uclacolumbiaunc

It's not about flight operated on DL metal... it's about DL charging extraordinary amount of miles for what's supposed to be a "saver level" award on partner airlines. that's against the spirit of "saver award" on partner airlines.

RealHJ

Yup, award prices have went up about 3-5 fold. But it gets better. Try to book. Everything is phantom inventory. Nothing is bookable. I've tried too many times to count various routes and airlines, and even at the exhorbiant levels (where 500K miles gets one RT vs. 8 RTs on the same route earlier), nothing is actually bookable. Inventory keeps showing, but when you try to book it always errors out after the payment page.

RealHJ

Don't know from LAX, but HNL-TPE (or ICN, PVG, FUK, NGO, KIX, NRT, HND, etc.) has been always 35K for J. Went up nearly two fold to 60K a while ago. Of course now it's like 170K, tripled further, or more than 6x from the normal price (as in effect at other airlines, where 35K one-way for J is the norm to N and E Asia).

RealHJ

The other big question is: now pretty much no partner awards are bookable (at least, all KE and SV ones I've tried - and I've tried literally 100s of flights on various dates). It shows and you can go through, view fare rules and all, but when you submit the CC info on the payment page, it always errors out...you go back to search, flights are still there, just can't book. So, it not only costs more, but you cannot actually book anything now (at least that I've tried) anyway. I've tried just KE and SV flight by itself, together with DL, various dates, routes, different permutations thereof. Everything always fail to ticket, 100%.

Utskicat

Keep in mind that for a while now OW can be same cost as RT. Did you look up RT price on these routes?

xliioper

It's not that they are the "same cost" as RT, it's that DL has different award levels for one-way vs. roundtrip bookings. While some one-way award levels can be as high as a roundtrip, you won't know difference until you compare the various different levels. The award levels that require a roundtrip booking with have an 'R' in the middle of their fare basis codes (found at "Fare Rules" link) and will often have some kind of minimum stay noted in the fare rules as part of the roundtrip booking requirement (many have 7 days on international awards). Revenue fares are very much the same with the cheaper international fares having either 7 day or Saturday night stay roundtrip booking requirements.

In order to see the difference between one-way and roundtrip award levels you need to attempt a roundtrip booking (with a 7 day stay to also meet the min stay requirements). The lowest roundtrip levels generally also all have a 60 day advance purchase requirement (so you will never see lowest award levels if searching closer in). If you use the "Price Calendar" option in the award search (can only be selected after initiating a search), you can more quickly search over a broader range of dates for lowest levels.

FYI, DL is still quoting partner awards on Canada-ICN KE metal awards -- 50K coach/120K business each-way. Beyond ICN awards are being quoted as broken fare awards. For example, Canada-TYO is 120K + 15K = 135K in business.

PotomacApproach

One reason they can is rollover MQMs. I'll be PM for years just on rollovers, which means I'm getting nearly 2x the RDMs I would be on AA or UA. Pretty sure they realize if they ever got rid of rollover MQMs they'd have to adjust the value of SkyPesos.

xliioper

The changes look to be a continuing effort to more closely align revenue and award pricing which has been going on since DL introduced dynamic awards on June 1st, 2016. While they do not copy revenue fare filings with award fares on a one-to-one basis (there are generally quite a few more revenue fares than award levels on any given route), there's enough different award levels that mileage amounts will generally be within a fairly close range of revenue fares (they also employ the same types of advance purchase, day of travel, seasonality, and roundtrip booking requirements found in revenue fares to award levels to more closely align them).

The process seems to have been completed on domestic awards several years ago, but they had not finished process on international awards at that time. They eliminated the 80K one-way low-level D1 awards to EU around Oct 2020 and replaced them with a 105K low-level award that had a roundtrip booking requirement (could not be booked as a one-way). They also raised partner biz awards from 86K one-way to 120K around that time. The more recent steps on international awards include making lowest award levels variable based on route (more competitive routes with lower fares also have lower award levels available) and aligning partner metal awards level with DL metal awards levels to EU and parts of Asia (so that cheapest levels all now require roundtrip bookings including on partners). There is currently an exception to Italy which is likely some kind of kind of carve out due to ITA still being in limbo. Also, partner award levels on KE from Canada to Asia still look to be in place. Looking at some of the JV info, it appears DL-KE JV only covers US-Asia routes and does not include Canada. So that would seem to be the likely explanation for that exception (VS/AF/KL JV includes both US and Canada). These changes have likely been in the works for awhile, but with travel demand continuing to improving and more of Asia reopening, DL probably decided to pull the trigger now rather than perhaps earlier during Covid.

Sp7

The answer is that they're not. I am a magical unicorn that gets the best of both worlds, I fly Delta for business travel and my wife is a DL employee so we get to fly non-rev for pleasure. D1 seat availability has been decreasing over the years as the D1 cabins in the new A350s and A330s are smaller than the 744s and 772s that they replaced. The route network is also much smaller due to NRT's closure, JVs, and fleet rationalization.

The answer here is really simple, they're filling the seats with paying customers. Supply is down, demand is either flat or up. Delta is making loads of money.

Adelphos

I think what a lot of people want to know are...

1) What is the current "lowest" each way pricing for Skymiles business class international redemptions from US to Europe or Arsa, regardless of partner or Delta metal - is it the 210K round trip (105K each way) price?

2) With more harmonized award pricing between Delta metal / partners, is there more availability?

3) When is the next Flash Sale

xliioper

Again, the lowest international biz awards will now vary with route for most international destinations from US. Routes like BOS/JFK-LHR seem to have about lowest levels (both currently 230K roundtrip). Other routes can be quite a bit higher -- lowest biz level on DTW-LHR is currently 370K roundtrip. It seems pretty clear they are trying to more closely align award pricing with revenue fare pricing which also varies between routes. They've actually had variable low levels on coach EU awards for quite some time with cities like BOS and JFK often having considerably lower levels available to EU in coach than other US cities (particularly during off season). They've had coach awards with seasonality rules for international awards for lowest levels for some time now. Business awards mostly don't seem to have seasonality rules baked in, but they do pretty clearly limit bucket availability for lowest award levels (like OZ) during busier seasons.

Don't think they have really enhanced availability. If partners release availability, it looks like they just book into lowest DL award level on a route (which will be different if you book as a one-way or roundtrip or don't meet AP requirements of cheapest levels). If they don't release any inventory on a flight to DL, you just won't be able to book award on them (just like before).

pmblinn

If I had a Skymile for every time someone opened a thread with a variant of "What is [DL/AA/UA] thinking? XXXk miles for an AAA-BBB award??? That's insane! What, do they hate their customers?"...then I'd be able to afford an AAA-BBB award.

RealHJ

Not quite. By the time you thought you had enough SlyMiles, DL would have moved the goal post yet again and further jacked up the award price. And, to add insult to injury, charge a YQ of $800+ on top.

JustAnotherGuy001

seriously , was looking to book a VS award in economy and it jumped fro 50k miles to 120k miles.

ffI

Don't be fooled - Other airlines (UA) can and will do the same as well.
UA to Asia was 60k each way in bz (long ago) Now it is 93k via Ethiopia -Via any other route with a single UA component it is 180k saver - then it becomes 300k !
Don't think AA is any better - 155k to DEL is now saver then price jumps to 180k and then 230k
AS charges 200k one way for "partner QR awards - although I just flew SIN-EWR back for 100k AS on the nonstop
The best choice is AC but the trouble is living in the US at a UA hub - the options are many more on the big 3 (at a vastly higher cost)

The real issue is this - the airlines were using their own miles before as funny money worth nothing - now they have assigned it a value of 1c each
When I can get 2.625c on a BofA card, there is no sense in getting miles worth 1c

Some exceptions occur in cost - I just got an offer on my Delta Amex - spend 21k - get 420$ cash back (2c) - along with the miles
So my 21k DL miles will now cost me 0.625c each - may be worth it - I can goose the spend to 30k and get a free 15k MQM out of it as well.over the next 2 months
Now to keep an eye out for the exceptions in prices and book at once

We got spoiled over the great recession and miles were very useful and valuable - now they have fallen into simple cash value of 1c