craig44485

No problem, that's what FT is all about. Welcome to FT.

gofish79

Hi. I am looking for some help. I am trying to get myself and my husband to MNL around 3/16 (dates are a bit flexible, 2 days before) returning 3/29 (dates flexible). We are traveling from Chicago.

I am only coming up with BC flts for 220K miles per person. Given that I only have about 270K miles, that won't work. We'll fly out of DTW, MSP, ATL, JFK - not picky. Looks like we have to go through NRT.

I am platinum, so was thinking of booking an Economy full fare and upgrading, but that's $4000+ per person.

I called Delta and they weren't helpful.

Any advice? KA was an option, but they have blackout dates for my timing.

Main concern is 13+ hour flight to NRT.

Thanks in advance.

arcticbull

Because I'm feeling either generous to you or spiteful to Delta (joking) I went ahead and looked up your itinerary for you. The 2012 Delta blackouts for Korean are March 1-4. That means your travel dates are happily open. The easiest availability for you is going to be out of JFK -- and there is absolutely tons of it. And you get your choice of times!

OUTBOUND ROUTE 1:
KE86 JFK-ICN 12:50AM 3/16 - 4:20AM on 3/17 A380 [[6 SEATS LEFT]]
KE621 ICN-MNL 8:00AM 3/17 - 10:55AM on 3/17 773 [[3 SEATS LEFT]]

OUTBOUND ROUTE 2:
KE82 JFK-ICN 1:20PM 3/16 - 4:50PM on 3/17 A380 [[6 SEATS LEFT]]
KE623 ICN-MNL 7:10PM 3/17 - 10:15PM on 3/17 773 [[4 SEATS LEFT]]

RETURN ROUTE 1:
KE622 MNL-ICN 12:20PM 3/29 - 5:15PM on 3/29 773 [[4 SEATS LEFT]]
KE85 ICN-JFK 7:30PM 3/29 - 8:40PM on 3/29 77W [[3 SEATS LEFT]]

RETURN ROUTE 2:
KE624 MNL-ICN 11:40PM 3/30 - 4:40AM on 3/30 773 [[4 SEATS LEFT]]
KE81 ICN-JFK 10:20AM 3/31 - 11:35AM on 3/31 A380 [[7 SEATS LEFT]]

If I were you I'd take Outbound 2 and Return 1. The Korean A380 has full-flat bed seats and 2 lounge areas on the upper deck, which is all business. That's what I'm looking forward to trying for myself in a month.

These all price out to 120,000 miles round trip, and are bookable only by phone. The taxes and fees should total $100 per person. You're going to have to call, ask to make a partner booking (1-800-323-2323) They tend not to have much trouble with Korean thankfully.

In exchange for this info, post back and let me know how the booking process went! Good luck!

gofish79

Wow! Thank you SO much. Just called Delta and they were able to help (I called a different number earlier and they were MUCH less helpful). The exact dates above didn't work, but I was able to get BC from JFK to MNL (through ICN) on the 14th and MNL to ICN on the 27th Economy, ICN to JFK BC on the 27th.

I really appreciate your help - you made our day!!

arcticbull

Glad to help. I hate seeing DL force someone into overpaying for an award itinerary. Welcome to FT by the way! Make sure you share any cool tips and tricks you find with the community too.

In the spirit of teach-a-man-to-fish... Moving forward you're going to want to figure out how to book Delta low-level awards on your own, and DL isn't going to want to help. Thankfully ExpertFlyer (a paid service) will help you find SkyTeam partner award space on Aeroflot, Alaska, China, China Eastern, China Southern, Czech, GOL, Korean and Tarom. They're worth every penny.

For Delta, use the site, but look up the tricks. For Alitalia, KLM, AirFrance, AirEuropa and Vietnam Airlines you should sign up for a FlyingBlue account and use that.

Once you have space confirmed available, try using the multi-city booking engine on Delta's website and enter the city pairs one flight at a time. Remember, not all partners are supported, especially the Eastern ones. If that fails, you can always call in and pay the $25. Booking Delta awards is _hard_ but there are some good values in here for sure.

arcticbull

Actually, on those dates, there's availability on KE38/KE37 direct ORD-ICN-MNL. If that works better it may be worth the change fee... Also, those flights are 77W (not sure if you booked the A380). I see KE38 has O/4, and KE37 has O/6. The return feeder MNL-ICN KE622 is showing O/3 so you could business-up on that leg too. Good luck!

gofish79

Ok, you have outdone yourself
I called DL and they switched me to the ORD > ICN flight.
You've really helped and I can't thank you enough.
If I learn any tips I'll be sure to post.
I'll also be sure to try to do this on my own next time.

Thank you again!

wco81

That site doesn't work for me. I had registered a year ago to look for AF inventory.

Tried searching KE inventory and clicking on the KE award search just brings you back to one of the index pages.

This is on Safari browser.

mtkeller

I had to use the login link in the upper right to get logged in, but it's not finding any O inventory even when EF reports a ton of it.

earlek

Am going on a cruise end of the year from Southampton to NY. One way to LHR from the East coast is 200k miles vs 150k miles on a RT with a bogus/whatever return date.

have had conflicting responses from the DM Line wrt what would happen if I chose the RT option and just never bothered to use the return leg. Obviously I don't want a refund or return of miles. However, would DL adjust my account back to a 200k usage vs 150 if I never used that return leg?

CALlegacy

So I recently booked a trip MSP-EDI/LHR-MSP for August/September over in J and back in Y for 80,000 miles each for two of us.

Now the the thing was this result seemed to pop up out of nowhere depending on the exact day of departure (one exact day) and one exact combination of routing (back from LHR). I had been looking at redemptions in Y for a combination of entry points to the UK (EDI, GLA, MAN, DUB, and LHR), and this one routing in J over to EDI just appears.

Is there any explanation at all for finding this booking when anything one would try around it in J would be absurd prices in miles; indeed anything around it in Y was pricing at more miles?

Yes, I've read lots of the threads on this process, but this kind of capriciousness seems absurd.

As a history we have twice booked longer trips like MSP-ATH-MSP and MSP-NRT-MSP in Y for 60,000 RT and those seemed to just pop-up from nowhere as well.

Just some observations.

3Cforme

Revenue management games plus funky (dysfunctional, really, award calendar) = observations of oddities.

Much more specific to your booking: you'd save a bit of $$ in UK Air Passenger Duty if you reversed your itin to MSP-LHR, EDI-MSP. It's the UK departure, especially long haul and in premium cabins (yes, return in Y you said) that gets you.

3Cforme

We can't very well expect agents to contradict airline policy and encourage throw-away ticketing, can we?

mtkeller

Scotland is still part of the UK (as much as their Fist Minister wishes it weren't so), and the Westminster Parliament hasn't yet devolved APD to the Scottish Parliament. (They have given the Northern Irish Assembly control over APD out of NI.) Thus, an EDI departure will carry the same APD as an LHR departure.

CALlegacy

But that 80000 mile price can't be even remotely acquired except on the routing I found. The entry point to the pricing is MSP-EDI on one specific day, via AMS. That means the J availability is really tied to a specific flight and day MSP-AMS. That would tie in with the original advice on this thread to search Y calenders one way to entry points in Europe and find J offers pop up. In effect, I would say that was the process that got this particular itinerary.