ryandc99

Twitter. Both me and LIH Prem were able to call this to attention to them on Twitter quickly, and they confirmed early on that these were valid mileage earning fares. I would send a DM and ask for Michael to review it.

Frequentlander

I got around to doing this today and got in contact with Michael. Still no joy. His response was:

"So sorry, but DL will not allow us to credit that flight. In many cases, we
can bill DL for W Class if there is an underlying Class of Service, but in this
case it was book as W Class and they are not allowing that for credit. I am
very sorry."

That's 2 sorrys but still no miles - which I think would be about 1.5 more sorrys than I could expect most other places.

Well, I doubt that is AS is as sorry as I am...... Lesson learned - Don't fly DL on a W ticket if you want AS miles.

I suggested that AS change their website because as it is now its misleading.

alphaeagle

Sounds like you had a fare basis of W which doesn't earn miles unfortunately. Any other fare basis class (that is on the chart) would earn miles if you book a C+ ticket, even if you're reservation is in W class.

xliioper

Did you purchase from delta.com? What does your "Fare Details" section say? It should look something like this --

Fare Details: DTT DL MIA164.65TAUNA0MJ/NN1Y DL X/ATL DL DTT164.65TAUNA0MJ/NN1Y USD329.30END ZP DTWMIAATL XF DTW4.5MIA4.5ATL4.5

Frequentlander

I don't see the actual "ticket" because I buy through a TA (see previous explanations upthread). I did OLCI and the boarding pass clearly said "W" fare.

In my previous post a couple of hours ago, I copied the e-mail I got from Michael at AS. We had also been exchanging DMs on Twitter and he had been exchanging DMs with someone at DL. I saw the thread and whomever at DL told AS it was a no go. The exchange looked like this:

"[I]Hi (Frequentlander), I am so sorry, but I received the following from DL:
Private DM - Sorry for the wait, I was able to reconfirm with our ticketing support dept. that W is original class of service paid. *RS[/I]"

and

"Due to this, we cannot credit this flight to your account. Once again, I am very sorry we cannot post this to your Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan. Sincerely, Michael"

So it looks like they tried but DL are not doing what they need to. I must say, I feel that because the mileage earnings chart on the MP website says W is a legit fare, AS should honour it....at least until they fix their website.

Maybe if I were a bit less Canadian, I'd scream louder but as it is, AS are still not AC and I'm grateful for that.... but slightly less grateful than I was.

alphaeagle

This is what Alaska's website says about "W" class:
Since W is the original class from what they told you, it doesn't earn any miles according to the chart. It stinks, but not really anything AS can do about it. Just one more thing to be on the lookout for when booking DL tickets.

Frequentlander

It's vague. It doesn't say that to earn mile you must have an Underlying fare and you cannot book into a W. It says "Earning is based on original booking class" So to a layman like me my original booking class is W so it should earn something. This could end up into a circular argument both ways to I;m going to declare it a loss, pour a drink and put it behind me.

I have other things I can be spending my time on.

xliioper

Just seems unlikely that the underlying fare was actually a W. The only time I've seen them for Comfort+ is when they correspond to very pricey full Y fares for Main Cabin. The highest I'm seeing on YVR-PIT has an underlying M fare.

rustykettel

Interesting. Basically DL won't pay AS for miles on W base fares and AS won't eat it themselves to provide mileage credit (which is somewhat understandable). The question to me is why won't DL pay on W fares? Is it a technical or business reason?

Frequentlander

Precisely.

LIH Prem

I would have to disagree with the advice not to purchase Comfort+ fares if that's what you are saying.

I booked a W fare (Delta ticket, delta metal, booked on delta.com; sfo-jfk) and got credit, I had the e-ticket receipt showing the underlying fare code, which was T. The fare code was TAVSA0CK, which if you deconstruct using the link I posted above is a Delta Comfort+ W fare.

At the time of purchase I could have simply purchased the regular economy T fare or paid the upsell for the W fare, which is what I did on delta.com. This fare has an underlying fare basis, which is T. I guess the Comfort+ W fare thing is sort of a modifier to the underlying T fare basis. Yet Delta considers it to be a separate Fare code, but in reality it isn't completely separate. (I can see that a real premium economy fare might be booked as a completely separate fare basis, but these are not like that.)

What is your full fare code that's shown on your e-ticket receipt from Delta?

Sure if somehow you were able to book a true W fare that starts with the letter W, then there is no other underlying fare for that, so sure, you probably want to avoid those especially if we can figure out how somebody could book something like that.

-David

Frequentlander

My guess is that only TAs can get "true" W fares. Those are the ones to avoid.

LIH Prem

sure. there's so many possible variables. codeshare, foreign vs domestic, etc.

Can you dig up the e-ticket receipt?

-David

Frequentlander

As said upthread. I book through a TA, all I get it the ticket # and the locator code. Its never been a problem before. I can ask how the TA booked the ticket. If I get a useful response I'll let y'all know.

ryandc99

with your PNR you should be able to pull a full receipt from the DL website..