East Coast US to Hawaii on Korean for 25K points
Sep 6, 2017, 10:52 am
#31
Join Date: May 2010
Location: NYC
Posts: 246
It seems like having more than 1 connection on either legs, or having 1 connection on both legs, is still causing the KE site "calculate" option to error out.
Anyone has success booking for more than 1 connection on the website?
Does calling in help? So far it seems that success has been spotty. Trying to book NYC-Hawaii, with a stopover on the west coast. Would rather avoid all the faxing business if possible by booking over the website but it seems like a system limitation...
Anyone has success booking for more than 1 connection on the website?
Does calling in help? So far it seems that success has been spotty. Trying to book NYC-Hawaii, with a stopover on the west coast. Would rather avoid all the faxing business if possible by booking over the website but it seems like a system limitation...
Last edited by gtu2004; Sep 6, 2017 at 11:07 am
Sep 7, 2017, 3:30 pm
#32
Join Date: Apr 2013
Location: MCO, YEG
Posts: 1,182
Doesn't seem (based on my experience) that connections have anything to do with it. I tried a straight Seattle to Hawaii return flight, no connections at all and it still would not calculate. Their website is simply not very useful.
Sep 8, 2017, 8:24 am
#33
Join Date: Mar 2008
Posts: 1,536
I then used the Skyteam alliance search site and it would show Delta Flights, but apparently they were NOT the "low" level award flights. Even searching Delta, the "best" I could find a year out was 270,000 Skymiles per RT ticket.
I then used JuicyMiles to try to find the awards and that's when I learned that the 25k KE redemptions were only for the lowest level award that Delta publishes, and according to the Delta forums, they only release one FC/Business seat to Skyteam partners, KE included.
The "trick" will be either to call into KE and prepare to spend a LOT of time on the phone. IF they can even find something.
Or:
1) use delta.com to repeatedly search, segment by segment, and try to find the "low level" award. The problem is that with Delta removing the Award chart, you have no idea what the miles are for a low-level award.
2) Supposedly if you get an expert flyer subscription, you can have it alert you when the particular fare bucket opens up, and then quickly try to call KE to see if they have the inventory. I'm not sure what the codes are (C0 or something like that, I don't know).
But according to Juicey Miles and the DL forum, Delta almost (never) releases more than one seat especially from east coast. Apparently if you have really flexible travel plans, you can fly from LAX and about 3 weeks prior, some seats may open up. Other option, was to book with KE on coach seats (apparently that's doable from east coast to Hawaii) and then if something opens up, you can "upgrade" to the FC/Business with the additional miles at no charge. But I didn't want to chance ending up in coach the entire trip.
Ended up using AA miles instead (actually found 2 seats at saaver awards, but it was one seat on 2 diff. flights, and wasn't willing to split up the travel party). Even at "aanytime" awards, it was only 57.5k miles per one way ticket. Considerably less than Delta, although a lot more than KE.
Sep 8, 2017, 11:47 am
#34
Join Date: Aug 2017
Location: New York City
Programs: TK E/*G, Hilton Diamond, Hyatt Explorist, Marriott Platinum
Posts: 151
So, when I was looking for the elusive East Coast to Hawaii Business/First at 25,000 miles, it would always error out.
I then used the Skyteam alliance search site and it would show Delta Flights, but apparently they were NOT the "low" level award flights. Even searching Delta, the "best" I could find a year out was 270,000 Skymiles per RT ticket.
I then used JuicyMiles to try to find the awards and that's when I learned that the 25k KE redemptions were only for the lowest level award that Delta publishes, and according to the Delta forums, they only release one FC/Business seat to Skyteam partners, KE included.
The "trick" will be either to call into KE and prepare to spend a LOT of time on the phone. IF they can even find something.
Or:
1) use delta.com to repeatedly search, segment by segment, and try to find the "low level" award. The problem is that with Delta removing the Award chart, you have no idea what the miles are for a low-level award.
2) Supposedly if you get an expert flyer subscription, you can have it alert you when the particular fare bucket opens up, and then quickly try to call KE to see if they have the inventory. I'm not sure what the codes are (C0 or something like that, I don't know).
But according to Juicey Miles and the DL forum, Delta almost (never) releases more than one seat especially from east coast. Apparently if you have really flexible travel plans, you can fly from LAX and about 3 weeks prior, some seats may open up. Other option, was to book with KE on coach seats (apparently that's doable from east coast to Hawaii) and then if something opens up, you can "upgrade" to the FC/Business with the additional miles at no charge. But I didn't want to chance ending up in coach the entire trip.
Ended up using AA miles instead (actually found 2 seats at saaver awards, but it was one seat on 2 diff. flights, and wasn't willing to split up the travel party). Even at "aanytime" awards, it was only 57.5k miles per one way ticket. Considerably less than Delta, although a lot more than KE.
I then used the Skyteam alliance search site and it would show Delta Flights, but apparently they were NOT the "low" level award flights. Even searching Delta, the "best" I could find a year out was 270,000 Skymiles per RT ticket.
I then used JuicyMiles to try to find the awards and that's when I learned that the 25k KE redemptions were only for the lowest level award that Delta publishes, and according to the Delta forums, they only release one FC/Business seat to Skyteam partners, KE included.
The "trick" will be either to call into KE and prepare to spend a LOT of time on the phone. IF they can even find something.
Or:
1) use delta.com to repeatedly search, segment by segment, and try to find the "low level" award. The problem is that with Delta removing the Award chart, you have no idea what the miles are for a low-level award.
2) Supposedly if you get an expert flyer subscription, you can have it alert you when the particular fare bucket opens up, and then quickly try to call KE to see if they have the inventory. I'm not sure what the codes are (C0 or something like that, I don't know).
But according to Juicey Miles and the DL forum, Delta almost (never) releases more than one seat especially from east coast. Apparently if you have really flexible travel plans, you can fly from LAX and about 3 weeks prior, some seats may open up. Other option, was to book with KE on coach seats (apparently that's doable from east coast to Hawaii) and then if something opens up, you can "upgrade" to the FC/Business with the additional miles at no charge. But I didn't want to chance ending up in coach the entire trip.
Ended up using AA miles instead (actually found 2 seats at saaver awards, but it was one seat on 2 diff. flights, and wasn't willing to split up the travel party). Even at "aanytime" awards, it was only 57.5k miles per one way ticket. Considerably less than Delta, although a lot more than KE.
I've called in 3-4 times already for late Feb (post president's week) or March and have only been able to find economy (as well as when searching on KLM's website for skyteam anyways) awards available.
With the above info, seems like I can cross Delta off the list of possibilities as I would only book economy if we had the chance to upgrade for miles or cash to premium economy.
Sep 8, 2017, 12:08 pm
#35
Join Date: Mar 2008
Posts: 1,536
Is the first class availability also true of booking Hawaiian awards via Korean? Does Hawaiian allow for a paid upgrade to their premium econ if I book an econ award?
I've called in 3-4 times already for late Feb (post president's week) or March and have only been able to find economy (as well as when searching on KLM's website for skyteam anyways) awards available.
With the above info, seems like I can cross Delta off the list of possibilities as I would only book economy if we had the chance to upgrade for miles or cash to premium economy.
I've called in 3-4 times already for late Feb (post president's week) or March and have only been able to find economy (as well as when searching on KLM's website for skyteam anyways) awards available.
With the above info, seems like I can cross Delta off the list of possibilities as I would only book economy if we had the chance to upgrade for miles or cash to premium economy.
I'm not sure if the KE miles used that way (on Hawaiian airlines) follows the same rule as Delta where it has to be the lowest award.
Sep 10, 2017, 8:11 pm
#36
Join Date: Aug 2017
Posts: 6
I've been having a rough time finding any info on Hawaiian airlines booked via KE. I was told by one Korean Skypass rep that they only release partner awards 6 months before flight day. I haven't been able to verify that from any other source though?
I had an itinerary that showed awards available on ExpertFlyer (hawaiian award) but KE couldn't find anything to book on any day, and then gave me the 6 month message.
Oct 2, 2017, 11:06 am
#37
Join Date: Sep 2016
Posts: 11
So a cautionary tale for putting flights on hold over the phone. I did this so that we could build up the 50k points needed and planned to do the ticketing sometime over the next few weeks.
A little over a month ago, I booked a trip from MCO-LAX-HNL/KOA-LAX-MCO. MCO-LAX-HNL had an overnight layover and KOA-LAX-MCO had a 1.5 hour layover in LAX. Korean's rules are that you can only have one layover over 4 hours.
I logged onto Korean's website and got the schedule change message. Turns out Delta completely changed the flight time for our flight out of KOA and put us on a flight that leaves KOA on 3/4 at 10:14pm and lands in LAX at 5:30am on 3/5. The flight from LAX to MCO was set for 10:30pm on 3/4 and lands in MCO at 6:20am on 3/5. As much as I would like to be on two planes at once, it would not be physically possible.
I called Korean's Skyteam line and was told they had no other availability and basically was SOL. If I had had the reservation ticketed, it would be a different story. Just a warning out there- the hold policy isn't a guarantee until the reservation is ticketed.
A little over a month ago, I booked a trip from MCO-LAX-HNL/KOA-LAX-MCO. MCO-LAX-HNL had an overnight layover and KOA-LAX-MCO had a 1.5 hour layover in LAX. Korean's rules are that you can only have one layover over 4 hours.
I logged onto Korean's website and got the schedule change message. Turns out Delta completely changed the flight time for our flight out of KOA and put us on a flight that leaves KOA on 3/4 at 10:14pm and lands in LAX at 5:30am on 3/5. The flight from LAX to MCO was set for 10:30pm on 3/4 and lands in MCO at 6:20am on 3/5. As much as I would like to be on two planes at once, it would not be physically possible.
I called Korean's Skyteam line and was told they had no other availability and basically was SOL. If I had had the reservation ticketed, it would be a different story. Just a warning out there- the hold policy isn't a guarantee until the reservation is ticketed.
Jan 18, 2018, 1:16 pm
#40
Join Date: Jul 2007
Posts: 27
Ugh. It totally sucks too because before I decided to move my points over to KE, I made sure there were flights, and when I transferred them there is none to be found. I now have 100K miles tied to a KE account that I need to use and cannot find any reward flight. This is beyond annoying.
I did some searches on Delta's site and cheapest RT flight I was able to find for dates throughout 2018 is 60K. While last year, cheapest I could find for RT was 45K. This is not good.
I did some searches on Delta's site and cheapest RT flight I was able to find for dates throughout 2018 is 60K. While last year, cheapest I could find for RT was 45K. This is not good.
Last edited by noungning; Jan 18, 2018 at 2:15 pm
Jan 19, 2018, 11:51 am
#42
Join Date: Jul 2007
Posts: 27
I learn the hard way. It was as if it was a matter of a day and everything just disappeared. I just called them for a different route, I was able to put a hold on the departure and half of the return. The connecting flight back home is all reserved. This is just nuts.
Feb 28, 2018, 6:51 pm
#43
Join Date: Jul 2015
Location: Madison, WI
Programs: United Mileage Plus
Posts: 27
Same with me. I searched yesterday, and there was availability, transferred points, now nada. and for the few that pop up, i get that dumb invalid booking ERT-4004 error could the search attempts be triggering the booking system to think there are more requests and blocking off availability?
Guess I'll try and call.
Guess I'll try and call.
Mar 7, 2018, 9:31 am
#44
Join Date: Jul 2015
Location: Madison, WI
Programs: United Mileage Plus
Posts: 27
Quick update, after searching the KE website for a couple weeks, getting errors all the time (both before and after clicking calculate and pay now), I made a call to KE on Monday, and they called back Tues saying that there was NO space at all from any city to HNL until a month after I wanted to travel (I was trying to get out of MSN, and had suggested a multi city, but she said there was none). So after almost booking paid flights (I had already tranfered UR to Skypass) I checked AF site, and showed booking from ATW to HNL only 2 days off from my originial dates, so I hoped on it and was able to book! Shows up on DL so I should be good to go.
So TL;DNR, keep checking online, and call in, and double check AF. Also, dont transfer miles to KE until you can reserve booking by phone, as even if you can get to the pay screen (after calculating) it may not show up.
Has anyone had any luck trying to change skypass flights on DL? I want to change my return date, but am hesitant after going thru everything, to even try (if they have to alter my original flights and I cant get it back.
So TL;DNR, keep checking online, and call in, and double check AF. Also, dont transfer miles to KE until you can reserve booking by phone, as even if you can get to the pay screen (after calculating) it may not show up.
Has anyone had any luck trying to change skypass flights on DL? I want to change my return date, but am hesitant after going thru everything, to even try (if they have to alter my original flights and I cant get it back.
May 31, 2018, 2:20 pm
#45
Join Date: Mar 2016
Posts: 984
Quick update, after searching the KE website for a couple weeks, getting errors all the time (both before and after clicking calculate and pay now), I made a call to KE on Monday, and they called back Tues saying that there was NO space at all from any city to HNL until a month after I wanted to travel (I was trying to get out of MSN, and had suggested a multi city, but she said there was none). So after almost booking paid flights (I had already tranfered UR to Skypass) I checked AF site, and showed booking from ATW to HNL only 2 days off from my originial dates, so I hoped on it and was able to book! Shows up on DL so I should be good to go.
So TL;DNR, keep checking online, and call in, and double check AF. Also, dont transfer miles to KE until you can reserve booking by phone, as even if you can get to the pay screen (after calculating) it may not show up.
Has anyone had any luck trying to change skypass flights on DL? I want to change my return date, but am hesitant after going thru everything, to even try (if they have to alter my original flights and I cant get it back.
So TL;DNR, keep checking online, and call in, and double check AF. Also, dont transfer miles to KE until you can reserve booking by phone, as even if you can get to the pay screen (after calculating) it may not show up.
Has anyone had any luck trying to change skypass flights on DL? I want to change my return date, but am hesitant after going thru everything, to even try (if they have to alter my original flights and I cant get it back.