unitedbusiness

What also sucks (such a pedestrian term), is that even if you find an partner award online, especially on Korean Air in a premium cabin, the website will time out and say it is “sold out.”
This happened to me, so I called the Diamond Desk, saw the award space available. Then they put me on hold for 2 hours to reach the partner desk to get the ticket issued, only to be told after the long hold that the inventory wasn’t there.
truly dreadful experience all the way around .

flyerCO

KE issue usually, but notcalways, is blackout dates. DL doesn't have them. KE does, however still there's inventory in the award bucket. Thus DL sees award flights available. However when it goes to confirm inventory, KE system rejects booking.

xliioper

If award rates are same, then sure, it could tip in favor of DL due to MQM/MQD earn. With the harmonization to/from US/Canada, the partner awards always look to book in lowest applicable DL award level (which is based on advance purchase, roundtrip booking w/min stay requirements, day of travel, seasonality, etc.). But there actually has to be partner award bucket availability open on their flights. DL metal flights can book into a number of different award levels based on the fact that DL has multiple award buckets on their own flights (it's not simply binary). If there are flights on DL metal that have availability is lowest level DL award buckets, DL award pricing should match awards available on partner metal (assuming there is some partner availability on that day).

TrojanTraveler

Related topic…if I have a skymiles redemption through Delta, and one of the flights is DL marketed but operated by another sky team carrier (say KL or AF), I will only earn MQMs/MQSs/MQDs on the DL operated flights?

VFR

Delta award tickets are always booked under the operating airline's code -- you will never have a DL marketed award flight operated by another carrier.

TrojanTraveler

News to me, I seldom redeem miles and it’s been many many years since I redeemed for a flight outside the US. I can understand how they would calculate the MQMs, but how would they calcite the MQDs on an award ticket for, say, JFk-MUC, where JFK-CDG is on DL and CDG-MUC in on AF?

xliioper

They will usually divvy things up on the basis of flight stage length in these cases (apply percentage flown on DL metal to number of miles redeemed).

TrojanTraveler

I thought that was the case, so you likely won’t know until after completing the flights. Unless DL has programmed this to show when you are redeeming, similar to when you purchase a ticket. But with Delta’s IT…

Cledaybuck

They suck for DL awards too!

jiburi

Mileage aside, I thought KL charged fuel charges? If so, wouldn't that essentially nullify the mileage award advantage?

Jiburi

xliioper

If you are talking about when redeeming KL (or other partner operated flights) using DL Skymiles, there are no surcharges for DL/AF/KL/VS metal on ex-US one-way or roundtrip DL Skymiles awards to EU. You will pay surcharges on all 4 carrier operating metal if your DL awards have an EU origin.

BigFlyer

KLM does have extra charges, so let's compare.

The SFO to AMS itinerary shown in post #3 is 66,000 miles plus $113 for connecting flights in both directions departing from SFO on the outbound at 5:40 AM.

I started a dummy booking by comparison on klm.us. It is 40,000 miles plus $241 for non-stop flights in both directions leaving at civilized hours. So the KLM award flight is 26,000 miles less and $128 more than the Delta award.

I don't care about MQM any more.

xliioper

The DL award levels also apply to the non-stop KL operated flights. See post #6 -- https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/34954709-post6.html

BigFlyer

Yes, but very difficult to find availabity and book those with DL miles.

flyerCO

How hard is it to calculate a percentage? Flight length out of total ticketed miles. Simply calculate what would earn for the miles spent and multiple by that percentage.

Same way you do it when ticket is cash and have DL and OAL marketed flights on one ticket. This is MQD earned

MQM is strictly based off flight length.