I just don't get it.

Longtime WorldPerks traveler trying to book first merged award tickets and shopping for them on both delta.com and nwa.com. What I'm finding, very consistently, is that the DL site has lower mileage requirements but higher fees and taxes, and NW's site has much higher mileage requirements, but quite low fees and taxes, at least in comparison.

Example:

PHL to AMS, in March 2010
DL: 75K miles, $206 in fees
NW: 162.5K miles, $63 in fees

Since I would pay either site from the same Skymiles account these days, why such a difference? Also seeing very different availability for the same dates from site to site; when will that be consistent.

and let's not even talk about trying to book open jaw tix these days (sigh)...