Help flying SAN to Amsterdam
 

Need help, suggestions, strategy, and/or a plan to get two business/first RT tickets SAN to Amsterdam, Holland for a flight arriving a day of two before 7/15/17 and returning 8/4/17 after 2 PM or a day or
two later (cruise inbetween).

We are two seniors without any remaining airline status. We want to get “saver” rates using some of our ff miles. We have 110,000/125,000 UA and a one account with Alaska of 260,000. We have plans to stretch these as much as we can. We have always been told we are too late, so here we are with plenty of time. We do have a UA CC that allows us any available seat at standard point level.

We will also consider paying. Last year we went to SYD on a super-super saver payment on Fiji. The year before we went to South America, via Panama on another super deal. Both of these opportunities were with FTer’s help, FF tickets were not available in the lower point category. Thank you.

Assuming you want to travel together, consider booking two one way tickets each to use your miles on different airlines. Start searching as soon as the awards are available (I believe UA is at 11 months prior). And just keep looking once a day. When you see something, book it.

Your dates are pretty specific. Flexibility is usually important. Willingness to arrive a day early or leave a day later can sometimes make all the difference.

There have been some decent paid fares to Europe recently, but you're unlikely to find deals this far out.

Finally, for specific advice on how to best use your miles, post in the respective airline forums here. People are generally glad to help with tricks and tools, but you'll get more expertise in those forums.

Not to be unhelpful, but FT is not a travel agency, and short of checking the same websites that you can regarding flight availability, we don't have access to extra seats. If you need to travel on those dates, you may end up having to pay for travel.

Thank you.

I have failed so many times to locate a saver fare to an international destination, that I was looking for process and sites that might help MORE than just checking UA and AS sites every day for a year plus. Perhaps a partner airline would be best? JBord suggests I repost on the two airlines. I do not like to duplicate post, but perhaps this is a good time to. JBord also suggest starting, for UA, perhaps 11 months out. If I could pen that down for AS and UA it would save me lots of checking, starting now, 13 months out.

LondonElite, thank you for responding. While I have been a member of FT since it's inception, I find that the programs are always changing. Going from elite, wife was 1-K for years and 1-k G for a few and I was elite with Alaska, to non status changes writing letters to the Airlines for "help". I have found input from FT always useful, and special informed experience often adds avenues I have not thought of. Sometimes splitting mileage, special routing or the like can change the availability. And as you say, perhaps I will just have to pay for a couple RT seats, if I cannot successfully find an alternative. As I posted, I have had to do that the past two flights. Members of FT have led me to well priced "alternative" airlines servicing my desired destination at prices 1/3 to 1/4 of booking outright with the likes of UA directly.

13 months out won't help you, airlines just don't publish that far in advance.

And, as you correctly pointed out, airlines are always changing, so you may not have noticed that UA now charges significantly more to fly with their partners instead of its own planes.

One other suggestion is to look for one way. Many people look at that as a negative since you would have to pay TWO change fees in case something went wrong, but for me it's always worked in that I normally only have to change one flight and pay only ONE fee and don't have to worry about fare difference on the other flight. That may be different with reward travel.

I didn't mean to snap at an 'Old-Timer' around since the days of Randy, so my apologies (you can't see details on the stupid mobile version)! :)

I guess if I were you, I would start looking for an outbound flight once those seats become available for booking on whatever routing UA and its partners will allow. Obviously the transatlantic portion is the most important to nail down, so look for those flights if you can't get something close to home, and bolt on a connector as appropriate. You can then build the returns accordingly.

Good luck!