WidgetTravels

Again with comments that are woefully ignorant. The issue above is because there were more than 2 connections (RST MSP SFO TPE MNL) which as far as I know, no Res system can handle. It requires booking point to point, and again, has nothing to do with the res system.

What is true is that Delta typically will push KE, CZ, and MU flights. The agent can EASILY override this by specifying a connection city. Agents are trained on this, and it's something used all the time. They may not be proactive with it, but a customer suggesting a connection via TPE is simple.

RealHJ

That's the a woefully ignorant statement, to use your own words. dullta.com and every reservation system can easily do 2, 3 connections (3, 4 segments) and 10,000s if not 100,000s of such flights are booked globally each day. Even most LCCs res systems (that are built on point to point vs connecting hub and spoke) can handle that. For an airline such as DL with a hub and spoke model, 2 connections (spoke to hub to spoke) are common, and 3 connections are also not uncommon.

Even when there are limits of 3 or 4 segments max as per fare rules, longer routings can be booked, just then the fare would be split up.

Let's not spread ignorance here on FT.

WidgetTravels

I've worked in 5 reservations systrms over the past decade (Sabre, Apollo, Worldspan, SHARES, and Deltamatic).

None of them will display results with greater than 2 connections. Sure, you can build the record by adding the flights in separately and it will price, but it won't come up by default, unless the fare breaks.

​​​​​​Now maybe this has changed for other systems now, and if that's the case, I stand corrected.

RealHJ

Wouldn't that be one reason why agents have to put in flights segment by segment, but then price it out origin to destination (if valid and meets MPM, fare rules, etc.)?
That being the only way when the connections desired won't show up if it is >2 connections, while one of two ways if it is 1 or 2 connections (other being specifying connecting airport, ignoring the mispricing that it shows for CI/TPE, etc.), based on what you say. (While for online bookings there are no such limitations, based on my observations at least.)

BTW, just go to www.united.com. Search for some award flights. You will find lots of 3 and 4 connections options, priced properly as a through fare, not additive. delta.com is very buggy and sometimes may price 3 connections as through fare, while 1 more logical connection as additive, other times vice versa. But, just from a layman's observations, I don't believe that 3, or even 4 connections, can't be priced O-D as a through-fare. I mean it takes 5 seconds to pull up such results and show that so can be done and is routinely done each day who knows how many 10,000s of times just through the airline websites alone.

Ilove2fly

I noticed the T&C says the certificate is transferable. Does it mean I can give it to anyone or do I have make the reservations for the person using the certificate?

josephstern

You have to make the reservation from your logged-in account, and you have to pay with an Amex.

But you don't have to be one of the travelers, obviously.

And be careful which traveler you put first; only that one will accrue MQM, MQS, and MQD.

Ilove2fly

Good deal... Thanks.

drvannostren

I know there's dynamic pricing, but I'm just looking to gauge some possible redemptions.

I've got 3 things in mind and I'm wondering if anyone can give me a range of miles that might be required. I've looked and found what's currently showing, but I'm not sure if they come down, or only go up or if these are high or low or what.

1. DOM return flight in Russia. Looking to go Moscow-St. Petersburg in March, one way is fine if that's all I can afford on points, but return would probably yield better value from what I saw. Off the top of my head I saw like 15,000 (which would be fine...) but also $65 USD. At that price I think I can probably just buy a return ticket for like $125-150 CAD.

2. DOM one way in Argentina. EZE or AEP - Iguazu or Cordoba, this would be in Oct 2018.

3. One way Argentina-Brazil, EZE/AEP - POA/GIG/SSA/GRU/REC, not sure if I'm barking up the wrong tree or not. Let's omit Aerolineas being garbage...that doesn't bother me, I have some orphan points in DL from airbnb earnings and the occasional skyteam flight. So I'm not worried about the quality, I'm more just worried about burning the points on a flight that'd be cheap to just buy cash wise, also Oct 18.

Not really looking for anyone to do the price/points comparison for me, I can do that on my own. But just looking for expert DL miles users to gimme the range of points to "expect" to pay. If these redemptions are all futile, that's fine too.

4. All garbage? Lemme know. If there's something I should be shooting for, a 1-way somewhere in the globe that's often good value from YVR/SEA then that's fine I can do that. Right now I've got like 15,000 miles give or take, but I do fly AM a couple times a year so I could run that up to 25,000 or maybe 30,000 in the not too distant future. I've also got 55,000 SPG points I could transfer to DL if there were a redemption that made sense. I know it's not a great idea to have orphan miles, but I use airbnb because it's generally more economical than hotels, so I might as well collect the miles from DL since they're giving them out.

flyerCO

Wholly Partner rewards don't have variable pricing. It's one level, saver. Booking OW or RT won't matter for these.

eastindywalrus

I've only got a comment on option #1 - don't waste miles (or money) on flights from Moscow to Saint Petersburg. Take the train. Once you factor in time to get to each airport from the city center, check-in time, time to retrieve bags (if checked), and time to get to the city center from the airport, you're just as well off taking the Sapsan. Price-wise, you'll end up about the same with the Sapsan vs round-trip SVO-LED on Aeroflot (for economy, anyways), but you'll be more comfortable on the train and won't have to waste a bunch of time in transit to/from the airport or at the airport.

tl;dr: Don't do option 1 - not worth the miles.

italdesign

Anyone know what's the award price for USA to Tahiti?

drvannostren

You know what, I had no idea. Thanks for that, I'll look for the award charts, I honestly had no idea.

Fair point, I do enjoy train travel especially if it means I can skip paying for a hotel for a night. One thing I'd really like to do though is try a Sukhoi Superjet. I've looked and never found one on this route (recently) for Aeroflot, but I'm hoping maybe I can find one with a connection in a random smaller city. Maybe I'll combine train and flight if I can get an SSJ one. The other option is Interjet and it's never really worked out for me either.

Sidebar: A dream is to take the trans siberian one day, but who knows if I'll ever have time cuz it takes so damn long and isn't cheap either lol, I thought it would be, then I looked into it...nope!

Thanks for the tip!

flyerCO

Obviously you didn't.

eastindywalrus

IrAero flies a SSJ on VKO-LED, but that's the only MOW-LED route with a SSJ that I'm aware of. Aeroflot doesn't operate it on SVO-LED. I took it from SVO-VOG a few years ago - interesting from an aviation geek perspective, but otherwise pretty forgettable.

I feel you on the Transsiberian. I'd love to do it as long as I did multiple stopovers - I know myself well enough to know I'd be bored to death if I did it nonstop. That's gonna be a later in life thing though - I can't justify blowing all of my vacation days for it now.

Regarding the trains from Saint Petersburg to Moscow and vice versa... They're great, but even the sleepers that leave near midnight get in way too early. After a night on a train, I need a shower ASAP, and you get dumped at your destination city at 8 or 9 AM a lot of times, and then have to wait to check into a hotel. I did the Red Arrow once for the novelty (along with another overnight sleeper years ago on a study abroad, but it might have been one of the lower-class sleepers), but I won't do it again. 4-hour Sapsan ride every time from now on. There's enough departures in a day to plan your arrival to coincide with your hotel check-in time without much hassle.

Utskicat

@RealHJ I think this is exactly the info I need. I am trying to book YYZ-DL/JFK-CI/TPE-CI/SYD-CI. Dullta.com will pull up YYZ-JFK-TPE for 85K and TPE-SYD for 65K. EF shows good O business inventory as well, so its not phantom. I called DL tonight and got what I think was a decent agent. She manually sold the segments in Axis YYZ-TPE and TPE-SYD, but it returned error that no valid award fare existed (didn't even break the fare additively). If she put in a longer than 24 hour conx in TPE, then it would price additive with fare break in TPE at 85K+65K. She dug into the fare rules for CSM850 (YYZ-AKL Award fare basis) and found that acceptable routing is only North American gateways. TPE not a valid routing. She spoke to a collegue who said TPE is not a valid fare routing on anything from US/CAN O&D. Not sure if I really believe that from other posts here.

1) From some posts here, I am wondering if the YYZ-JFK on DL was creating a married segment issue? I would be fine to remove it and sort another way to get from YYZ-JFK.
2) I really want to find 85K miles in O class from NA to SYD. I know TPE is a long ... trip, but the J hard and soft product on CI sounds amazing. In your post above, you mention holding the agents hand through the process. I worked at DL in college so I know the lingo and Deltamatic and could probably explain the process respectfully. Is this "process" you mention somewhere here, if so can you give me the post # or link? Otherwise can you sum up the CI with Skymiles award booking process for me to pass on?

Thanks so much for your help!