twospirits

As usual, I am planning my Hawaiian vacation for the end of the year and usually I go by United.
But this time around, instead of the usual NYC to HNL and back, I decided to make a stop at SFO. For that part I am using United.
But from SFO to HNL and then from KOA back to either LAX or SFO, is there any reason not to use Hawaiian or would you prefer United.
Mind you I will be using Hawaiian for my inter-island transfers. (I don't think I'll use go this time around).
I do have both FY programs but United is my main carrier.

Any thoughts?

bocastephen

Depends - what's more important, miles or comfort/service?

I just flew the Hawaiian 767 from SEA to OGG - very comfortable seats (if legroom is an issue, you can $25 for an exit row), decent inflight entertainment, free beverages (3 passes during the flight), free food with optional paid upgrades and rental video units if you're not happy with the free inflight entertainment.

The aircraft is spotless (a 767-300 with winglets and Boeing's new-style 'wave' interior) and you're flying Hawaiian - you're in the mood before even leaving the ground in CA.

So - all things being equal (cost/flight time) and earning miles aside, I'd take Hawaiian. If you need the UA miles, then that is your only option from SFO.

One thing to consider - Hawaiian flies from SJC as well, and you should check those flights to compare.

twospirits

Both But if I had to choose one it would be miles. Since I usually get Economy Plus seats on United and Hawaiian doesn't have that. But from what I remember using Hawaiian, I did feel comfortable.
Yeah, I will be looking at all the available departure cities in the Bay Area. Thanks for pointing that out. Since its just me and my lover we like to have the the seat configurations of the 767 (2-3-2), and 777 (2-5-2), so I will check both airlines out on Seat Guru to see which one is offered.

Of course, I could just go from SFO down to LAX and then fly to HNL from there.

tonywestsider

Don't forget, HA flies to Hawaii out of all three Bay Area airports: SFO, OAK and SJC on 763s.

Ancien Maestro

The miles is what gets us to Hawaii now for 7 years.. so United is my choice. Paid flights interisland, doesn't make sense with Unitied, so my choice for interisland flights is Hawaiian.

cblaisd

I would disagree on comfort - HA in Y is miserable.

Given my size and height, I will always take UA E+.

Back in the day when HA upgrades were only 15K miles (and I was earning lots of HA miles), I'd go for HA F (which is nicer than UA F)

twospirits

I agree, I do like UA E+ on United.

6rugrats

UA - we had vouchers to use and we earn miles on UA. The biggest reason though is the possibility of receiving an UDU because of status. Two of us have already cleared to F, and the others at least have E+ seating.

frankhi

Seems like you know you get one stopover or open jaw... you could use the united stopover in sfo instead of the open jaw in HI.... might need one additional interisland transfer, but that's easy. We do that all the time, even if it is only to overnight at LAX or SFO to break up the outbound (against the wind part).

skj

We just flew LAX-LIH round trip on UA, and there were empty FC seats on both flights, even after all the UDUs and employees. Don't know if upgrades are as easy to/from other Hawaii destinations or at other times of the year, but we enjoyed our upgraded seats more than E+

azhoopsfan

I always like earning miles --- sometimes even when I would be more comfortable otherwise (that's why I never fly Jet Blue). So I would pick United, although getting on a HA plane would start to feel like I was on vacation before I left.

twospirits

^ That is true (in my case) with JetBlue as well. Anyway, at this point I am most likely going to stay with/use United instead of HA. I'll just used HA in the inter-island segments.

Thanks to all.