Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer - new to using Star Alliance mileage

hi all I am new to this forum. Presently, I am a Kris Flyer PPS flyer with Singapore Air. It seems that I should have used my United account, but that is history. Is it always difficult to book frequent flyer trips on Star Alliance using SIA miles. It seems that going thru American Express or AAdvantage (Platinum elite) is easier. Since I travel so much for business (using SIA business class), I rarely travel for vacation. It's hard to face yet another airport. This post is triggered by my conversation with SIA about using frequent flyer miles for a trip from Singapore via Narita to Seattle on United Airlines. Apparently, there are no seats available for the month of August. Is this typical? thanks, charlie

hi all I am new to this forum. Presently, I am a Kris Flyer PPS flyer with Singapore Air. It seems that I should have used my United account, but that is history. Is it always difficult to book frequent flyer trips on Star Alliance using SIA miles. It seems that going thru American Express or AAdvantage (Platinum elite) is easier. Since I travel so much for business (using SIA business class), I rarely travel for vacation. It's hard to face yet another airport. This post is triggered by my conversation with SIA about using frequent flyer miles for a trip from Singapore via Narita to Seattle on United Airlines. Apparently, there are no seats available for the month of August. Is this typical? thanks, charlie
Yes, August is peak season - so probably no seats (although it's a bit surprising if it's the only month) as:

1) UA releases less award inventory in anticipation of selling more revenue ones
2) The limited number of award seats are snatched up by others around 330 days before departure (policy depends on airline).

One thing I advise - do your homework, via UA website to look for awards or sign up for ANA account and look for availability - these are a good (but not infallible) ways of trying to get a gauge of what is available for redemption or not.

Also be a little flexible with routing. For example, you may want to consider a routing to SEA via SFO (SQ to SFO then UA to SEA), or on OZ via ICN, etc, and you may need to suggest the routing to them.

SQ website does not allow you to search for award availability on partner airlines. UA's site does but the results are not always accurate. People on this board suggests using ANA's website. However, they hide the results unless you have ANA miles. Search thepointguy.com blog for a way to get around it if you don't have ANA miles.

Once you are able to search, you could see if there is any other SA airlines that have availability for the route you want.

Also, if you use UA miles to redeem, the fuel surcharge is low, whereas if you use SQ miles, the surcharge for a RT Singapore to North America can be up to $600.

I have read that you can fly SQ, deposit the miles into UA and still qualify for PPS since this latter program is based on dollar spent.