cphkid

As far as I can see, you can't redeem your Eurobonus points on Star Alliance flights online. Before calling SAS I would like to hear your experiences about these awards...
I'm considering a one way Business Class award to LAX in August/September, which should cost me 60% of a return fare, 66000 Eurobonus points. Compared to the SAS "Best availability" to SFO which is around 110000 points on Business (almost no award availability in Business), this seems interesting. Especially as it's not certain that SAS will have refurbished their 340's they use on the SFO route at the time on my travel.
I've heard though, that taxes can be high on those award tickets, so that might be a consideration as well? What about availability? And will you have to pay the extra phone charge on the award flight when calling SAS about this?

https://www.sas.dk/eurobonus/point-c...points-charts/

ScandiGB

Hi cphkid

It can certainly be interesting. I have redeemed long haul business class flights over the past year with Thai to Bangkok, and Lufthansa to both Hong Kong and Dubai.

The issue you will find is that if you call SAS they will tell you there is no availability. This is however not correct.

You can generally find availability by using the award ticket checker on United's website or by using the similar tool with ANA.

United may show availability on their own airplanes, which is not available to members of other carrier's members, so it only works well when used to search for flights, which are not operated by United.

ANA requires you to apply for an account and post points to it once before you can use their tool.

You will then use either of these to search for availability and call us sas with instructions on exactly what flights you want to book.

The agent is often surprised that there is availability as he or she cannot see if they search for a flight e.g. from CPH to LAX.

Good luck.

ScandiGB

UltraRant

About taxes: if you book a *A award flight with LH then prepare to pay an enormous amount of taxes. UA is generally better. I'm also a LH*G and I usually have to pay up to 5000NOK for a C award (plus points, of course). These extra costs will stay through *A awards

Furthermore, generally what ScandiGB says. Just make sure they do a bit of work for you and look further than just their login screen.

There are a few award availability tools available that collect data from multiple sources. You'll find some in the 'Travel Tools' forum.

clifford79

You don't need to have points on your ANA account to be able to search for award availability. You do, however, first need to search for availability on their own flights before being able to choose *A carriers. You can use e.g., this guide for more instructions.

cphkid

Thanks a lot guys for your input.

As far as I can see, there's no availability in the week of August the 24th (yet?) for business nor first. I've read in other forums, though, that Lufthansa releases those awards quite late (e.g. 2 weeks from departure).

I'm excited to hear that Head of Eurobonus at SAS says that *A is in negotiations about the future of those high taxes on awards. Let's see how that ends up.

rumble

I have found Star Alliance award availability in long-haul business to be very good. Last year I had to change a flight twice very close to departure and got new bookings with no trouble each time. I even changed airlines, no problem. All by calling the Eurobonus line.

As long as you are flexible with airline and somewhat flexible with departure and changeover details, there should be something available.

In fact, today I just booked a one-way business class *A award from Sweden to Tokyo with Eurobonus points, with departure one month from today. I got exactly the flight I wanted. A very nice person at Eurobonus helped me and it was done in a matter of minutes.

SAS award availability is another matter though!

UltraRant

As in line with good SAS traditions, it depends a lot on who you're talking to, is my experience. But you're right, if you talk to the right people, it's very well possible to book *A awards with SAS. I've done that a few times now and found that, in the end, you usually get done what you want to, given that there is availability.

@cphkid: I bet they end up agreeing that everyone will have those high taxes on *A reward tickets....

Anyway, you're right about LH availability. LH, like a lot of *A carriers, open up award space based on booking prognosis, which means that at the end of the day they only release award space just a few weeks before departure.

DebitNM

I just booked a *A award with SAS. The flight is on United, CDG - SFO. My husband booked the same flight using aeroplan/air canada.

I was charged an "International Surcharge" of $139 along with usual fees. Also, I used 42,000 points vs 30, 000 points for my husband's ticket with fees of $96.

Is this International Surcharge legit? Is there anyway I can argue it? I know it is really a fuel surcharge in disguise, but since UA doesnt charge a fuel surcharge, what gives??

UltraRant

Well, for the point difference: if you look at the spending tables then you'll see that SAS used the classic StarAlliance award chart, which means 60% of a round trip in points (or 42000 points for economy) for your one way trip. Aeroplan has a different spending table, in which it divides Europe in Zone 1 and 2. And with Aeroplan you only need 50% of a round trip for a single trip, which in this case is 30.000 points. See this link: https://www3.aeroplan.com/FlightRewardChart.do

For the costs... that's where it gets a bit shady. From personal experience I can say that things seem quite depending on agreements between airlines, availability of award seats and even the competences of the agent on the phone. SAS is not allowed to have weird surcharges on its own flights, but that doesn't say much about what it can bill when booking with other airlines via SAS. I have paid everything between $50 and $800 (conversion rate at time of booking) for award flights within StarAlliance.

I dare you to use your SAS points for a StarAlliance reward flight with Lufthansa next time. I bet you'll throw your phone out of the window when you hear the total costs.

Anyway, please check your award ticket and see if it's fully refundable. If so, you may try to call again to SAS and try to book the same award flight again. If the international surcharge pops up again, interrogate the phone agent about it and find out where it comes from. There's probably not much you can do about it, but at least you'll get to know what it is.

DebitNM

The extra fee charged by SAS is the same $ amount as Lufthansa for the same ticket, so you can see my angst.

UltraRant

If both SK and LH charge the same amount on a UA ticket then I think you should contact US and ask what the surcharge is about. Or you should contact Aeroplan and ask if they haven't forgotten anything...

Anyway, 'just' $139 in fees on an award ticket is not bad. As stated, I paid $800 once with LH points on a Lh reward for a long haul return in C... About $500 for a return ticket on Thai paid with SAS points, and $50 with SAS for a reward trip within Europe. And as said, I feel that Aeroplan uses different rules than the standard *A reward chart rules, also based on the link I posted earlier, so I really think that would most likely explain the difference.

fassy

The high surcharges on the *A redemptuons is quite common on most FFPs in Europe at least. We can be very happy that SK doesn't charge YQ and scam charges on their own metal...

In general I only book on *A metal going C of F. Then you get quite a good value.

DebitNM

I asked them on their Facebook page about the "international surcharge;" they gave a rather generic answer. I pursued my displeasure, but no surprise, they didn't reply.

fassy

I think the charges are applied by the operating carrier, so you need to talk to AC what they charge for.

UltraRant

UA is the operating carrier and should thus be contacted.