vnfilm1

"We're sorry, we aren't able to confirm space on these partner flights. Please try again and choose different flights, dates or cities"

The same message display when I try to book award ticket myself using Alaska website. I contact Alaska international partner desk and they could not book it for me either. I was told , Japan Airline does not update their award ticket release on their system, as a result, it still shows availability on AS website althought there is no award ticket availability at all .

Speedbird84

My take is it's easier to blame JAL than tell a customer "our system is having issues".

I've booked numerous JL tickets over the years and made oodles of changes to each of them. This has never been an issue until recently, and all of a sudden it's affecting multiple airlines.

I won't even get into how badly limited the search result and change functionality has gotten since even this time last year, but in general the AS experience with their IT has been getting steadily worse and worse.

QT31415

HUCA is my friend.

vnfilm1

Data point:
After 2 weeks struggle with Alaska booking website, follow by several calls to reservation desk and no progress and dead end. Today, I am able to book 2 one way award (J) ticket myself .
Many times, the reservation desk agent transfers me to another reservation desk instead of the correct place ( international partner ticket desk). I also lost $25 partner booking fee because misundrestanding with the so called international reservation agent who does not know how to do it correctly.

Based on what I have experience so far, and I was told, until the purchase request is submitted and confirmed by Japan Airline, the international partner ticket agent can not tell for sure about an award ticket availability and sucessfully book it ,which I feel very weird.

For my case, I have tried to book an around trip using AS Mile and plan to modify it later as some expert has suggested. However, it does not work . And I have tried to book the ticket on different day.

Although I am able to book 2 award business ticket for next year. And I still do not know whether the problems we all facing with Alaska award booking is only temporary or it is like this from now on .

TA

This may be a plausible excuse after the fact, but the root cause is a problem of Alaska's own creation, which I have said previously here.

It comes from 2 things:

1. a deliberate or look-the-other-way strategy of making partner awards hard to redeem for what they probably believe are cost benefits, (making it harder leads to less redemption - see also the ridiculous $12.50 partner booking fee)
   
2. a contributing factor of being incentivized to avoid the cost of improving the fare query/availability engines to display and be able to book the tickets properly.

Fares and availability certainly can be displayed properly between carriers -- many partners are able to with few problems. AS just chooses not to put the resources/cost in to getting them in sync. Which causes us headaches as passengers trying to book, and actually costs them in people tying up their phone representatives with stupid questions that could be answered if their systems worked right. So they shoot themselves in the foot trying to to save a buck.

The sad thing is, the space gets booked in the end anyway, so Alaska hasn't saved on any redemption costs really. They've only created more work and less satisfaction for everyone.

olouie

AS loves that $12.50 partner redemption fee. One of the few airlines that does that then proceeds to tell customers they cannot really help much with the actual redemptions. Obvious money grab. And don't even get my started on their excuses for charging premium cabin taxes and fees for mixed cabin redemptions (e.g. BA) when the long haul legs that cause the huge taxes and fees are actually in economy.

Eastbay1K

Yes, sometimes. But when you've already been "escalated" via transfer to the department that is supposed to know what it is doing, the odds of getting the same "escalation" agent is probably a lot greater than "low," with a PNR all marked up.

jsguyrus

Every single day Alaska pumps out more J award space on LATAM, and every day they are not bookable.

olouie

Easy to release a bunch of phantom award space 😝

soy

Does AS have access to all Latam U bucket ?

Eastbay1K

Historically, it seems so.

soy

….then I guess I too have been hit by the buggy website. Cannot confirm ticket when I know U is available. I will call in to see if anyone can help.

For what it’s worth I am trying to change dates on an exiting biz award.
If anyone has any tips I’ll be glad to hear them

surfman49

I have another data point about LA booking through Alaska.

I tried to book AEP>LIM>JFK and I got the "denied" error. This was showing a mixed cabin with AEP>LIM in economy and LIM>JFK in business.

Next, I tried booking only LIM>JFK in business. I was able to successfully ticket this flight.

I don't know exactly what happened. For example, there could have been a change in actual availability or synchronization between the IT systems between my failed and successful tries. On the other hand, I wonder if it could have been a glitch related to either the connecting flight or the mixed cabin.

Update: I was able to call Alaska and the representative added the connecting flight from Buenos Aires to Lima to the ticket that I booked on the website.

Also, just to add to this, I was able to call Alaska and the representative added the connecting flight from Buenos Aires to Lima to the ticket that I booked on the website.

metoometoo

I have read alot about Alaska airlines website on JAL phantom booking.
I booked 2 biz award seats which include the LAX to HND to TSA and received a confirmation code from JAL and chose the seats already.
Do I need to be concern that it may be cancelled in the future?

olouie

Always a risk of cancel or changes but not due to phantom space, just normal airline operational changes.