How to Read a Sabre PNR Line by Line (With Real Examples)

Sabre PNRs follow their own structure, distinct from Amadeus. If you're used to one and switching to the other — or just learning Sabre from scratch — this breaks down exactly what each line means.

A Real Sabre PNR Example

1.SMITH/JOHN MR
2  DL 145 Y 15JUL 3 JFKLAX SS1  800A  1105A
3  DL 892 Y 22JUL 3 LAXJFK SS1  600P  205A/23JUL
4  AP 555-1234
5  TK OK15JUN/AGT

Line 1 — The Name Field

1.SMITH/JOHN MR follows the same LASTNAME/FIRSTNAME title pattern common across GDS systems. The number before the period is just the passenger's position in the name list — useful when a PNR has multiple travelers.

Lines 2-3 — The Segment Lines

Breaking down DL 145 Y 15JUL 3 JFKLAX SS1 800A 1105A:

• DL 145 — Delta Air Lines, flight 145
• Y — booking class (full economy)
• 15JUL — travel date
• 3 — day of week code (Sabre includes this inline, unlike some other GDS formats)
• JFKLAX — New York JFK to Los Angeles
• SS1 — status: sell segment confirmed, 1 passenger (Sabre's equivalent of Amadeus's HK1)
• 800A / 1105A — departure and arrival times

Line 4 — Contact Field

AP 555-1234 is the "agent phone" or contact field — a callback number tied to the booking. Sabre requires at least one contact field before the PNR can be finalized.

Line 5 — Ticketing Field

TK OK15JUN/AGT records the ticketing status and time limit. OK means the ticket has been issued, followed by the date and who issued it (AGT for agent).

Common Sabre-Specific Quirks

A few things that trip up agents moving from another GDS: Sabre inlines the day-of-week digit directly in the segment line rather than as a separate token, arrival dates on overnight segments appear appended after a slash (like 205A/23JUL above), and the ticketing field format differs meaningfully from Amadeus's ticketing arrangement lines.

A Multi-Segment Sabre PNR With a Waitlisted Segment

The two-segment round trip above is a clean, fully-confirmed example. In practice you'll regularly see a booking where one segment sold instantly and another had to be waitlisted. Here's a more typical four-segment Sabre PNR for two passengers, including a connection and a waitlisted leg:

1.GARCIA/MARIA MRS
2.GARCIA/LUIS MR
3  AA 712 Y 12OCT 1 ORDMIA SS2  915A  105P
4  AA 2190 K 12OCT 1 MIAGRU HL2  620P  530A/13OCT
5  AA 2191 K 02NOV 1 GRUMIA KK2  145A  845A
6  AA 713 Y 02NOV 1 MIAORD SS2  1105A  120P
7  AP 555-0148
8  APE MARIA.GARCIA@EMAIL.COM
9  TK OK15SEP/AGT
10  RM PAX REQUESTS ADJACENT SEATS ALL SEGMENTS

Segments 3 and 6 sold instantly (SS2), but segment 4 came back waitlisted (HL2) — both passengers are on the list for that Miami–São Paulo overnight flight, not yet guaranteed. Segment 5, the return leg from São Paulo, shows KK2: the request was referred to the airline and came back confirmed. Line 8 shows Sabre's email contact field (APE) alongside the phone contact field on line 7 — like Amadeus, Sabre PNRs commonly carry more than one contact method.

When HL Clears: What Actually Changes in a Sabre PNR

A waitlisted Sabre segment doesn't stay in limbo forever — it either clears as the airline works down the list, or it sits until it's cancelled or the flight departs without that passenger. When it clears, the status on that line changes, most often to KK (confirmed by the airline) rather than flipping to SS, since SS specifically represents the agent's own direct-sell action at the time of booking, not a later airline-side confirmation.

Because that change happens on the airline's system, not inside a document you've already sent, the only way to know it happened is to redisplay the PNR. Sabre pushes updates like this to the booking's queue, so checking queues regularly — particularly as the ticketing deadline in the TK field approaches — is how agents catch a clearance before a client does. Once a segment moves off HL, that's the moment to re-confirm the booking with the passenger, not a detail to quietly note and leave alone.

SS vs HL vs KK — Why Agents Mix Them Up

These three sit next to each other so often in a Sabre PNR that it's easy to treat them as interchangeable shorthand for "the segment is in there somewhere." They're not:

• SS — a direct sell the agent made against available inventory; confirmed immediately at the moment of booking.
• HL — no seat was available at sell time, so the passenger was placed on a waitlist instead. Not confirmed.
• KK — the request had to be referred to the airline rather than sold directly, and the airline's response came back confirmed. This often shows up on codeshare segments or flights operated by a partner carrier.

All three can end in a confirmed passenger, but only SS and KK mean confirmed right now. Reading HL as "probably fine" is the single most common mistake agents make when scanning a Sabre PNR quickly.

Legacy and Carrier-Specific Codes in Sabre

Because Sabre connects to airlines through a mix of traditional EDIFACT-style messaging and newer NDC content, you'll occasionally hit a status or field format that doesn't match the standard patterns above — particularly with smaller regional carriers or airlines that have only partly modernized their distribution setup. When that happens, don't guess based on which familiar code it resembles.

Sabre's own format reference tools, or a direct call to the airline, are the reliable way to confirm what an unfamiliar code means. Treat anything you don't recognize as unconfirmed until you've checked — the cost of a five-minute verification is much lower than the cost of telling a client they're booked when they're not.

OSI vs SSR — Two Field Types That Look Similar

Longer Sabre PNRs often carry both OSI (Other Service Information) and SSR (Special Service Request) lines, and new agents frequently treat them as interchangeable since both attach extra information to a booking. They're not the same thing. An SSR is an actionable request sent to the airline — a meal preference, wheelchair assistance, an unaccompanied minor notation — and it carries its own status code (HK, HL, and so on) the same way a flight segment does, because the airline has to confirm it. An OSI is purely informational — something like a frequent flyer number for a non-participating carrier, or a note about a connecting itinerary on a separate PNR — and it has no status code because there's nothing for the airline to confirm or deny.

11  SSR WCHR AA HK1/S3 GARCIA/LUIS
12  OSI AA FQTV AA 1234567890 GARCIA/LUIS

In this pair, line 11 is a wheelchair request confirmed for segment 3 — it needed and got an airline response. Line 12 is just passing along a frequent flyer number for the airline's reference; there's no confirmation to track because it isn't a request at all.

From Sabre Status Codes to What the Client Sees

None of these two- and three-letter codes appear anywhere on the passenger's own ticket or airline confirmation. The translation looks like this: SS and KK segments become a normal confirmed flight in the airline's app and on the e-ticket; an HL segment typically shows the client nothing until the airline emails them separately about the waitlist, or you tell them yourself; the TK ticketing field is purely internal and never visible to the traveler; and the AP/APE contact fields become the actual phone number or email the airline uses if there's an irregular operation or schedule change. Keeping that gap in mind is a good reason to hand a client a clean itinerary rather than the raw PNR text.