Just got this alert when searching for Z space:
EK award inventory is temporarily unavailable due to an issue with our data provider. They are actively working to fix the issue. Thank you for your patience.

Has this been going on for a long time?

I think at least 2 years

brutal. That’s the reason I signed up for EF. Is there any other way (aside from manually searching EK’s website) to search for and be alerted of EK F award space?

None that I'm aware of.

It’s not just EK but also EY, QR and BA.

Their response to members on FT have been aggressive when questioning how long this continue…

I was just about to sign up for one year membership with Expertflyer. Mainly to look up BA, IB, QR and AY flights. I will not buy it due to this information. Thanks

I agree that they are aggressive and short when responding to queries and issues. However the other side of the coin, is that they are offering access to different GDS systems (I think) and certainly different modalities of GDS access. This inevitably brings complexity and has quirks and limitations. Ask any travel agent, and they will tell you that on this system you can't do that, and so forth. Secondly, they have no control over what the airlines choose to publish - especially in the area of awards - where it changes frequently and is deliberately limited in many cases.

I pay for the alerts on availability and seating - award info is a bonus that sometimes helps and often doesn't. I think it is easier to look on the UA site for example than on EF.

Just my 2c

When you're paying for a service, you expect the advertised functionality.

To be fair, they did promptly provide a refund as soon as I requested due to not having access to the award space I was seeking

I also wish Expert Flyer would fix this. I use their service for other things but no access to EK award inventory is not good. EK website is clunky and seems unreliable. Recently I searched for an F award from about 5 US cities to DXB in June. Each time the first response was "no first class flights available, showing biz class instead". Then when clicking 'show available flights' it says no flights available. Maybe I will try the QF website. IIRC they show EK award inventory.

My subscription has ended - but before I renew, does it still work for Emirates to say how many seats are left to be sold? Like to look to see if there would be a chance of an op up. Thanks!

Yes, in my experience the only feature that does not work is the award / upgrade information. The rest, including the availability of paid fare buckets seems to work OK.

This is all I get too - frustrating as there are obviously flights those days. Has it been broken like this for a long time?

This is correct, only EK award/upgrade searching is affected. For that we do have a clear notice at the top of the Award search results for EK noting the issue.

We are currently working on/testing a fix and we will let you know when it is available for use, thank you.

ExpertFlyer Voice can you please share a rough timeline of when customers can expect the EK award availability data issue to be resolved? It would be really helpful for planning purposes!