Richard Berg

Successfully booked 2x JFK-BRU(12hr layover)-FCO(11 day stop)-BRU(3 day stop)-JFK in J for next October, for about 40K+$140/pp.

I've been calling every few days for the last month to establish a pattern of when new dates open up. It's quite consistent @ 330 days out. Never bothered calling Manchester -- agents in NY and DFW offices were uniformly decent, so long as I gave them exact routings to price out.

Note: SN is stingy about which connections are allowed on EY tix. No agent would book a stopover that crossed dates (even if under 24hr); many would not even allow a same day connection in BRU. Since there is no pricing advantage to putting everything on a single ticket, I just bought a pair of roundtrips, leaving plenty of room for IRROPS, since beer shopping near BRU is a preexisting hobby of mine.

Intra Europe availability is wide open, never a limiting factor on any itinerary I tested. Even so, given the ~$60/pp taxes and lack of proper J seats on their A319 service, I may cancel those segments in favor of RyanAir on the MR portal. EY miles are just too valuable to "waste" on anything less than transatlantic.

Now all I need is for everyone else to keep quiet so I can enjoy these trips in the future...

cln

having used EY miles last year on Oman Air MCT-SLL-MCT-MLE in J (went smooth) and Jetairway SGN-BKK in Y ( which was a mess , i had big troubles to get on the plane ).
This year used the remaining miles for FRA-PRG-ICN in J on CZECH AIRLINES

dannyrado

Ryanair on the MR portal??? Not sure you can book Ryanair with amex in the UK?

snic

Using the SN reservation code, you can reserve seats on the LH website.

Edited to add: apparently reservations for within-europe SN business class itineraries are not possible on the LH website. Not sure if they're available by calling SN.

snic

I just booked three J tickets on BRU-Sweden-BRU and BRU-Italy-BRU. Availability for end of next summer was wide open. One agent put me on hold and then disconnected, but the next one was very competent. The idea was to fly from Sweden to Italy via BRU, but the agent said it would have to be two separate itineraries. So I chose flights to leave a long layover in BRU. Kind of a pain, and maybe it would have made more sense to just buy the tickets and gotten shorter layovers. But buying would have cost about $300 more - and that would have been for economy. SN J within Europe I'm sure is nothing special, but it does come with a free checked bag per passenger, so we save about another $100.

Richard Berg

I happen to have a surplus of MR right now, but I really just meant "cash equivalent points". By the time I fly this route, it may be Barclaycard miles or BofA Rewards or a Citi Prestige annual credit or whatever.

Richard Berg

It is literally a Y seat.

This A319 aircraft carries 141 Economy Class passengers in a one-class configuration with 25 rows. This aircraft is used on a variety of routes throughout Europe and the Middle East.

Seatguru comments say legroom is worse than LCCs: https://www.seatguru.com/airlines/Br...tno=3181&date=

Ryanair flies the same route for $75 RT. I'll the run the #s on bag fees, but I suspect the EY miles + taxes won't come out ahead, given the opportunity cost.

In my case, the main reason to fly another carrier is schedule, not cost. JFK-BRU arrives at 07:20. The BRU-FCO connection requires a 7.5hr minimum layover. I'd rather not waste my entire first day lounging around BRU, even if I end up spending a few more $$ on bags.

snic

So, what if you miss your RyanAir flight due to the SN flight being delayed? Then you are out $75 plus the cost of a last minute ticket (x3 pax, in my case). That's why I padded the schedule: even though we are connecting with SN, it's necessarily a separate onward ticket, which might give SN an excuse not to accommodate us even if the first SN flight is delayed. The long layover will give us a whole day to explore Brussels - not hang around the airport!

onlysuites

I booked a partner award way back in July but wasn't advised about the changes to cancellation fees. Been told now that my ticket came under the new rules which means 10% charge. Anyone else faced this situation?

snic

I've booked twice in the past month or so, and both times I was clearly advised of the 10% miles penalty for cancellation.

dtokuda

Forgive me for not coming up with this in search, but for the partner award charts that are distance based, is the distance in miles or kms?

MaxVO

Redemption tables for EY partner awards are adopted from each partner's own tables. The distance is often in miles. But to be certain, look up the partner's own redemption tables for details and explanations.

pogonation

Has anyone had success booking OZ one-way. I noticed that it says that redemptions are only valid when a return is booked but I know that people have had success booking Oman Air one-way when it says 'one-way journeys not permitted'...

gradtraveler

Two main points if you don't want to read it all:
1. You can book AA flights with multiple connections and it will still be priced as is on the Ethiad AA award chart.

2. If AA shows T class but Ethiad says seats were not released to them, ask the rep to try to push a booking request anyways, it worked for me.


My wife and I have been looking for a way to get to the Galapagos from Albuquerque, a trip that runs around $2000pp for flights. I have a ton of delta points and "had" a ton of MR points. The Ethiad award chart for AA makes small airports in the US that do not offer international flights a very lucrative spot for award bookings.

After finding T class tickets between Albuquerque and Guayaquil, Ecuador on the AA website, I entered the ring with the Ethiad call centers expecting a blood bath. The tickets I wanted were ABQ -> DFW -> MIA -> GYE roundtrip and according to the award chart were 17500 points pp one way. The first rep I talked too, pretty sure she was in Abu Dhabi, knew how to book it, confirmed availability, then went to transfer me to the department that could book it and then the call disconnected. Second rep, English accent, said that availability could not longer be found on the return trip, T class tickets had been dissolved (even though 5 minutes earlier they were okay). HUCA. Third rep, English accent, seemed to know what he was doing from the first couple seconds of the call, took the airport codes and dates and searched availability, again no availability showed on the return flights. T class showed up but as unbookable. I mentioned they were showing up on the AA site and his response was lets try a dummy booking. He took all my info for the tickets and submitted the booking request to AA even without current T class availability. A few seconds later, the tickets are confirmed and ticketed. Even with 2 connections, I was only charged the 17500 points pp totaling 70k points transferred from MR instantly. There were around $115 in taxes pp matching what was shown on the AA site.

I transferred 18750 MR points to 15000 BA avios in order to book the Guayaquil to Galapagos segment on LATAM. Around $100 pp in taxes for that too.

In total it was 53750 MR points pp plus $200 pp for the entire trip. No fees to move points because they are international carriers.

If you can get this deal during a 20-30% point transfer bonus it becomes even better.

MaxVO

Very creative idea! ^ Thanks for sharing.