ExpertFlyer
 

ExpertFlyer

Using EF to look at the EK seat map, to review award/upgrade availability, setting seat and fare alerts.
http://www.expertflyer.com/

ExpertFlyer is an extremely valuable tool for the road warrior. You can sign up for a free account, which allows a capped amount of travel searches or for a nominal fee, you can sign up for a paid account, which provides unlimited search query.

What is EF?
An online tool which shows:

• Flight availability for over 400-airlines
• Award and upgrade availability for select airlines
• Real-time seat maps for over 100 airlines featuring SeatGuru® seat reviews
• Published fare information complete with rules, restrictions and Around the World fares
• Flight Inventory & Seat Alerts™
• Flight status
• Mobile edition for up-to-the-minute information

This section will walk you through how to search for an upgrade award on EK as well as award travel (ie mileage ticket)

When looking for a Business Saver Award and upgrade (from Y to J), EK books these into fare class D.

A Business Flex award is fare class C

Step 1
Login to EF

Step 2
Choose Upgrades & Awards from the menu on the left

Step 3
Input the desired city pairs, in this case I'm searching for award/upgrade availability between DXB and JFK departing the 5th April 2011 and returning 12th April, 2011

http://img703.imageshack.us/img703/9...01222atam0.png

You will then be presented with the search results and seat availability. Like this:

http://img816.imageshack.us/img816/9...01222atam0.png

I can clearly see that there are 7 seats available on the A380 service ex DXB - which can be redeemed as flight awards and/or upgrades.

If I scroll down, I am presented with the return availability. Again, I can see that there are plenty of seats available. Always a good sign!

http://img194.imageshack.us/img194/9...01222atam0.png

What EF allows you to do is arm yourself with all the data you need so you can either then make the award booking on EK.com or you can call the Skywards desk directly and instead of waiting for the agent to find you seats, you simply tell them the dates you want, knowing that the availability should be there.

Ok, once again I'm having problems with using Expertflyer to manage a booking, though this time I don't think anyone's at fault, but I'm just frustrated.

As usual flights for next week were completely sold out till a couple of days back. I'd see a seat available in the fare bucket I needed but by the time I would ring up EK the seat would be gone.

Now, EK has started releasing inventory so I actually see seats available on EF for long periods of time. The problem is however that neither the EK website nor their call center is willing to sell me a seat in that fare bucket. (I already have a ticket, just changing dates).

Now one possible solution that the EK rep I last spoke with suggested was that this is the inventory made available for US point of sale, which I believe is what EF tracks. As usual, EK is out to fleece it's DXB based customers, so one can't book the fare from here any more.

Now this hasn't happened before so I want to confirm if it's truly the reason I've felt like an idiot telling the EK agent but no there is a seat available.

In my experience, EK is the airline where actual availability and "theoretical availability (according to expertflyer and KVS) fall apart the most. Don't know if the reason is only POS (eg KVS lets you check different POS's). It is hit and miss. I only use expertflyer/KVS for directional availability nowadays.

I believe that SV (Saudia) is the worst in terms of discrepancy. It is an airline that blocks probably 20% of seat inventory in premium classes for late VIP arrivals. Often I see the aircrafts have vacant seats whereas my colleagues were desperate to score one on that flight :(

Back to the topic, EF often shows inventory on SV flights but the GDS of my TA seems to be more accurate.

Point of Sale
 

We have just released a new feature on ExpertFlyer that allows you to select a UK POS for a Flight Availability search which may give you better results. No, we are not aware of how to get a DXB specific availability point of sale or if it would show different results as compare to the UK/USA points of sale.

To answer your next question, we are not sure if we will apply this to the Award & Upgrade search, or if it is even necessary to do so. If someone finds a case where the Award/Upgrade inventory is different based on POS, please email us and we will look into it.

I've been trying to logon to Expert Flyer and there appears to be a problem with the website and keeps on crashing - help!! Thank you.

The website is working correctly and has been all day. If you are having problems with your account please email us at [email protected]

EF is often showing inventory when my TA's system (Sabre) does not.

For instance today, I was looking for

EK 3815 DXB RUH 5-Mar for availability of F or A: EF states there F1 A1, however, Sabre shows blank zeros

Same for

EK 818 RUH DXB 8-Mar for F or A and it shows full availability whereas Sabre again shows zeros.

I am getting annoyed with this, am paying the premium fare fore more than 2 yrs now and EK's is getting more and more unreliable. What could be the explanation for this? Is EF's GDS not uploading as fast? Which system is EF's GDS actually based on?

I believe the problem has to do with EF using the USA POS, while you would need the DXB POS. I had the same problem in January with DXB-SIN flights. EF would show seats available - I'd call EK and they'd tell me there weren't any.

Our USA POS GDS for most searches is Sabre. You may have been looking at the wrong flight/day because both our USA and UK POS are showing F0 A0 for EK 818 on 8-Mar.

Again as we posted before, please try the new UK POS as it may provide better results.

Thanks for your reply, however, I was sitting in front of my TA with the mobile version of EF and the dates were absolutely correct, for both him and me.

If your TA is not based in the US did you also look at the UK POS?

Also if you come across such an issue again, please email us so we can help you in real time.

He is based in the Middle East. Should I as a default always use the UK PoS. What is the disadvantage of it?

There is no advantage/disadvantage, it's just that you may find the UK POS more closely mirrors the POS of your TA.

Yes, but if the UK POS is mirrors 'more closely' why shouldn't I use it all the time? If so, it only has benefits correct?