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Originally Posted by SFO777
(Post 20307710)
If that's how you read it, so be it. But there are still lots of ways to get First award seats on the dates when you want to travel.
I can't help it if you are unwilling to expand your horizons beyond Aeroplan. In the end, you can always buy an F ticket. ;) |
Originally Posted by Chiro1979
(Post 20309822)
I booked a seat last week for YYZ-IST-BKK on TK in J for January 2014 using Aeroplan miles (the return IST-YYZ is on AC) I believe there was only one seat though as when I was looking at alternatives flight later just to pass time I noticed there was no availability on TK for the dates I had purchased.
Logic! |
Booked in early January for Oct/Nov 2 x J IST-CPT/JNB-IST-ASR-IST as part of a *A trip to ZA. Needed to work it a bit, but lots available.
No TK via YYZ, some AC, but no domestic J to YYZ. Even Y to YYZ is Clasic+ for most of 2013. Never found LH or SA in J for a 2 month window to ZA. Did find SA via EZE and GRU though. |
The secret is to book TK IAD-IST.
I was searching last month for an African Reward and there was a TON of it for flights 250-300 days out in both directions. No or limited availability ORD-IST and YYZ-IST. |
I managed to book a J seat on TK for May, albeit using my MP miles: YYZ-IST-TXL. This was a month ago. (Paid 50K miles and $56 but not sure what an AE award would cost.) I think it's just that TK is doing good business filling its premium seats ex-YYZ. But agree with others, check out the US gateways TK uses and you're more than likely to find a J seat.
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Originally Posted by worldtraveller73
(Post 20323865)
The secret is to book TK IAD-IST.
I was searching last month for an African Reward and there was a TON of it for flights 250-300 days out in both directions. No or limited availability ORD-IST and YYZ-IST. |
Originally Posted by sp4294
(Post 20301130)
These are not easy to get...people have caught on.
BTW LH and LX don't block J availability (SQ only blocks access to their premium planes) SQ J is next to impossible unless it's a short flight you're looking for. I only joined AP a few years ago. Since that time, let's recap the enhancements: 1) Huge fuel surcharges on AC and LH. 2) Point devaluation. 3) Elimination of LX F. 4) LH J/F and LX J available only T-x. 5) Less availability of TK J (I swear, it was always wiiiiiiide open to/from YYZ before). Instead of just whining about it though, I've shifted the majority of my 6 figure monthly CC spend to my AX SPG card, which I'm going to use to transfer to airlines such as JAL to redeem EK F. I've also started buying AA miles when they have promos because I can use them for CX J and F. Just got a CX J ticket YYZ-HKG RT and it was so sweet to pay next to nothing in taxes and "fuel surcharges". I'm still sitting on over a million AP miles though, will probably redeem them for TG F, which I find the best value in the entire program right now. |
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9B179 Safari/7534.48.3)
Watch out with booking TK J using AP miles. From my experience, TK will oversell J and waitlist confirmed J award ticket holders. Total crap. Luckily, AP had also booked me for the wrong date due to an invol sched change (long story) and so accommodated me in confirmed J on another carrier. TL; DR: Babysit your TK J Aeroplan ticket and check on it daily leading up to departure. |
Originally Posted by spideysense
(Post 20324140)
LH and LX block J until T-14 (more like T-3 based on my experience), which is bloody inconvenient for all but the most flexible/masochistic travellers.
SQ J is next to impossible unless it's a short flight you're looking for. I only joined AP a few years ago. Since that time, let's recap the enhancements: 1) Huge fuel surcharges on AC and LH. 2) Point devaluation. 3) Elimination of LX F. 4) LH J/F and LX J available only T-x. 5) Less availability of TK J (I swear, it was always wiiiiiiide open to/from YYZ before). Instead of just whining about it though, I've shifted the majority of my 6 figure monthly CC spend to my AX SPG card, which I'm going to use to transfer to airlines such as JAL to redeem EK F. I've also started buying AA miles when they have promos because I can use them for CX J and F. Just got a CX J ticket YYZ-HKG RT and it was so sweet to pay next to nothing in taxes and "fuel surcharges". I'm still sitting on over a million AP miles though, will probably redeem them for TG F, which I find the best value in the entire program right now. 3, 4, and 5 are *A wide. 1 I hate. 2 I sorta agree with but then they had the best award chart of all the airlines just over two years ago, so it sort of balances out. Earn and burn. I just saw: 6 figure MONTHLY spend! That's intense. |
I booked IST-NRT on TK in J for August a couple of months ago. They seem to release 3 seats in J per flight and 4 on BKK-IST flights. Oddly enough, there has been ZERO seats released for August on the LHR-IST route in J or Y. So right now I have LHR-ZRH-IST-NRT on LX/TK but I keep checking for the LHR-IST direct flight to open.
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Are people still finding that Turkish Airlines isn't granting seat requests until about 100 days out?
I'll call after the weekend is over just to try, but the bumping award J off is another worrying issue. |
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