RealHJ

So I've been trying to book an award using M&M that has a few Air China (CA) flights. But, M&M can't see any of the CA flights (not in I and not in X), though both on united.com and ana.co.jp under award search, the CA flights are clearly there and available.

The agent just told me that M&M availability of awards is "limited and less than that of other Star Alliance airlines," but I don't buy it. Isn't it that as per StarNet it's the same award inventory available to all *A airlines?

Is there a system-wide problem of M&M not being able to see and book any CA flights at this time (like UA has had on and off for quite a while; currently it's on and works just fine)? Or..?

I did ask the agent to try long-sell and she claims that she did, though to me it seemed awfully fast for long-sell (which can take minutes, hours or sometimes days to get a response back).

Any advice here on how to book CA flights in I (business award) using M&M, which are clearly available as per both UA and ANA award searches, but M&M says are not available at all in any class (ever)?

Air Rarotonga

No, availability is different from carrier to carrier. AV Lifemiles got the same problem, they were not able to issue any CA ticket since some months. Don't know where the reason or bug is. Not much that you can do about it... You're in mercy of the mileage programs and operating carriers... ;( You might to search a plan *B*.

RealHJ

I see. Yes. I called back again, and LH/M&M can't see any CA flights. Second time the guy doesn't even know what long-sell is. But I asked him to check the flights I wanted and other always open CA flights (both long-haul and short-haul) on various dates for the next 11 months in X and I, and as I suspected, they never see any CA flights at all. Period.

UA had the same problem with CA for quite a while last year and earlier this year, on and off (most of the time not working at all).

Plan B is to book it with UA miles (recently booked another CA flight with UA, so I know it is working now, and shows up online also on united.com), but with UA I can only have one stopover, vs. two with M&M, and it's considerably more expensive miles-wise. But, may need to do that unless M&M can fix their system-wide issue here (which is what it is - not limited inventory, just system-wide can't see any CA flights at all, it appears).



Anyone able to book any CA flights with M&M recently?

24left

Just a fyi, this issue also exits with Air Canada's FF Aeroplan:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/air-c...ard-space.html

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/air-c...air-china.html

RealHJ

Thanks for the insight. That's good to know that LH/M&M is not alone on this.

So it's a problem currently known to happen on Miles & More/LH, Avianca LifeMiles, and also AC Aeroplan. They may be all using the same API and/or vendor/software to tie into Air China. (So there is no common *A wide StarNet then, that I've read about on FT previously, for award inventory/res?)

United had such a long standing problem with CA back last year and earlier this year (lasted for a good 9 months or so), but now it's fine. It now definitely works on UA and on NH - can see inventory and book it (on UA at least I can confirm can also book).

TPJ

Not so long ago I- and X-class availability was visible to all Travel Agents in any GDS. I was certainly able to see these classes while checking my Corpo Booking Tool (SABRE-based). Now these classes are no longer visible and I suspect they wanted switch visibility off to Travel Agents and by error (?) removed access also from other Star Alliance systems.

Slightly OT - I still se I- and X-class on TK:

20NOV SUN IST/Z‡2 BKK/‡5
TK RESPONSE ** DIRECT CONNECT PARTICIPANT **
13TK 68 C4 D4 Z4 K4 J4 I0 R0 Y7 ISTBKK 0055 1450 333 0
B7 M7 A7 H7 S7 O4 E7 Q7 T7 L7 V7 P7 W0 U0 X7 N0 G0
14TK 64 C4 D4 Z4 K4 J4 I4 R0 Y7 ISTBKK 1940 0945‡1 333 0
B7 M7 A7 H7 S7 O4 E7 Q7 T7 L7 V7 P7 W7 U7 X7 N0 G0

24left

Just an update....

If you are considering a rewards ticket on Air China, you might want to read this recent thread (only 6 posts incl OP). His title does not explain it well.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/air-c...ir-ticket.html

RealHJ

I had the same issue with UA last year. I know exactly what he's talking about.

Had two CA flights booked and ticketed with UA. CA could see the ticket by ticket number, but there was no record (PNR) created on their end, so they canceled the ticket with UA, as it wasn't paired with a PNR on the CA end (as it always must be). I got no refund, no notification, but it just didn't exist anymore. Took a long fight with UA, escalation to DoT, and several months overall, to get a refund and some compensation for this failure of UA to properly reserve it (it was ticketed, but no PNR ever created with CA) and then UA allowing CA to cancel my res without my authorization and without any notification, refund, nothing. (Thankfully I was able to book a flight on MU a day later, and get UA to also cover the extra night hotel that was necessitated as a result of this.)

I did get my issue escalated higher up at UA, and a few months later they had it fixed and now are able to ticket CA properly, CA can see the record, do seat assignments, etc., so now with UA it's safe to book CA awards again. They recognized the problem and fixed it. But AC and LH and AV obviously have not yet.. though that's a different issue, as they don't even show CA inventory, vs. UA last year would sometimes show it and allow to book it, only not to ticket it properly (which is what it seems like AC was doing, so they pulled all CA inventory to avoid that, I suspect - same as UA did back later last fall).

For the OP there, the issue likely is that while AC ticketed it, the CA PNR was never created, so it's not associated with any PNR on CA end, and thus CA has no record of the flight being booked (even though it is ticketed by AC, CA doesn't have the ticket properly assoc. with a PNR). That is what was the problem with UA and CA flights back last year. So happened to many, not just me. I just took the time to escalate it via DoT (failure of UA to honor the ticketed and paid for flights) and UA.

Edit: the problem is that *A has very poor network/coverage, unlike SkyTeam and OneWorld, at least out of HNL. Only OZ angled lie-flats to ICN and just a few times weekly CA true lie-flats to PEK, that's it (not counting domestic flights on UA going east). So with *A there's not much choice, unlike with ST and OW who have such a vastly superior and better network with many fold more flights and direct int'l destinations than *A out of HNL.

RealHJ

Update: M&M has just confirmed that they are "aware of the technical error" whereby their agents don't see any CA award flight availability, and that they are working on fixing it.

No timeframe given, though, for the fix, or if they will put some temporary workaround in place in the meanwhile, for booking CA awards.

kay_jay

Thanks. Found this thread after calling MM to book my Air China award, which I saw on United.com. The agent told they couldn't find any award space between the CA segments.
Hope they fix it soon.
Other alternatives are China Eastern & China Southern which I have to pay out of pocket.

24left

UA may have "fixed" their problem with Air China. However, there consent to be issues with those Air Canada Aeroplan members trying to book seats or have tickets honoured by Air China.

Also, this is one of those examples where not all *A programs show the same availability.

RealHJ

It should be working. M&M confirmed that it was fixed a month+ ago. Was escalated to Germany HQ and supposedly fixed...or so they said. It may be just a workaround though, so you may need to HUACA until you get a more helpful and knowledgeable agent who will take the time it'll take to find the internal documentation of the workaround (if that is the approach needed there, I'm not sure; I ended up booking my CA flights with UA and never did so with LH/M&M after all). Call back and hold your ground that it IS available, that M&M has a known problem with [not] seeing CA awards, and ask the agent to research for workarounds in internal docs and otherwise to escalate; have them "call Germany" if they can't figure it out on their own.

sbbi

it seems this issue is still not fixed yet. any good luck with Air China availability? thanks.

RealHJ

It is fixed, just most agents don't know how to do it and are still trying to use the Star Alliance search for CA. That will never work and will return zero results. Tell the phone agent to do neutral availability search and then they will be able to see and book CA flights easily and quickly without any issues (use united.com beforehand to check availability).