Stgermainparis

Correct. You can only book for family and must set up a family account complete with birth certs, marriage certs, passports etc.

Coasterdevils30

Has anyone had any experience with booking a round trip with different origin and final destination? Id be looking to fly jfk-ogg/lih out and then ogg/lih-tpa back. Not sure if this would count as a round trip for the 25k miles.

waterandwoods

I haven't heard that specifically, but in general DL availability through KE is more limited than DL's own space. From what I can tell its difficult to predict what will/won't be available. From my limited experience low level first class seats to Hawaii from New York/Eastern U.S. are practically non existent even if using DL miles so you can pretty much forget using KE miles. If you are willing to connect in LAX/west coast you may have better luck. Personally, it's hard enough to find coach availability to Hawaii on DL through KE, I can't even imagine the luck it would take to get multiple first class tickets.

waterandwoods

I have not tried that specifically, but I know you can do an open jaw at the destination (ie fly into OGG, out of HNL) so I think it might work the other way around as long as orgin and destination are in the same country.

ronnyk

I have been accumulating my Chase UR points for a while in the hope of taking a family vacation to Hawaii next August. I live on the East Coast. I am currently waiting on my callback from Korean Air.

Based upon what I've read and what I see on the DL website, I'm not optimistic of finding a flight on DL (though I'd love that flatbed FC flight out of Atlanta!). The alternatives are then Alaska or Hawaiian Air. I'm not seeing any of the lower mileage award seats on Alaska for my dates, so I assume this means no Alaska flights would be available to KAL.

But how does one see potential availability for Hawaiian Air? They don't seem to classify their award seats the same way as other airlines. Any advice would be much appreciated, as there is a Hawaiian flight that would work reasonably well for us.

Stgermainparis

My understanding is that all your segments must be on the same carrier for US. So in this case, DL. You'd need to find saver level DL flights for the entire trip. At least this is what I did and was successful. These will price out at 22.5k on Alaska search engine. I don't think ATL-HNL is ever available for saver level, but you can try. Anyway, Hawaiian Air and Alaska are not technically part of Skyteam, so you couldn't use KE points for those. http://www.skyteam.com/en/about/korean-air/


Someone please correct me if I'm wrong.

waterandwoods

I think Alaska and Hawaiian are non skyteam partners of KE. They have a separate chart. I believe it's 30,000 miles roundtrip in economy to hawaii. You also can't mix carriers.

I do not know the best way to search Hawaiian availability but surely some blog out there has covered it at some point or another.

floridastorm

Is there any other airline where their frequent flyer program is as convoluted as that of Korean Airlines? The process of booking frequent flyer miles on other Skyteam airlines is truly draconian. I haven't tried to book Skypass miles on Korean itself. But, I would think it may involve the same absurd procedures. From having to call and speak with customer service two or three times, having to send in forms to allow compiling of family mileage, to the difficulty incurred trying to actually get seats on a member airline, to not being able to purchase additional mileage, to only be allowed to use mileage for Korean hotels and rental cars, etc. etc. Also, it you have enough mileage for one seat on a Korean flight, and your wife travels with you as a cash customer, the price for the second seat will be double that of most other airlines since Korean tickets are normally more expensive than other majors. I rue the day when I changed my frequent flyer credit card program to Korean from Delta.

Coasterdevils30

I've been having the worst experience trying to book on Delta using Korean Miles. My first shot was calling in on the 11th and requesting a callback from the Skypass dept. They did call back the next day on the 12th but my flights weren't available.


I did some more research and found what I believed were to be flights that would be available and called back last Tuesday, the 13th and was told they would call back in 24-48 hours. On Friday they still had not called back and I called again. I was told I was still in the queue to be called. They still haven't called as of today. After some checking, I don't believe my flights are available anymore so no use calling back, but what a pain...

Stgermainparis

You can read back through my own frustrations with KE, but with a lot of patience and diligence, I did ultimately succeed. Hang in there. Try to have some back up flights. Google Skypass bookings. There's lots of advice out there for identifying potential availability etc.

Coasterdevils30

Thanks. That's what is so ultimately frustrating about it. After some research I was able to find what I am pretty sure were available flights with different cities and such for backup using both delta/Air France sites and AwardNexus but the flights all seemed to go away before they called back. I'll just have to keep checking

ronnyk

I'm not in Atlanta, but just saying that traveling through Atlanta on Delta is by far the best route. I agree that this is unlikely to be an option.

You are incorrect concerning Hawaiian Air and Alaska, as these are both partner airlines for which KE points can be used, just not at as desirable a level as DL (round trip on Alaska and Hawaiian is 30K/60K). And yes, your flight needs to be with the same carrier and, in the case of Hawaiian and Alaska, but not DL, round trip-- though it can be an open jaw).

I did get a callback from KE last night and currently, no Delta, Hawaiian or Alaska flights are available for my dates going out of JFK, EWR or PHL. I'll just have to be diligent. It's bothersome to not be able to see Hawaiian availability except to call.

waterandwoods

Wow, that is frustrating. They always call me back within 24 hours. Usually next day but sometimes that same day. They actually called at 9am eastern following a call the previous afternoon, which I thought was strange because everything I read said they operate 8-5 pacific time. Of course they are almost always calling to tell me they've found no avilability so that could be why I get called quickly...

Coasterdevils30

Well my persistence finally paid off.. called back yesterday after finding likely flights. They apologized for me not getting a callback before and stated I would be put on an urgent callback list. Missed a call last night around 730pm eastern and called back and they called me back earlier today. Have two seats on Delta from Florida to Hawaii for 25K each. I'd say it was worth the aggravation.

I also asked earlier in the thread about flying into and out of different airports and did get my answer-- you can't; origin and destination must be the same.

ronnyk

Thanks for the update. How far out is your trip? Just trying to gather datapoints as to when these class of fares tend to be released for Delta.