_stephan_

I'm about to book my first Star Alliance award with Asiana Club and am looking for experiences regarding changing/canceling an award. I was able to do a mock-booking (I stopped before the last step) using the Korean language site and the Google Chrome translate feature.

I'm wondering if it would be possible to change and/or cancel an award online as well?

If refunds are possible, are the points refunded back to my account immediately?

Background: I hope to book a First Class award on Lufthansa. However, F award space on LH is only released to partners within 14 days of departure. So I was thinking about booking an available C award now (just to be safe) and then either change or quickly cancel and re-book if F award space becomes available.

zeer0

Changes and cancellations are easy and cheap. Cancellations and most changes cost $30. However, there are some (positive) exceptions as phone agents don't always follow these rules exactly. For example, I've been able to change flight routing for free but the only thing I changed was the connecting point.

So it'll probably be $30 as you'll have to reissue the ticket to change class, but you might get lucky and the fee will be waived.

I would go ahead and book the J award, but I do wonder whether the OZ miles will return to your account immediately in case you do cancel and rebook. I'm not sure of that.

truncated

You'll have to call in to change/cancel. Have cancelled an award before and IIRC took about a day for the miles to be returned to my account (not sure how long exactly but definitely was not instantaneous). Taxes/fees took even longer.

_stephan_

Thank you, @zeer0 and @truncated. I went ahead and booked the J award. I do see an option to cancel the award online - but not to change. If (hopefully) F award space opens up I'll try to upgrade / change by calling in.

LAX

How did you check *A availability online?

LAX

_stephan_

@LAX Asiana has a Star Alliance search/ticketing tool on their Korean-language website (I'm new to this forum and am not yet allowed to post URLs. It's [Asiana Website]/I/ko/RedemptionTravelRegist.do?DOMINTType=I&BIZType=STA R). I used the Google Chrome translate feature. It's a bit rough, but it works ;-)

NB: I was able to book a C award (with Lufthansa) completely online. There's even an option to pay with a foreign (non-Korean) credit card. The ticket was issued immediately. A day later, I found an F award (also LH) that I wanted to change to. There is an option to cancel an award online - I did not try this though, as I wasn't sure if (a) one has the option to choose whether to pay the cancellation fee in USD or miles and (b) how long it would take for the miles to be refunded. Instead, I called the US call centre. They told me they had no access to my original booking, as it was issued in Korea (website) and could only be changed/refunded by the Seoul office. So, I called the Korean hotline (they do speak English) and they were able to rebook my award :-)

PVDtoDEL

How were you able pay the change fee? I'm stuck in a situation where LA office is saying only Korea can rebook, and Korea is saying that they can't accept a US credit card.

suntorytime

I had a similiar situation. I provided them (Seoul office) with three credit cards (Mastercard and AmEx issued in Germany, Mastercard issued in the UK) via email and asked them to try them all until one works. The charge ended up on the German Mastercard, but I'm not sure if they tried another card first.

zool007

This was just a recent rule change since I was still able to pay using a non Korean card in November. For changes that require the Korean office, you can ask them to change/reissue, then call your local office to pay. you can do the same when making a new award booking, reserve with Korean office then pay in local office.