Friend of mine wants to fly 5 people Envoy to VCE, has lots of US miles. Leaving PHL April 30, back the 8th of May, not flexible on dates. Claims to have seen the tix for $1800 but thinks that is too high. Must be the ZR108E fare. My questions are:

1) How to get to VCE, I know US flies to FCO but award tix to FCO very scarce.

2) I checked award inventory and not surprisingly nothing at 80K level, but seats available at 160K (ouch!)

3) Would best strategy be to buy cheapest upgradeable seat and then spend 30K each way to u/g in advance?

4) Is the $1800 50 day AP the better deal?

Welcome all advice.

If it has to be PHL to VCE using US miles, don't go through FCO. I recently learned the hard way that this is US's most popular European route and April-June is the busiest time. Two months ago when I booked my trip to FCO for late May, the first available 80K award ticket was for late August! That's 9 months out!

I ended up paying $830/ticket for a Q fare and then using 30k/segment to upgrade. Just so you know, the envoy seats that they have available for upgrade from a discounted coach fare (Q,V,M,H) are extremely limited, so it might not be a good strategy to buy the cheapest upgradeable ticket because the envoy seats might already be taken.

My advice:
Considering that VCE is the destination and not FCO, don't go to FCO. Go through FRA or MUC (Germany) and then grab a Luftansa, Alitalia, etc. to hope on over to VCE. The FRA and MUC routes are much less travelled than FCO and the prices and award or upgradeable seats should be more readily available. You could even look at MAD or CDG, but those make for a longer connecting flight to VCE.

By the way, USAir.com is showing a nonstop roundtrip, PHL-FCO, April 30-May 8, for $860 on a V (upgradeable) fare. I would look into that but don't be surprised if they tell you that there are no envoy seats available to upgrade into, let alone 5.

Good luck

I agree -- avoid FCO!

Getting 5 people upgraded with miles might be tough, so if he can find a $1800 ticket with availability into MUC, FRA, LGW, CDG, AMS.. I might do that. Then use a LCC in Europe to continue to VCE.

Another possibility would be to try and find availability on UA at the 80K level into one of their cities.

[This message has been edited by noah (edited Jan 20, 2004).]

If you are looking for envoy award availability or to upgrade using miles, than I would recommmend you try to link up with the PIT-FRA flight(us 782/781. I've had little trouble in the past with this one..