Fly America Act

• When the use of U.S. carrier service would extend travel time (including delay at origin) by 24 hours or more
• When the costs of transportation are reimbursed in full by a third party, such as foreign government or an international agency
• When U.S. carriers do not offer nonstop or direct service between origin and destination. However, a U.S. carrier must be used on every portion of the route where it provides service unless, when compared to using a foreign air carrier, such use would:
  • Increase the number of aircraft changes outside the U.S. by two or more
  • Extend travel time by at least six hours or more
  • Require a connecting time of four or more at an overseas interchange point

The Open Skies Agreement allows any airline of the European Union and any airline of the United States to fly between any point in the European Union and any point in the United States.

When an Open Skies agreement in place(European Union, Japan, Switzerland, and Australia), use of a foreign carrier is allowed when transportation is between the U.S. and any point in the agreement member state or between two points outside the U.S. provided that:

• Funding is not provided by the Secretary of Defense of Secretary of a military department
• No city fare exists
  • For the EU agreement, a non-U.S. government employee traveler is exempt from the city pair fare requirement, i.e. a foreign carrier may be used for travel to any point outside the U.S. but must land in an EU Open Skies agreement member state before traveling beyond the member states
  • Review the fare finder. If no city pair exists the fare finder response reads “Awards not found for the given criteria.”

Code-sharing agreements are aviation business arrangements where two or more airlines share the same flight. Code-sharing agreements with foreign air carriers comply with the Fly America Act Regulations. The ticket, or documentation for an electronic ticket, must identify the U.S. carrier’s designator code and flight number generally stated as “U.S. Air Carrier flight XXXX operated by Foreign Air Carrier.” For example:

• Allowable: American Airline (AA) 1234 operated by Quantas Airways (QF) 4321
• Unallowable: QF 4321 operated by AA 1234

Note: Some funding sources may not recognize code-sharing as being compliant with Fly America Act regulations. Check the FY20 Domestic and International Code Shares.

As of January 2016, there were 18 major carriers:
Mainline passenger

• Alaska Airlines
• Allegiant Air
• American Airlines
• Delta Airlines
• Frontier Airlines
• Hawaiian Airlines
• JetBlue
• Southwest Airlines
• Spirit Airlines
• United Airlines
• Virgin America

Regional Airlines

• Envoy Air (subsidiary of America Airlines Group)
• ExpressJet (subsidiary of SkyWest, Inc.)
• SkyWest Airlines(subsidiary of SkyWest, Inc.)