Happy

Actually after BA devalued the umpteen times, CX seats would just hung in there after the initial release. During the last AA devaluation I actually booked 2 Avios F awards slightly less then 24 hours before AA could book them. Then the next day during midday when nobody was looking, I called BA to cancel it within 24 hours booking so also got back the cash part, then immediately called AA to book the seat now back to the inventory. Repeated the same process for spouse' seat. And that was well over 2 years ago.

The US-HKG routes are not difficult to book - it is those one daily flight only routes are difficult, as well as the HKG-Australia/ New Zealand routes, despite CX flies to 6 airports in Australia!

Even CX remains partnering with AS, it would not surprise me we see a devaluation in 2018 though may not be the same degree as the EK one.

We always have enough miles in AS accounts so the SPG route has no effect but I do feel the current chart may be on its last run.

ecgz88

My concern is same AS may devalue.....so AS/AA/JAL all 330 days, if I want to book earlier than this will be CX/BA?

Edgerfly

Here’s to hoping AS teams up with Aer Lingus!

jamienbaker

I tend to agree with your thoughts. I think 2015 (pre-AA) was the last time I had a really hard time find awards for August travel at the 330 day mark. I counted last weekend and I’ve redeemed over 150 segments on CX in the last 10 years - I haven’t flown them all, but my success speaks to the ample availability. My biggest current issue is the mismatch between AS and OneWorld partner availability. I still haven’t gotten to the bottom of that. It’s hard for me to believe CX would layer in a third level of award inventory just for Alaska. Seems needlessly complex.

CDKing

Anything can happen. SQ kind of does whatever it wants though and goes against *A for instance not allowing *A Gold members to access some of the their lounges.

eponymous_coward

It's not against the rules to have a *A Gold lounge that is not a J lounge; the rules say you just need designated *A Gold lounges. LH does the same thing SQ does and does not have *A lounge = J lounge. (They do it differently and have the designated *A Gold lounge as the SEN/partner F lounge. But either way is in the rules. Personally, I think SQ's approach is more logical; it's bizarre that you get a worse lounge if you're on a multi-thousand dollar longhaul business class ticket but have no status than if you're *A Gold on a $200 economy ticket for FRA-LON.)

/digression

jinglish

I was a wee lad back in the days when UA had a significant Express presence in the northwest, so I can't really speak with much authority on this, but that could have had something to do with CO dropping AS as a partner. Or maybe UA was just grumpy about them having other domestic partnerships.

Either way, two airlines that are in the same alliance don't necessarily get along well, as seen with the DL/KE spat that is only recently being mended (and DL still hasn't moved KE back up to a higher partner tier, so for the time being DL flyers don't earn MQMs on KE-marketed/KE-metal flights). UA seems to not always get along well with other *A members--notably SQ, who were partnered with VX for SFO feed despite having an enormous UA hub right there.

Happy

My speculation all along despite people here dont think so, is AS has put in some type of blockage because the CX redemption really costs them dough. There were some speculation a couple years ago, stemmed from the AS account closures on the abuse of its credit cards, and the convo people had with the BofA reps, it seems to me that, unlike AA or UA or DL program that the airlines sell boatload of miles to their partners for cash and then carry such as deferred revenue in their books, AS does not sell miles to BofA or its partners, but rather, expensed those miles as they are awarded / redeemed - sort of like a Pay as You Go system which might have served them well in the past when Blogs were not prolific and knowledge of travel hacking was not widespread. Market dynamic changed long ago but it might be hard for AS to adapt to the traditional model as the US3... The EK devaluation in my mind, has all the hallmarks of AS saying, enough is enough, to stop the bleeding.
I am not optimistic on the current CX and JL charts going forward in 2018. It would be a loss to us had the devaluation happened. Fortunately we normally dont make a specific trip US to HKG or even Asia - they are always worked in an itinerary that is pretty much encompassing multi-continents, just so it would be "cheaper" for us to visit families at the same time. On top of that, between EU and HKG, there are usually far less competition and enough options with other programs.
As of now, I am not transferring any more Marriott Travel Package to AS program until we are into 2018 for some time when things may become clearer. (CZ leaving SkyTeam and CX might join Star).

Happy

I wholeheartedly agree your comment about the "bizarre" situation. QR does the same thing at DOH as SQ, Only QR's own premium passengers be it on revenue or on award, have access to QR's lounges while it has set up separate lounges for status passengers who gain access only via their OW statuses. The SQ and QR arrangements make perfect sense to me. CX on the other hand is overly generous, making its HKG lounges very crowded at times during the concentrating flight banks, to the point that the lounges become uncomfortable to everyone.

jamienbaker

I don't disagree with the basic concept you propose. It could very well be the case that the economics of CX awards are not favourable to Alaska. But what I'm hung up on is the execution.

If it was formulaic, such as AS = OneWorld - X, or something like that, then we'd be able to figure out the pattern pretty easily. But it isn't. I've had cases where OW = 3 and AS = 2...but I've also had cases where AS =1 and OW = 0. I've also had cases where AS and OW match. (Last week, I changed 3J EWRHKG to 3J JFKYVRHKG without much fuss...and the EWRHKG was returned to OW inventory).

Now, it could be that AS specifically revenue manages its CX awards...but that seems ridiculously complex. The time and expense associated with that just seems really unlikely to me.

So it leaves us where we began - why don't they harmonize?

Respectfully, Jamie

Aker

what is the best way to search for cathay availability now?
ba?
asiamiles?
qantas?

trying to go yvr to hkg.

thanks in advance,
a

flytoeat

There is no "best". All of the sources you mentioned will work, but do not necessarily reflect Alaska partner availability. You can use any of these for your initial search, then call AS to verify.

skimthetrees

I have not used Asiamiles but between BA and Qantas I much prefer Qantas to search. You can get fairly large calendar range of dates searchable with Qantas at one time with a flexible date search whereas BA only gives you one day at a time for partners.

Aker

when searching Qantas availability are you only able to redeem Alaska points on the flights listed under their “classic rewards”?

Edgerfly

Does anyone know if it’s possible to get CX space from HKG-TLV?