Jan 1, 2014, 6:10 am
Last edit by: NWIFlyer
If you wish to request availability for a specific flight, please state the date and origin/departure airport codes, not just the flight number.
Please also restrict requests to BA/oneworld flights - flights for other airlines may be removed to avoid cluttering the thread and taking it away from BAEC.
As of 15 Oct 2014 flightstats.com no longer displays flight availability.
Fare class availability can be queried in various ways*:
* Please update wiki if you know of any others.
** Origin of data concealed
What do the codes mean?
Suppose we have a result as F1 A0 J9 C7 D0 RC IC W9 E9 T4 Y9 BC HC ...
This means:
There is 1 seat in the F bucket for sale
There are 0 seats in the A and D bucket for sale, but you can join the waitlist in case seats get released later.
There are at least 9 seats in the J, W, E and Y buckets.
The R, I, B and H buckets are closed to waitlisting.
There are two important things to note about how to interpret these numbers that many people don't understand as it is very counter intuitive:
1) There is NO direct relation to the actual number of seats available on the specific flight. They only mean that the airline is willing to sell this many seats on that specific flight. The airline may intend to oversell seats or withhold seats from sale for many reasons.
2) In the example above, the results show W9 E9 T4 (which are all WT+ buckets). This does not mean that there are 9+9+4=22 seats for sale. Interpret these numbers as "there are at least 9 seats for sale in WT+". There could really be anywhere between 9 and 22 seats for sale - we just can't tell from the numbers the system gives us. Therefore, the conservative approach of assuming that there are at least 9 seats for sale is usually the best one.
What does the "C" mean?
Closed to waitlisting.
In the example above we have RC, IC, BC and HC. This is different to A0 and D0: The A and D buckets are "full" but you can apply to join their waitlists (if your fare permits waitlisting). With R, I, B and H you cannot even request a seat.
The carrier will determine how to confirm your seat if it wishes. Sometimes this may happen immediately, other times only a few minutes before the flight's departure. The order of the waitlist is determined by the carrier privately, but your Executive Club status will push you towards the front of the queue. Many cheap fares do not allow waitlisting.
Differences for non-BA airlines
Please also restrict requests to BA/oneworld flights - flights for other airlines may be removed to avoid cluttering the thread and taking it away from BAEC.
As of 15 Oct 2014 flightstats.com no longer displays flight availability.
Fare class availability can be queried in various ways*:
* Please update wiki if you know of any others.
** Origin of data concealed
What do the codes mean?
Suppose we have a result as F1 A0 J9 C7 D0 RC IC W9 E9 T4 Y9 BC HC ...
This means:
There is 1 seat in the F bucket for sale
There are 0 seats in the A and D bucket for sale, but you can join the waitlist in case seats get released later.
There are at least 9 seats in the J, W, E and Y buckets.
The R, I, B and H buckets are closed to waitlisting.
There are two important things to note about how to interpret these numbers that many people don't understand as it is very counter intuitive:
1) There is NO direct relation to the actual number of seats available on the specific flight. They only mean that the airline is willing to sell this many seats on that specific flight. The airline may intend to oversell seats or withhold seats from sale for many reasons.
2) In the example above, the results show W9 E9 T4 (which are all WT+ buckets). This does not mean that there are 9+9+4=22 seats for sale. Interpret these numbers as "there are at least 9 seats for sale in WT+". There could really be anywhere between 9 and 22 seats for sale - we just can't tell from the numbers the system gives us. Therefore, the conservative approach of assuming that there are at least 9 seats for sale is usually the best one.
What does the "C" mean?
Closed to waitlisting.
In the example above we have RC, IC, BC and HC. This is different to A0 and D0: The A and D buckets are "full" but you can apply to join their waitlists (if your fare permits waitlisting). With R, I, B and H you cannot even request a seat.
The carrier will determine how to confirm your seat if it wishes. Sometimes this may happen immediately, other times only a few minutes before the flight's departure. The order of the waitlist is determined by the carrier privately, but your Executive Club status will push you towards the front of the queue. Many cheap fares do not allow waitlisting.
Differences for non-BA airlines
- Some carriers (those using Sabre such as AA) only show a maximum of 7 available seats (not 9). Others only show a maximum of 5.
- Some carriers use "L" instead of "0" (e.g., CL DL YL) to indicate you may waitlist for the seat. This tends to happen when the entire flight is on a list basis.
Help to check seat availability and flight loads
Nov 23, 2014, 9:22 am
#211
Join Date: Sep 2012
Posts: 6
How reliable is EF anyways? I just started a 5-day trial and looked up a flight on got these results : J9 C9 D9 Z9 P9 Y9 B9 M9 E9 U9 H9 Q9 V9 W9 S9 T9 L9 K9 G0 N0
But when I asked an employee of the company to look into it it seems there are only 21/50 available in C (but with 8 held) and Y is oversold with 27? They also seem to allow upto 46 overbookings in Y.
But when I asked an employee of the company to look into it it seems there are only 21/50 available in C (but with 8 held) and Y is oversold with 27? They also seem to allow upto 46 overbookings in Y.
Nov 23, 2014, 9:29 am
#212
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Aug 2002
Location: London
Programs: Mucci. Nothing else matters.
Posts: 38,644
How reliable is EF anyways? I just started a 5-day trial and looked up a flight on got these results : J9 C9 D9 Z9 P9 Y9 B9 M9 E9 U9 H9 Q9 V9 W9 S9 T9 L9 K9 G0 N0
But when I asked an employee of the company to look into it it seems there are only 21/50 available in C (but with 8 held) and Y is oversold with 27? They also seem to allow upto 46 overbookings in Y.
But when I asked an employee of the company to look into it it seems there are only 21/50 available in C (but with 8 held) and Y is oversold with 27? They also seem to allow upto 46 overbookings in Y.
EF is reliable, because you can correlate the displayed numbers to the airline's own website (for example, ba.com's flash for specific flights saying "Only 3 seats available at this price").
Nov 23, 2014, 9:46 am
#213
Join Date: Sep 2012
Posts: 6
None of this is surprising. FTers consistently misunderstand or overlook the amount by which some cabins have to be overbooked at some points in the selling cycle for the aircraft to be anywhere near full on the day of the flight.
EF is reliable, because you can correlate the displayed numbers to the airline's own website (for example, ba.com's flash for specific flights saying "Only 3 seats available at this price").
EF is reliable, because you can correlate the displayed numbers to the airline's own website (for example, ba.com's flash for specific flights saying "Only 3 seats available at this price").
It's actually not an BA flight and I'm trying to get info on SN & DL flights (same day, same city pairs). F.e. for the SN flight I get J9 C9 D9 Z8 P5 I0 Y9 B9 M9 U9 H9 Q9 V9 W9 S9 T9 E9 L9 K0 X0
but on the website it seems I can only book S class, which would lead me to a full/overbooked economy cabin?
Nov 23, 2014, 10:22 am
#214
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Aug 2002
Location: London
Programs: Mucci. Nothing else matters.
Posts: 38,644
So if the lowest booking classes shown on EF are (to take a hypothetical example) V9 S9 N9 Q4 O2, then you will find that if you're asking for two seats the airline will offer you two O class fares; if you ask for three seats the airline will offer you three Q class fares (as all seats sold at once must be in the same booking class), and if you ask for five seats the airline will offer you five N class fares.
I could see that your original numbers weren't for a BA flight, but if you were to look at ba.com in this hypothetical example, when you made the query for two seats you'd see a flash saying "Only 2 seats at this price"; when you made the query for three seats you'd see the higher price and a flash saying "Only 4 seats at this price"; and when you made the query for five seats you'd see a yet higher price but no flash (because the availability in that booking class is at the maximum, ie 9).
It's actually not an BA flight and I'm trying to get info on SN & DL flights (same day, same city pairs). F.e. for the SN flight I get J9 C9 D9 Z8 P5 I0 Y9 B9 M9 U9 H9 Q9 V9 W9 S9 T9 E9 L9 K0 X0
but on the website it seems I can only book S class, which would lead me to a full/overbooked economy cabin?
but on the website it seems I can only book S class, which would lead me to a full/overbooked economy cabin?
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The concept of a "full" cabin is pretty elusive. So what if the cabin is already overbooked by 27? If the airline took no further bookings for the cabin, it might go out with only half the seats occupied. That's what I mean when I say that it's underappreciated here just how much overbooking sometimes needs to take place to get a cabin anything like full on departure.
Nov 23, 2014, 11:04 am
#215
Join Date: Sep 2012
Posts: 6
Thank you for the concise and clear explanation! I understand it all now :-)
Warm regards
Warm regards
Nov 25, 2014, 9:42 am
#216
Join Date: Apr 2005
Location: London
Programs: BA Lifetime Gold & GGL & CCR, HH Diam, Bonvoy Titanium, IHG Spire, Tastecard
Posts: 7,549
Nov 26, 2014, 12:17 am
#217
Moderator, Emirates
Join Date: Oct 2012
Location: Where My Heart Is
Programs: BAEC Silver, FB Platinum, KQ Asante Gold, Shebamiles Blue, Emirates Blue
Posts: 3,385
Grateful if someone could have a look at the loads for BA039 on Sunday 30th November.
Currently only 24 Y seats have been chosen/blocked. Looking to try for a bit more space if possible with an AUP or paying for UG if space available (+TPs). Dummy booking currently shows 14 WTP seats available to choose from but not indicative of actual number available.
Thanks in advance
Safe & Happy travels
S
Currently only 24 Y seats have been chosen/blocked. Looking to try for a bit more space if possible with an AUP or paying for UG if space available (+TPs). Dummy booking currently shows 14 WTP seats available to choose from but not indicative of actual number available.
Thanks in advance
Safe & Happy travels
S
Nov 26, 2014, 3:59 am
#218
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2013
Location: London
Posts: 17,007
Grateful if someone could have a look at the loads for BA039 on Sunday 30th November.
Currently only 24 Y seats have been chosen/blocked. Looking to try for a bit more space if possible with an AUP or paying for UG if space available (+TPs). Dummy booking currently shows 14 WTP seats available to choose from but not indicative of actual number available.
Thanks in advance
Safe & Happy travels
S
Currently only 24 Y seats have been chosen/blocked. Looking to try for a bit more space if possible with an AUP or paying for UG if space available (+TPs). Dummy booking currently shows 14 WTP seats available to choose from but not indicative of actual number available.
Thanks in advance
Safe & Happy travels
S
F1 A0 J0 C0 DC RC IC W7 E1 TC Y9 B9 H9 K9 M9 L9 V9 S9 N9 Q9 O9 G9
Nov 26, 2014, 4:07 am
#219
Moderator, Emirates
Join Date: Oct 2012
Location: Where My Heart Is
Programs: BAEC Silver, FB Platinum, KQ Asante Gold, Shebamiles Blue, Emirates Blue
Posts: 3,385
Nov 26, 2014, 11:32 am
#220
Join Date: Apr 2005
Location: London
Programs: BA Lifetime Gold & GGL & CCR, HH Diam, Bonvoy Titanium, IHG Spire, Tastecard
Posts: 7,549
Nov 26, 2014, 11:35 am
#221
Join Date: Oct 2011
Posts: 4,964
.....
Last edited by angatol; Mar 1, 2015 at 2:24 am
Nov 26, 2014, 2:19 pm
#222
Join Date: Nov 2013
Location: Glasgow
Programs: BA Silver,
Posts: 15
Could someone please check the loads for BA274 27th Nov.
Im trying to UUA but having no luck, I couldn't upgrade the outbound flight either but ended up getting an OpUp, it now looks like my only hope of an upgrade will be the slim chance of another OpUp.
Im trying to UUA but having no luck, I couldn't upgrade the outbound flight either but ended up getting an OpUp, it now looks like my only hope of an upgrade will be the slim chance of another OpUp.
Nov 26, 2014, 4:13 pm
#223
Join Date: Nov 2012
Location: London
Programs: BA Gold
Posts: 140
j9 c9 d9 r9 i9 w7 e7 t7 y7 b6 h7 k5 m6 l5 v6 s6 n5 q5 o5 g5
Nov 27, 2014, 5:38 am
#224
Join Date: Jun 2008
Programs: BA Executive Club, Bronze
Posts: 438
Can it be determined how many reward seats have been released/booked in a specific cabin?