will cost me nearly $300! Bastards! I know it will cost me, but what can I do to get a cheaper penalty fee? Help!

I'm having a good time and would like to spend more time to get to know family that I haven't met before. And to get a complete travel experience that I've been yearning for, but have not yet achieved. Also, I'm at a crossroads...I do not want to go back to America right now and I don't know what options I have to make this trip as long as possible, given my small budget. I am beginning to learn pricey lessons by creating a hole in my pocket... one that didn't have a whole lot of change to begin with. Any tips will be appreciated. Thanks!!!

In my experience, there is no way to avoid this fee (besides buying an unrestricted ticket, but of course, this doesn't help in these circumstances).

The only way you can ever rebook without a fee—that I know of—is in the event of weather or mechanical problems, otherwise I am afraid you are stuck with it. The airlines are extremely strict on non refundable tickets.

This is one of the things I checked out on our round the world ticket, can I change the dates and how much does it cost and can I change the route and how much does it cost. Thing is when you are travelling you never know what is going to change especially if you are travelling for months on end. You'll just have to pay the cost and put it down to experience. We changed our dates a few times and it cost us an admin cost of £10 we also cancelled a flight and changed the route and country we flew back from this cost £100 but it was worth it.

Qantas claimed they had no seats for a month on the segment of my One World RTW ticket & it cost me $1034 to change to an itinerary that suited me, so just chalk it up to experience & enjoy the rest of your time in incredible SE Asia.