Reward Rant
 

First of all, let me say hello to everyone. I haven't posted in months due to the move from EWR to SEA and things are finally settling down. Anyway, I feel as though I have always defended CO on this board in the past when it comes to redeeming award tickets. This time, I am pissed. PISSED.

My wife is 16 weeks pregnant and we want to head home to see our families for mothers day. She isn't working here, so her schedule is totally flexible. I have been trying to find her a non-easy passs F ticket to no avail for the past 2 days... So far, my only options are stopping in CLE or a redeye on the outbound and a 6:30am flight (3 days after the day she really wants to come back) that stops in CLE on the return. Its amazing to me, absolutely amazing that there is not a single desirable non-stop non-easy pass ticket available on any of the skyteam partners. I thought I found one on AS, but when I tried to redeem it online it said I had to call CO to book and of course when I did they told me that it was never available in the 1st place.

Id sooner spend the $1300 for the F ticket than use 90k miles on principle alone. I can understand not finding a BF seat to Europe in the summer, that at lease make some sense to me. But to not have a single desirable seat over a 14 day spread amongst 3 airlines for less than 90k miles is a SLAP IN THE FACE.

(And I fully realise that my wife should suck it up and fly the redeye or stop in CLE, but you try telling that to my wife.)

I think CO recently has reduced availability of transcon standard F rewards. In addition, I also have had problems with AS flights showing available on the website, then being unavailable on the site or over the phone.

Your situation is exactly what EasyPass is for: someone who wants to restrict themselves to a couple flights a day, and those two aren't available.

What would you do if you had UA miles? Or AA miles? Neither of them fly that route non-stop, nor do their partners.

Having CO miles, you can fly SEA-EWR on CO or AS, or SEA-JFK on DL. So you actually have best access to that route that you want.

Do be sure to check DL into/out of JFK if non-stop is important to you.

If you post your dates, maybe someone can find you something better.

First off congrats BigPoppaCO on the LittlePoppaCO ^

Have you checked out PDX & YVR availability? AS has regular flights to/from SEA to those markets and from their the Mrs. could catch a non-stop. Also don't forget to waitlist the wife for the flight she wants once (I assume the non-stop SEA-EWR flight) once you actually find a reward.

I don't know what's worse, the reward flight availability, your unpleasant stereotyping of Jewish women or your belief that a four-months pregnant woman should "suck it up".

Lighten up. Having been raised by a Jewish mother and now married to one, I think I can safely make that joke. Its amazing how thin skinned this country has become. Sometimes when I fly, I see pregnant women in coach. This one time, I saw 2! What fortitude!

hey, easy on the jewish mothers....

I edited my original post to appease all of the Jesse Jackson/Al Sharpton types that apparantly live on this board. Its so sad that we have gotten to a point where people are so thin skinned that a jew (me) cant even make a joke ABOUT HIS OWN people without the PC Police out in full force. Sad.

PS- The alltime funniest epiosde of Seinfeld is the one where Tim Whatley converts to Judiasm just for the jokes. Did that piss you off?

Spend the miles..Thats what they are for!@:-)

Certainly, spend them. But why waste them on SleazyPass?

I nornally do, but the thought of using 90k is an ashunda. This past summer I was able to score 2 BF tickets to Italy (Via AMS) for a total of 150k miles.

How did you manage that? I thought AF/KL J tickets were 80k roundtrip (or is one of them 100k now?).

The outbound was EWR-FRA and the return was AMS-EWR. All of the intra-eurpoe flights were on AZ. This was in July...

So, the two tickets cost only 75k each for BF roundtrip (or am I missing something?)?

Sorry CO1E, didnt mean to confuse you- each ticket was 75k. And I have also been able to redeem EWR-HNL in F at the non-sleazy pass level as well. Thats why the 90k for a EWR-SEA is such a bitter pill to swallow.

Was this before the current mileage redemption rates? I'm not trying to bust your chops, I just thought that the cheapest US-Europe roundtrip business class reward was 80k (as opposed to 75k).

I have no idea, but the trip was last July. I guess we booked in March of 06?

Gotcha. A good deal, certainly.

[QUOTE=channa;7582706]Or AA miles? Neither of them fly that route non-stop, nor do their partners.

Having CO miles, you can fly SEA-EWR on CO or AS, or SEA-JFK on DL. So you actually have best access to that route that you want.[QUOTE]

AA actually serves the route non-stop into and out of JFK, and they code-share with AS on at least one of their SEA-EWR flights. I will give you that CO/Partners have more options, but AA does give you some.

FWIW, AA doesn't seem to have any non-stop availability for May, but they do have availability in F every day in May, except for the 18th, 24th, and 27th Eastbound and the 24th Westbound. On many days, you have several options to choose from. For all I know, they also might have availability on AS, but only the code-share is searchable online. Given that they have an even tighter relationship with AS than CO, I would suspect they would have access to the same (or more) seats as CO.

At least they are offering U a CLE connection. If they offered only an IAH connection :eek: , she would really have standing to kvetch! ;)

That's exactly what CO wants you to do.

I value my CO miles at a little less than one cent per redeemable mile. So... <$900 in miles equivalent or $1300 cash? You decide.

Yes, reward availability is poor.

B7

From the 2006 10-K:For comparison, here's AA's 10-K blurb on AAdvantage:

Thanks J. Edward, for the full disclosure. Too bad CO reports in RPMs (which I assume are revenue passenger miles) and AA reports as a percentage of total passengers, and that neither airline breaks down standard vs rulebuster. Still, I would have to guess that AA comes out ahead, assuming that % RPMs > % pax, since I don't think most people like to use their miles for short-haul trips.

I had no problem booking AS DCA/SEA this summer FC for 44K a ticket. Did it right of the website. Maybe EWR is the issue? Why not I believe AS flys both DCA and BOS so book a FC SEA or BOS and shuttle the wife to NY. It's no worse then a CLE stop and if its over a weekend you can pretty regulary snag a $170 shuttle fare if you have flexibility on DL ( maybe US but I would never put an expecting mother on US)

And by the waqy congrats on the expected new arrival.

This may be a silly question, but did you try actually *calling*? I was having a heck of a time finding an Easy Pass First flight to Berlin last year online, but when I called, the rep spent a good deal of time with me and made it happen. Just a thought...

For starters, that Seinfeld episode was funny. Your comment was not -- simply mean-spirited.

The horrible award availability situation will probably backfire on CO sooner or later. I find it very irregular that they continue to get away with it.