xliioper

Unless it was a Y/B/M fare, it wouldn't have entitled you to access to Preferred seats. Otherwise, you need some level of status on DL or a partner, or be booked through a corporate agency, for access to Preferred seats.
See https://pro.delta.com/content/agency...d-seating.html

thekidvintage

I am a Delta Million Miler.....but 99.9% of the miles were flown on Northwest back in the day....so I don't know much about the current Delta. Home base is SNA-LAX-ONT.

I do know that Delta has HORRIBLE award pricing especially for last-minute award tickets. Next week i need a one-way ATL-ICT and Delta is pricing at 43,000 - 54,000 miles ONE WAY. I can get an AA ticket for 7500-9000 one way. HUGE difference!!

Does Delta have any alliance partners that offer reasonable redemption rates on Delta-metal with decent availability? (Something that is not indexed to cash purchase cost-of-ticket?)

I have had amazing luck with using Avianca LifeMiles for United-metal flights last minute (12,500-mile one-way transcon awards that were pricing at $600-$800 cash price). Hoping to find something similar with a Delta partner.

Have TONS of Citi, Chase, and AMEX to transfer to the right partner. Thanks in advance for your replies......

findark

I might be out of date, but VS awards are a common choice for DL metal. However, it looks like DL is blacking out partner award space within 21 days of departure. I'm not sure there is an option with DL.

xliioper

Delta no longer has separate award rates on partner metal (with the exception of WS) for awards to/from the US and Canada (they will just use the same mileage levels applicable to DL metal). This includes VS, AF, KL, KE, LA, and AM metal awards (among others). The reason for higher award prices on close-in awards is that award mileage levels to/from US/Canada now largely correlate with revenue fare pricing. Like revenue fares which have advance purchase requirements (and often roundtrip booking requirements) for cheapest revenue fares, awards also having matching advance purchase requirements (and potentially roundtrip booking requirements) for the cheapest award levels being available.

The cheapest Delta Main award levels on ATL-ICT are 22.5K miles each-way (19.1K with Amex discount) and require both a 30 day advance purchase and a roundtrip booking. Here are the fare rule requirements for advance purchase on these awards which matches fare rule requirements for cheapest revenue fares. Booking closer-in, or as one-way awards, will result in only higher mileage award levels.




There are still fixed mileage level awards for partner metal award flights that neither begin, nor end, in US/Canada and you may find deals on close-in awards on these routes when compared to revenue fare pricing (for example, partner metal awards from Mexico to Europe or South America or awards within/between Europe and Asia). Also WS metal awards are still fixed mileage for Skymiles awards between US and Canada (and within Canada).

gm1955

I initially avoided exploring this thread thinking there wasn't much I'd learn from a "newbie" thread. However, the breadth of topics covered--and the extent to which questions are answered succinctly and accurately answered--makes me think the official topic of this thread is a significant under-sell.

Wow, it's becoming obvious this FT forum thing has a lot to offer. Thanks to all who share their knowledge with patience. I may hang around awhile.

Merrula

Turns out that our ATL-LAX flight DL0301 was on a 359 so we had a chance to compare the Delta One suites to the 35L Delta One seats on DL65 LAX-AKL after all. Compared to the 35L seats, the 359 suites felt cramped, stuffy & less comfortable. If I needed to work & wasn’t going to sleep I’d probably like the 359 suites but definitely recommend the 35L for sleeping, despite the comparative lack of privacy.

gm1955

Years ago there were both a downloadable PDF and a software tool for listing the Delta schedule, organized by originating city.

I haven't been able to find that for awhile now. Does it exist somewhere, or is there an third party tool that provides the same information?

gm1955

If there are FCM offers, will the amounts of the offer to upgrade to FC be the same for different flyers, either in terms of
total amount paid for the segment, (e.g. PAX A original segment fare $300, gets $100 offer, PAX B original segment fare $200, gets $200 offer)
or total difference asked for the upgrade? (e.g. each has an offer for $200 regardless of original fare for the segment.)

Is there any information on whether Delta adjusts the offer at the time of check in based on past purchase history, Medallion status, etc?

xliioper

Fares are rarely priced by the segment. In most cases, you will have a single fare in each direction of travel which covers all segments in that direction (your fares will be listed in the Fare Details: line in email receipts and they will have an 8 letter fare basis codes -- XAUQA9MF and XFUQA0MF in roundtrip example below). While they update your booked class showing on a flight segment, the online seat upgrade offers are not upfares and do not touch the underlying fare or e-ticket (they will show as a separate 006 receipt for the purchase in My Receipts, but the existing 006 e-ticket receipt is not exchanged). They are not based on fare differences (and it wouldn't even be possible when you've got multiple segments on a single fare).



With an upfare (when going through "Change Flights"), you will pay fare difference and exchange your 006 e-ticket for a new one as well as a new fare which covers all segments on fare on the direction you upfared (you can separately upfare each direction of travel, but not individual flight segments in a direction). If you look at your original receipt in My Receipts after an upfare, the flights will show the status as "EXCH" instead of "OPEN" as below.


I've seen no real pricing sophistication or personalization in the online seat upgrade offers. The offers seem to generally change in concert with underlying fare bucket inventory on flight (J/C/D/I/Z for FC). Usually when a flight gets down to only J bucket inventory availabilty, they will pull the online seat upgrade offers. At that point, the only way to upgrade would be to go through Change Flights and pay fare difference with an upfare. I've had a roundtrip on DTW-MCO as booked above for several months and have seen 4 price points ($708.43, $520.30, $385.93, $278.43) for the online upgrade offers which have almost always correlated with C/D/I/Z bucket availability on flights when I check on EF. The offers have disappeared (seats X'ed out) when there is only J open on one of the flights.

Menamaria

Hi - somewhat new to all of this and trying to figure out smarter ways to earn Delta MQDs. I'm currently Gold Medallion status on Delta and I am booking a roundtrip flight from NYC to Paris. I'd love some advice on whether I'll gain more MQDs if I book this flight on Delta.com or on Airfrance.com.

From what I can figure, booking on Delta.com (Sept 5-15) would earn $841 MQDs (purchase price: $980).
Booking this same flight on Airfrance.com would cost $1180. I was looking at a flex fare, and I think this would be Y class (I called AF to ask, but they could only give me a guess). If it is Y class, my understanding is the MQDs I would earn is 20% of the roundtrip distance, 7,277 miles. Based on this I would earn $1455 MQDs.

If that's correct and since my goal is to earn the most MQDs, it sounds like I should book on Air France. I'd appreciate it if someone could confirm if I'm understanding/calculating this properly!
Also, the outbound flight is operated by Delta and the return is operated by Air France in case that matters.

Thanks in advance!

xliioper

No, Flex fares are not equivalent with Y class fares (which are generally very expensive and would be way more than $1180 roundtrip on this route). There are a whole series of Flex fares which start at the cheapest fare classes and go up from there (they basically have a separate Flex fare filing to go with most non-refundable Main/PE/Biz class fare filings except for the most expensive ones which are already flexible/refundable). AF/KLM websites identify the fare class you are booking by the first letter of the 8 character fare basis code. You need to click on the "View trip details and fare conditions" link after selecting flights to see them. The Flex fares have a 'U' in the third to last position of the fare basis code, but as you can see from below, the booking class can be as low as 'V' and that is what is used to determine credit (which would only be 5% of mileage flown for MQD in this case).

Menamaria

TY!! This makes sense!

Fare basis code: TKW46RM8
​​​​​​Fare basis code: NKW46RM8

It looks like it's only 10% of the distance and 727 MQDs which makes more sense.

spike74

I got a flight credit when my mother got sick and we had to cancel our trip LGA-MSY. When she booked flights recently using the credit, she was charged a $100 "change fee" I believe which was about 1/3 the value of the credit. Is there any way to avoid this fee or lessen it when I book flights with my credit?
Also, I believe the policy for use of the credit is one year from the original booking. Is that right?

xliioper

Unless it was a Basic Economy fare, there are no change fees on domestic fares. But you will get charged for fare differences. Normally, you have to book and fly within one year of original booking for credit to remain valid. But if it was booked in 2023, I believe you can still use credits for flights through end of 2024 due to credit extensions.

gm1955

The Delta schedule used to be available as a PDF (organized by departing city) and an updatable desktop program. I can't find anything like that currently.

Is either of those still available somewhere, or is there a different solution to get the same info?