Parents are flying SVO-LAX-SFO in about a month. We have the SVO-LAX tickets purchased with Delta miles (worked really well while nwa.com was still alive....), and unfortunately there isn't a Skyteam airline that flies LAX-SFO directly so we decided not to include that last short hop into the award ticket and buy it instead.

The best option is actually United who has flights for $60 which are frequent enough. I know Aeroflot actually sells tickets itself with United connections (the one we are trying to make specifically can be purchased as one ticket from Aeroflot), and there is definitely an interline agreement with United. I would really like to know if they may be able to check the luggage through to SFO when United ticket is a separate one. It would be a big help for the parents to drop off the luggage right after clearing customs if it has been already tagged, instead of getting from TBIT to T7/8 in LAX with all the luggage.

Does anyone know whether Aeroflot can do a through check-in when the 2nd ticket is issued separately? If there is a chance - I'd like to try, parents speak Russian so it will be easy for them to ask at SVO. If not and they have to carry the luggage anyway we may opt to buy them a WN ticket for LAX-SFO....

Thanks!