Apr 5, 2014, 3:23 pm
Last edit by: eponymous_coward
Emirates award guide using Alaska Airlines miles
Routing Rules:
All trips must start or end in North America.
One open jaw and one stopover allowed on each one-way award.
No fees for changes/cancellations prior to 60 days from departure.
North American Gateway Cities:
West Coast
Seattle
San Francisco
Los Angeles
Central
Chicago
Dallas
Houston
East Coast
Boston
New York (JFK)
Orlando (Effective September 1, 2015)
Washington DC (IAD)
Canada
Toronto
Award Chart Links*:
Middle East & Africa
Asia
Europe
*If region is not listed on chart its not available.
Perks
Chauffeur Drive NOT Available
Car service is not available for all Business Class and First Class passengers on Alaska Airlines ticketed award tickets on Emirates flights (as of Jan 2015). The chauffeur will not confirm if you use the EK website for this, though the website makes it look you can make a reservation.
Lounges
Access is available for all passengers traveling in Business and First Class. Not all cities have lounges and many may be operated by a Partner. There have been some reports of people having an issue accessing the Dubai lounges as the tickets may appear in their system as non-revenue employee travel. This is not as much of a problem as it used to be but in case it comes up please advise the lounge attendant that you are on an Alaska Airlines award.
Dubai Connect
AS Awards on EK do not qualify for Dubai Connect, which is the service that offers the free hotel.
Tricks to find Transoceanic availability
Instead of performing a blanket, i.e. SEA-DXB search, perform: SEA-MED.
Madinah is a destination that is only served by EK. Consequently, if there is availability, only EK will show up in the calendar results.
Routing Rules:
All trips must start or end in North America.
One open jaw and one stopover allowed on each one-way award.
No fees for changes/cancellations prior to 60 days from departure.
North American Gateway Cities:
West Coast
Seattle
San Francisco
Los Angeles
Central
Chicago
Dallas
Houston
East Coast
Boston
New York (JFK)
Orlando (Effective September 1, 2015)
Washington DC (IAD)
Canada
Toronto
Award Chart Links*:
Middle East & Africa
Asia
Europe
*If region is not listed on chart its not available.
Perks
Chauffeur Drive NOT Available
Car service is not available for all Business Class and First Class passengers on Alaska Airlines ticketed award tickets on Emirates flights (as of Jan 2015). The chauffeur will not confirm if you use the EK website for this, though the website makes it look you can make a reservation.
Lounges
Access is available for all passengers traveling in Business and First Class. Not all cities have lounges and many may be operated by a Partner. There have been some reports of people having an issue accessing the Dubai lounges as the tickets may appear in their system as non-revenue employee travel. This is not as much of a problem as it used to be but in case it comes up please advise the lounge attendant that you are on an Alaska Airlines award.
Dubai Connect
AS Awards on EK do not qualify for Dubai Connect, which is the service that offers the free hotel.
Tricks to find Transoceanic availability
Instead of performing a blanket, i.e. SEA-DXB search, perform: SEA-MED.
Madinah is a destination that is only served by EK. Consequently, if there is availability, only EK will show up in the calendar results.
Consolidated Emirates (EK) awards availability/booking/routing thread
Jul 8, 2014, 7:50 am
#886
Join Date: Dec 2008
Programs: Alaska MVP Gold, Hilton Diamond
Posts: 669
Is award availability for EK F just Z class?
Jul 8, 2014, 7:53 am
#887
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Nov 2007
Location: Denver • DEN-APA
Programs: AF Platinum, EK Gold, AA EXP, UA 1K, Hyatt Globalist
Posts: 21,603
Jul 8, 2014, 9:47 am
#888
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: DFW
Programs: AA 1M
Posts: 31,475
Jul 8, 2014, 6:53 pm
#889
Join Date: Dec 2008
Programs: Alaska MVP Gold, Hilton Diamond
Posts: 669
And what is the booking letter for J upgrades? O or D? Or is it just one of them?
Jul 8, 2014, 7:01 pm
#890
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Oct 1999
Location: Juneau, Alaska.
Programs: AS 75K;BA Silver;AA G;HH Dia;HY Glob
Posts: 15,822
Jul 9, 2014, 3:05 pm
#891
Join Date: Jul 2013
Posts: 116
I currently have a buisness class award in December for Sea-Dxb-Lhr that I booked last week. I have decided I might want to do the second leg in F. However the first segment D Inventory is at 0. If I cancel what are the chances that it will go back into inventory and be bookable?
Jul 16, 2014, 9:53 am
#892
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Nov 2007
Location: Denver • DEN-APA
Programs: AF Platinum, EK Gold, AA EXP, UA 1K, Hyatt Globalist
Posts: 21,603
Has EK simply stopped releasing First (Z) seats ex-DXB?
DXB-SEA shows F4 the rest of this week with only one assigned F seat.
Yet zero zip nada Z avails.
DXB-SEA shows F4 the rest of this week with only one assigned F seat.
Yet zero zip nada Z avails.
Last edited by SFO777; Jul 16, 2014 at 4:26 pm
Jul 16, 2014, 2:15 pm
#894
Join Date: Nov 2007
Programs: AA, AS, BA, DL Plat, Chase UR, Diners, UA, F9, WN, SPG Gold, HH Diamond, Amex MR.
Posts: 436
I just got screwed by phantom F availability on DXB-USA for 2 people. AS site showed availability, AS agent said her system showed availability, but when the AS agent tried to book it, EK rejected the booking.
AS tells me the inventory on their web site for EK isn't real-time, and this happens frequently.
AS needs to put up a disclaimer on their web site about this, and also work with EK to fix the problem.
I guess we won't be visiting Dubai this trip after all.
I thought I had the holy grail of award seats all booked up, only to lose it. Had even transferred in lots of *points (non-reversible). So sad.
AS tells me the inventory on their web site for EK isn't real-time, and this happens frequently.
AS needs to put up a disclaimer on their web site about this, and also work with EK to fix the problem.
I guess we won't be visiting Dubai this trip after all.
I thought I had the holy grail of award seats all booked up, only to lose it. Had even transferred in lots of *points (non-reversible). So sad.
Jul 16, 2014, 4:47 pm
#895
Join Date: Nov 2011
Location: West Coast, USA
Programs: Skywards Platinum
Posts: 3,747
Ok, pretty strange. Checked SFO-DXB for the entire month of April and May 2015. Z=1 and D=7 for almost all days as shown by Expert Flyer. Yet, AS shows not a single day of availability in either F or J. 
Jul 16, 2014, 8:59 pm
#896
Join Date: Jun 2013
Location: Denver
Posts: 85
I do see some DXB-USA availability in F through the AS website, so I don't think they have stopped releasing seats. I'm personally looking a few months out. So this is strange also.
Just an observation. I booked 2 J seats for my mother and sister (Middle East-DXB-BOS) for September. Multiple dates were available. I had used my laptop to search for these seats for a few weeks. Occasionally going through with the purchase up until the last possible point and aborting. When I finally did go to purchase the seats a few days later, the system would error out. I was next to my desktop, so went ahead and tried there, and sure enough the purchase went through. May need to clear the cache or history.
Jul 17, 2014, 2:33 pm
#899
Join Date: Nov 2011
Location: West Coast, USA
Programs: Skywards Platinum
Posts: 3,747
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/22763537-post756.html
But, with D=7 I am very surprised there are no J seats, and surprised there is not a single F seat available in all of April and May.
The question then is what criteria is used by EK to release J seats to partners?
Jul 17, 2014, 7:42 pm
#900
Join Date: Jun 2013
Location: Denver
Posts: 85
Correct on the F issue with Z<2, I was one of the first to report this phenomenon:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/22763537-post756.html
But, with D=7 I am very surprised there are no J seats, and surprised there is not a single F seat available in all of April and May.
The question then is what criteria is used by EK to release J seats to partners?
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/22763537-post756.html
But, with D=7 I am very surprised there are no J seats, and surprised there is not a single F seat available in all of April and May.
The question then is what criteria is used by EK to release J seats to partners?
I have still not been able to figure out Emirates' pattern. Only reliable thing is, that they will release 2 Z seats on the A380 (not all flights), but for AS purposes significant. I have seen Z2 on the 777 but close to departure. EK has been kind of different even with regular fares. They seem to only show F4 on all their flights; even empty ones.The A bucket varies, but on some routes they release A2, and once those are booked, another 2 gets released assuming it was F4. That used to be an issue if you wanted to book EK using the ex-CMB fares. Some flights were F4 A0. LH remains much easier to predict compared to EK.