Other European Frequent Flyer Programs - OK Plus - I've had it! They won't let me redeem my miles

So I wish to redeem my miles and leave OK Plus. I've got 240k which is just enough for the family and I (3 people) to go in business class to North America/Hawaii.

OK Plus makes me pay fuel surcharges on all flights and thus redeeming on AF/KL the taxes & fees per ticket will be about €600/person. However, if I redeem on KE the taxes & fees are only about €200/person. That is a total saving of €1200 which means a lot for our budget. Thus we decided on going to HNL which is the only destination we can afford to fly on KE-flights.

Now speaking with OK Plus I find out that they will not let me travel on KE although the rules specify that travel via Pacific is permitted. Why? Because this is not the most direct routing. I have to find availability with KL/DL HEL-AMS-LAX-HNL which is €1200 more expensive AND impossible as DL hardly ever releases 3 award seats in business on that route. If there is no availability on my preferred dates they will not allow any other routing. Czech Airlines will not let me travel HEL-CDG-ICN-HNL as it is not the most direct routing, then I would have to buy a separate ticket to CDG first they say.

Gah, I am so angry with this program. I've hardly redeemed with them before so never came across this stupid rule in all my years as a gold member. And here I've been recommending this program in the past, I'll make sure to stay as far as away as I can in the future.

Did anyone ever have any success with redeeming something OK Plus didn't think was the most direct route?

... this is a fairly general feature of all FFP, not just OK. Airlines usually make an exception, if the exception means that you travel on their flights rather than other airlines' flights. They are also not too difficult, if the detour is just a few miles. But wouldn't expect that any FFP lets you fly from Europe to North America via Asia ...

And yes, high surcharges are also a common feature ...

Yes and no, however OK Plus is a lot more restrictive than other FFPs in this regard. Other airlines will allow some flexibility but in my example I would not be allowed to go HEL-AMS-MSP-LAX-HNL for example, even if this was the only routing with available seats.

Furthermore, the OK Plus rules specifically state that when going Europe-Hawaii then travel via Pacific is allowed. The difference isn't that great either, ex HEL via CDG-ICN-HNL is 20% longer than CDG-LAX-HNL.

Paying the fake fuel surcharge is something that should be eliminated but I am prepared to do this. Seeing however that KE does not charge as big fuel surcharge, this would be the preferred carrier.

While it is probably obvious, but have you tried HEL-SVO (SU) and SVO-ICN-HNL (KE)?
It certainly seems like the most direct route to me.
UPD: Seems like overnight in MOW is required :(

Can't say they are great for intercontinental flights - had a business class return JFK-PRG on points (before they let you buy one-ways with points). The return leg (PRG-JFK ) was open. Only availability for that leg (any date) was 10 months later :-) No dates in between

Since the issuing carrier keeps the YQ, OK will try to extract as much as possible from you... :)

Gnopps, the requirements of the most straight route is not smth new. It's sad that the airline doesn't want to make an exception for you, but not surprisingly, as CSA now has been trying to limit opportunities to redeem miles with partners.

Try to call them and ask about the route:
HEL-SVO SU
SVO-ICN KE
ICN-HNL and v.v.

This route could work (as you say it's written in the rules Pacific flights to HNL are allowed), coz there is now such obvious flights 1500 km to west and back in the same ticket (HEL-CDG-ICN).

What was the final outcome of this? And what is their response to the website explictly allowing a Pacific route?

What was the final outcome of this? And what is their response to the website explictly allowing a Pacific route?
I am still waiting for their final reply, I will post here when I have the result.

I am still waiting for their final reply, I will post here when I have the result.
They finally allowed a HEL-AMS-ICN-HNL routing but due to other reasons I was never able to book.

Hi,

I have an Award booked with my ok Plus miles for Air France flight Mex-Cdg-Vie I'm already taken the flight into vienna.
I wanted to change my return flight which is on december 18 for a later departure.
But it is not possible they checked from the 1 of january to the end of april and no space not only one is available.
Its just unbelivible, when the Flying blue shows me almost every day until may award seats are available.
So I'm going to cancel the return flight and want to know if anybody knows if I can ask for the already paid taxes for the canceled return flight to be given back to me .
Is this possible or I will loose this money also beside the miles..
Thanks for any input.

So I've been trying to redeem miles with OK plus since fall.

Sometime in fall I requested YYC-FCO-YYC for April 2013.
Result: sorry, no flights within the whole month.
It took 1 month to get a response.

I felt that the whole thing was falling apart, so I went for what I thought would be an easier route: I provided multiple destinations and practically the whole summer as the window for my travel
("any weekend with stay of 2 nights between May and July 2013, YYC to New York, San Francisco, Miami, Los Angeles").
Another month passes. I'm getting another response "sorry no flights available. do you have other destinations?)

So I'm asking: ... I gave you like 70 options!!! What exactly do you mean?

A couple of weeks passes. Here's the phenomenal response (quoting):

"As my colegue told you, there are no opened flights in America for bonus tickets. If you have some other destinations, please do not hesitate to contact us."

So basically they're saying that they have no itineraries in North America for a whole year ahead?

This company really must cut the crap, go out of business like next week, and relieve anyone of any hope to redeem...

Search for the award seats yourself, using delta.com and Expertflyer is my advice.

Search for the award seats yourself, using delta.com and Expertflyer is my advice.

I second this plus KVS - the staff is totally incompetent, but if you play with dates and routings and give it to them, they will book it.

I.e. I have asked for 2 C tickets to any destination in Florida for end of Dec. No option offered. So I have searched and came up with PRG-SVO-IAD-ATL-EYW/MIA-SVO-KBP-PRG which I have later changed to PRG-BRU-JFK-ATL-EYW/MCO-ATL-PRG.

Thank you I guess I will indeed search the inventory myself.

In the meanwhile, OK provided yet another fantastic response.

Even though the whole summer was given to them as an option, they are saying "sorry no weekends in May" :-)

I also love the last paragraph. They are also threatening to cancel all miles - as if it's my fault that it takes then 1 month to post a response every time, and as if they themselves never promised that "expiring miles will not expire because yes we know we are too busy to handle requests on time" :)

Dear Mr laketravis,
Thank you for your e-mail.

We are sorry, but bonus ticket capacity on the flights of our partners from Calgary to USa for the May weekends has been entirely exhausted. There is only one SkyTeam member, Delta Airlines, operating within USA, thus the options are quite limited. The provision of bonuses from the OK Plus frequent flyer programme is exclusively subject to the rules of the relevant contractual partner, and Czech Airlines cannot influence the bonus ticket capacity of its partner airlines in any way.

At this point, we can offer you Czech Airlines flights or the services of our non-airline partners. The list of destinations operated by Czech Airlines can be found on our website www.czechairlines.com. You can also give a bonus ticket as a gift, for example, to a family member or a friend. The services of our non-airline partners include car hire, gift cards, parking at Prague Airport, and lounge access.

Please inform us by e-mail within 3 calendar days about the Czech Airlines destination or non-airline partner service that you have selected. We will then contact you to complete your request.

We would like to inform you that your request for redeeming already expired miles needs to be dealt as soon as possible as the mileage on both the accounts already expired. Please consider your choice and the decision to redeem your miles for bonuses carefully and write us your current phone number to your answer. Czech Airlines will not accept any further extension of the validity of miles beyond the scope of the applicable rules of the OK Plus frequent flyer programme or grant any other exceptions.


Have a nice day.

I had a ticketed OK award flight on EY and I still received the same "3-day threat" email. Looks like they sent it to everyone, not just you specifically.

If I were you I would book LAX-FCO on Alitalia for your miles. Later on if availability opens up with Delta you will be able to add up the flights b/w YYC and LAX, but at least you would have your miles protected by redeeming them. There are a few days in June available for both Economy and Business class seats on Alitalia (outbound around June 6-12 and return on June 25 or June 27 for example). Worst case scenario is you will have to buy a revenue ticket b/w YYC and LAX if DL availability never opens up (or if you miss it). It's still better then loosing all miles.

Thank you for advice! Will try LAX FCO.

Received same lies now to "ANY Destination from YYC for ANY day in summer".

Just 3 emails ago, they were offering themselves to take a flight outside weekend, but...

"We are sorry, but as we have informed you already the bonus ticket capacity on the flights of our partners to the destinations of your choice has been entirely exhausted.

At this point, we can again offer you Czech Airlines flights or the services of our non-airline partners. The list of destinations operated by Czech Airlines can be found on our website www.czechairlines.com. You can also give a bonus ticket as a gift, for example, to a family member or a friend. The services of our non-airline partners include car hire, gift cards, parking at Prague Airport, and lounge access.

Please inform us by e-mail within 3 calendar days about the Czech Airlines destination or non-airline partner service that you have selected. We will then contact you to complete your request.

Please note that Czech Airlines doesn't have any flights to the United States."

"We are sorry, but as we have informed you already the bonus ticket capacity on the flights of our partners to the destinations of your choice has been entirely exhausted.

At this point, we can again offer you Czech Airlines flights or the services of our non-airline partners. The list of destinations operated by Czech Airlines can be found on our website www.czechairlines.com. You can also give a bonus ticket as a gift, for example, to a family member or a friend. The services of our non-airline partners include car hire, gift cards, parking at Prague Airport, and lounge access.

Please inform us by e-mail within 3 calendar days about the Czech Airlines destination or non-airline partner service that you have selected. We will then contact you to complete your request.

Please note that Czech Airlines doesn't have any flights to the United States."

I would press them to try LAX-FCO. If you want a Business class seat there is availability for 6/12 departure and 6/25 return (or 6/27 return). Book it (tell them it's Z class and they may need to do a long sell) and later on if availability opens up for more convenient days you will be able to change the outbound or the return at no cost.

Did you check CI availability? via TPE or nonstop from Japan? their premium cabins are quite nice!

Did you check CI availability? via TPE or nonstop from Japan? their premium cabins are quite nice!

They would not allow TPAC routing from North America to Europe.

My friend was trying to use his CSA miles (he lives in the US), but each time he tries to contact OK, either through email or phone, the responses are a bit nebulous:

"Thank you for your email. Please accept your apologies for the late reply due to technical difficulties. We are sorry for the inconvenience caused by overloaded lines at our call centre. For bonus ticket inquiry it is necessary to provide us with following details: exact dates, names of the passengers, 2nd and 4th digit of your pincode. Once these details are provided, we will be able to send you the inquiry. Thank you for understanding.

Please do not hesitate to contact us for further assistance."

Since he is in the states, how can he best use his miles to book a J class ticket, either with OK, DL, or SU?

Thanks,
BmB

My friend was trying to use his CSA miles (he lives in the US), but each time he tries to contact OK, either through email or phone, the responses are a bit nebulous:

"Thank you for your email. Please accept your apologies for the late reply due to technical difficulties. We are sorry for the inconvenience caused by overloaded lines at our call centre. For bonus ticket inquiry it is necessary to provide us with following details: exact dates, names of the passengers, 2nd and 4th digit of your pincode. Once these details are provided, we will be able to send you the inquiry. Thank you for understanding.

Please do not hesitate to contact us for further assistance."

Since he is in the states, how can he best use his miles to book a J class ticket, either with OK, DL, or SU?

Thanks,
BmB

It depends on where he wants to go from the US and when. Does he have any specific plans? How many miles does he have/wants to spend?

OK does not fly to US at the moment. DL, SU, UX, AF, and KL do. So are several Asian carriers like KE, CZ, MU, etc.

To end my story (and maybe this explains why they're asking for exact days now):

After I offered other opportunities, I got yet another email.

This time, they wrote (sorry, in my own words because i don't want to look up that last email and re-read it):

We are sorry, but our management does not allow us to look up any other flights beyond what you've originally requested. Either take OK-operated flights or choose a non-flight award or forfeit your miles immediately.


In other words, if you don't come up with something that they have available inventory from the first attempt, they refuse any further attempts.

Actually, I also suspect that even if inventory is available, they are instructed to lie and say "no" to all non-OK-operated flights. I've already seen them bluntly lying to me several times in written correspondence.

Apparently, this is a violation of program rules.
But also apparently, OK Plus is run by crooks, and it doesn't bother them.

Result: donated all miles to Czech Paralympic team, and will not bring a single dollar of revenue to this company of fraudsters.

Laketravis, I really sympathize with you and applaud your decision to donate the OK miles to their Paralympic Team!

That said, I have the feeling that you didn't use the most effective approach when dealing with OK Plus. Yes, their customer service is infuriating when looking from the prism of a typical US/Canadian customer service. But if you have very low expectations and very thick skin, you can actually deal with them. Here are some important observations I made while redeeming my miles with OK Plus:

1. Helping customers redeem their miles has definitely not been among their priorities. They have been just formally trying to follow their own promises of allowing everyone (who submitted bonus ticket requests before October 1st) redeem their miles because they were incapable of dealing with the volume of bonus ticket requests immediately prior to the deadline. Also, it didn't not help that they don't have a website functionality allowing customers to redeem miles without calling Czech republic.

Best approach considering the situation: You have to do all the booking-related research work yourself and feed them the flights/dates when seats are actually available. This means loosing a lot of time and some money which ideally should have been saved if it was a good operation... But then again, OK Plus is not a good operation at all (thus you have to approach them with low expectations).

Anyway, the tools that could have helped are: Expert Flyer (paid service which had a very good award search feature for many airlines, including Air France, Alitalia, Aeroflot, etc), Delta.com award search (disregarding anything that is not in their low bracket inventory, i.e. 60K miles from North America to Europe in Y and 100K miles in J), Airfrance.us award search (AF Classic awards only), Etihad.com award search (for EY awards), KE award search website. The research time would be mostly spent in figuring out North American gateways for transatlantic travel (something you were interested in) both for DL and AF/KL/AZ/UX/SU and checking the availability of Y and J awards using the tools listed above.

2. If OK Plus agents make a mistake they (and apparently their management) expect you to pay for it.

Example 1: I had a perfectly good itinerary booked via their agent. On their request provided all credit card details at the time of booking to be charged for taxes, etc. Asked them to ticket the itinerary and was told they will asap. So I waited and waited. Ten days later my itinerary was still booked but not ticketed and Delta (who operated a flight I booked) changed the schedule by shifting a flight to depart 3 hours later effectively creating a new stopover in my booking. I had one already and two stopovers are not allowed. Two days after the change of schedule still no calls from Czech Airlines to let me know we have a problem, nothing. When I called them they confirmed that they have not ticketed my booking yet as their ticketing department has been busy and well, now I need to find another flight with Business class seat available and within the layover time limits. Of course, there was no longer any availability to travel non-stop in Business. I called Delta with whom I am a Platinum Medallion and talked to their Platinum line supervisor. He said he cannot do anything because the booking was not ticketed. If it was ticketed they could have opened availability in Business for me on the previous nonstop flight. He suggested I tell Czech Airlines to call them to fix this issue. Czech Airlines agents simply said "no, we will not call Delta" and refused to put me to talk to a supervisor. Actually, they never allow customers to talk to those "superhuman beings" called their supervisors who are not to be bothered by customers. As one would expect, they said they cannot do anything for me, cannot find any flights in J, nor in Y, and that now I need to drop the first flight from my itinerary too (it was starting and terminating in SEA) to avoid an open jaw which they don't allow either. I did my homework prior to calling them and I told them which flights to book as they were available (of course, that was after they told me there are no flights available). The tradeoff was that instead of a nonstop in Business I ended up with 2 leg economy flight with a new overnight in ATL.

Example 2: Prior to the situation I described above, I had another nice encounter with their accountability for their own mistakes. One of the flights on my itinerary was apparently booked by their agent in a revenue Business class instead of an award Business Class. Of course, the agent did not notice that during booking, nor did I (since I didn't check the booking classes trusting they are correct). Right before the first attempt at ticketing I received a call from Czech Airlines saying their agent made a mistake and so they have to drop that leg from my itinerary and that I need to find availability on another flight. Just as casual as that. Not even a hint of taking accountability for their own error and doing anything to fix it - just lay the problem onto the customer to deal with and add a 'cherry on top' saying it needs to be resolved today or tomorrow at the latest. I was able to find another flight after about 5 hours of searching every possible combination of flights.

3. You are at their mercy when it comes to ticketing the bonus award. No matter how many times I called in and asked to ticket the darn booking they simply didn't. I guess at some point they finally process those but that point often happens over 2 weeks after booking exposing customers to problems with airlines canceling their legs or rescheduling flights in the same booking.

4. As I mentioned you have no option to speak to a supervisor, manager or anybody else, but the agent 'assisting' you. They are "not allowed to do that".

5. They can raise their voice when they get annoyed with your persistence to fix something and may threaten you with phrases like "we cannot do anything more for you" and such.

6. Of course, you will experience one agent saying one thing and another saying a completely opposite one regarding the rules. For example, if your connection is shorter then MCT (Minimum Connecting Time) one would say that they can ticket the itinerary only if you take responsibility for making the connection. Then a couple of days later you will receive an email from them saying that no, they cannot ticket such itinerary even if I take the risks. Then you call again and the next agent tells you that "yes, it's possible to ticket this way if you take full responsibility for making the connection". As you don't have an access to a superior to verify who is right and who is wrong, you just allow them to ping-pong you.

Anyway, I was able to get my itinerary ticketed at the end but I paid dearly for that 'privilege' in terms of time lost, cell phone minutes burned, compromises made (loosing business class nonstop for an Y class connection for the same miles price), and most importantly I had them testing my nerves to the limit. Welcome to the world of OK Plus ;-)!

P.S. All that said, there are several objective factors that make redeeming bonus tickets for transatlantic flights very difficult. First, Air France and KLM severely reduced their award ticket availability for SkyTeam partners back in August/September. Prior to the summer of 2012 it was fairly easy to find an AF or KL-operated transatlantic flight with Y (and often J) seats available for awards/bonus tickets. This is extremely difficult to find now. Second, over the last few Delta has been extremely greedy in terms of releasing transatlantic award seats to SkyTeam partners. Same actually applies to DL domestic flights. Third, OK no longer flies to USA nor Canada. So they cannot offer transatlantic awards of their own even if they wanted to.

VladQ,

Thank you for summarizing your experience :)

It resonates with mine, although I was lucky enough not to have agents raise voice on me...

In fact, in the end I even didn't want a transatlantic.

I surrendered that option and just wanted to fly anywhere within North America with my family for a few days.

Delta operates daily direct flights from YYC to SLC and MSP (and other delta flights from YYC as well), effectively connecting YYC to the rest of the continent.

But OKPLUS insisted that all Delta award inventory within North America was exhausted as well - regardless of the fact that I saw award seats available in third-party engines you mentioned :-)

They simply refused to honor requests...

In the end, I felt that I spent more time and effort trying to book anything than the miles were worth in the first place.

Anyway, now that the miles are no longer in my account and I don't need to deal with this company anymore, I feel relieved :)

Delta operates daily direct flights from YYC to SLC and MSP (and other delta flights from YYC as well), effectively connecting YYC to the rest of the continent.

But OKPLUS insisted that all Delta award inventory within North America was exhausted as well - regardless of the fact that I saw award seats available in third-party engines you mentioned :-)

They simply refused to honor requests...


There is award availability both in Y and J on DL flights to MSP on various days as long as you were flexible and I think you mentioned you were very flexible. The problem is they don't bother to check unless you feed them the flights and the dates one by one including the award classes (for DL it's O for Business and N for Economy). I have had them saying there are no award seats for my dates on DL only to conceed that there are when I gave them the specific flight numbers, dates, and classes. They are just lazy and not willing to use their brains. When they are proven wrong they don't bother to apologize or try to improve.

You are fortunate in a way not to have to deal with them anymore. I am not returning to OK Plus either in the foreseeable future.

I'd like to add one point here in defence of OK Plus: Although you may see award availability in various tools it may not be bookable for your OK+ flights. Reasons may be (I have encountered them all within Skyteam, as I have Amadeus-access I'm able to compare online vs. what agents see):

1. Married segments. YYC-SLC and SLC-LAX may be available but YYC-SLC-LAX is not due to Delta no releasing award seats on this connection although the individual flights have award seats available.
2. Correct availability. Delta has several award levels; when using the Delta search engine you have to make sure you find awards in their lowest award level.
3. Different reservation systems. There may be availability in one reservation system (like Sabre) but not Amadeus that OK+ uses.
4. Using correct online tool. AF/KL releases more seats on their flights to Flying Blue members than they release to partner programs. So if you find an AF/KL-flight with award seats on their webpage that doesn't mean it is released to OK+. A very good example of this is to/from USA on Saturdays...

The last reason (I'm sure there are more) 5. may be due to a lazy agent or bad working tools. Perhaps you found a connection with a 2h layover but their computer is programmed only to show the connection with 1h layover. The agent perhaps doesn't see the 2h-layover at all unless he/she searches on a segment basis.

On a general note; I found the Delta award search enginge be the one that best matched OK+ reality when looking for DL/AM/AF/KL-flights. Make sure you search by schedule as AM/AF/KL-flights may not show up otherwise.

1. Married segments. YYC-SLC and SLC-LAX may be available but YYC-SLC-LAX is not due to Delta no releasing award seats on this connection although the individual flights have award seats available.


It's possible (I think mostly on those 'flights' with a stop which count as one segment), but the method most folks use to search for Delta award seats is by running the search on one way from origin to destination first and only if it does not yield anything in low, then switch to searching by segments/to and from a connection. If one finds all segments in low between the origin and the destination, plugs those in Delta.com Multi-City search and gets them priced in low from original to destination, the results should be bookable not just on DL.com, but also with OK Plus. One important note is that the search must be conducted without being logged in (as high level medallions apparently have access to expanded availability in low, not available to the partners)


2. Correct availability. Delta has several award levels; when using the Delta search engine you have to make sure you find awards in their lowest award level.


Yes, this is 101 in SkyTeam award search. Same applies to AF/KL.


3. Different reservation systems. There may be availability in one reservation system (like Sabre) but not Amadeus that OK+ uses.


I am not really experienced in this aspect, but how can the same airline publish its awards in several reservation systems? OK Plus agents should know which one they are supposed to use for a specific airline, right?


4. Using correct online tool. AF/KL releases more seats on their flights to Flying Blue members than they release to partner programs. So if you find an AF/KL-flight with award seats on their webpage that doesn't mean it is released to OK+. A very good example of this is to/from USA on Saturdays...


The best way to search this is by checking on ExpertFlyer (O and X classes) or plugging in the flights into Delta.com and searching by schedule.
On a general note; I found the Delta award search enginge be the one that best matched OK+ reality when looking for DL/AM/AF/KL-flights. Make sure you search by schedule as AM/AF/KL-flights may not show up otherwise.
+1. It also searches KE awards as well as VA and AS awards (though the latter two are not usable on OK Plus miles)

My experience is that Delta.com and airfrance.com were showing availability in lowest award buckets, but OK agents said repeatedly that they can't book them.

Gnopps - is there any bullet-proof rule? I'm trying now to change some stupid itinerary from Europe to SFO or LAX for my parents-in-law, before I loose even the taxes paid (huge ones, btw).

My experience is that Delta.com and airfrance.com were showing availability in lowest award buckets, but OK agents said repeatedly that they can't book them.

Gnopps - is there any bullet-proof rule? I'm trying now to change some stupid itinerary from Europe to SFO or LAX for my parents-in-law, before I loose even the taxes paid (huge ones, btw).

To LAX I would recommend SU via SVO, if you find the availability.


I managed to successfully redeem all the miles with OK+, bringing account to zero. I really enjoyed them a number of years when they had decent earning rates and good upgrades (I guess I had over 180 upgrades on OK metal over the years), but now they even do not fly anywhere nearby me any more.

My experience is that Delta.com and airfrance.com were showing availability in lowest award buckets, but OK agents said repeatedly that they can't book them.

Gnopps - is there any bullet-proof rule? I'm trying now to change some stupid itinerary from Europe to SFO or LAX for my parents-in-law, before I loose even the taxes paid (huge ones, btw).
Can you give an example of flights that they can't see?

Can you give an example of flights that they can't see?

I had same experience when building last award, though the reason was in my opinion that KVS is much less accurate for AF/KL award than EF. EF pretty much matches responses I got from all the agents.

I had same experience when building last award, though the reason was in my opinion that KVS is much less accurate for AF/KL award than EF.

KVS Tool supports many different AF/KL Award Types, so it is important to select the correct Method, depending on the FFP you will be redeeming from.

I'd like to add one point here in defence of OK Plus: ... 1. Married segments. YYC-SLC and SLC-LAX may be available but YYC-SLC-LAX is not ...Just to clarify things up:

The latest version of my request was to fly anywhere in the North America anytime for 365 days ahead. That included YYC-SLC and YYC-MSP - direct flights with significant availability of award seats.

The latest response from OK Plus was not that they don't see award seats. It was that they are not willing to consider giving any tickets for any itineraries, even if available, as long as that was not the itinerary requested originally.

Basically they told me, "you had one shot. we don't have THOSE seats. we will not even consider any other requests and will not give you anything else regardless of availability, because that's what management tells us".

This is a direct violation of OK Plus program rules, but they don't care.

This is why I call them crooks and thieves.

If they just couldn't see award seats, I would call them incompetent.