goliath

Hello, this is my first post in the FlyerTalk forums - although I have been lurking here for a while. I am hoping you can give me some advice here.


My question is about a trip I'm planning to New Zealand in early 2008.

The plan is to get 2 people on:

ZRH-AKL Feb 09, 2008
AKL-ZRH Apr 21, 2008

plus 2 people on:

ZRH-AKL Feb, 09, 2008
AKL-ZRH March, 1, 2008

in Business class on an award ticket with M&M miles. Basically, flying to AKL together and flying back seperately.


I have found the following options with online search and calls to the M&M call center:

1)
ZRH-SIN-AKL-SIN-ZRH on SQ - seems to have the best availability and has the new J class ZRH-SIN, I don't know about the seats on SIN-AKL though.

2)
ZRH-HKG on LX, HKG-AKL on NZ and vice versa - seat availabilty on NZ seems to be low, but would be the new J class, I don't know about the seats on ZRH-HKG on LX, though.

3)
ZRH-LHR-(LAX or HKG)-AKL-(LAX or HKG)-LHR-ZRH on NZ - seat availability on NZ seems to be low, but we would appreciate to be in the new NZ J class almost all the way.


What do you think would be the best way to go (provided that seats are available)? Would you recommend any other routings possible with M&M miles?

Any suggestions would be appreciated, specially about the J seat experience on the different carriers mentioned!

(Being 6'4" or 195cm tall, I'm most concerned about the seats...)

sentom

i just booked a F award to AKL, with stopover in SYD on the way home very last minute and got exactly the dates and flights i wanted. check out the ANA award search tool, it seems to be pretty much in sync with M&M... i had it all planed out before i called the SEN line, which helped...
i think it will be incredibly difficult to get 4 C (I) seats at exactly the dates you want, i would say almost impossible. anyway you should definitely consider options via SYD, MEL or other OZ destinations... maybe you can get 2 seats with one routing and another 2 with another routing... there is plenty of possibilities, with many carriers and via many cities...

sentom

also a warm welcome from me, how rude that i forgot in the first place

weero

Welcome to FT goliath

All depends a bit on what "best" does mean for you. There is
e.g. as of 2008 no integrated Miles&More partner flying this
route, so a companion award is out of reach. That moves the
focus of "best" to luxury on board and the stopovers you crave.

While I agree that SQ availability with LH miles is indeed really
good, I agree with sentom that getting 4 seats on a single
bird is very, very difficult. Especially on the SIN-AKL hop.
Also keep in mind that SQ has not yet fitted the new seats,
so expecting them on your journey is pure speculation. They
won't completely bungle it as LH did but they may make route
decisions.
Due to the duration of SIN-AKL, you will probably see today's
comfy pods in business - not like on the SIN-PER route where
you get tiny old-style C seats. But you may very well not get
the new wide seats to come.

The LX seats do not even live up to the current SQ pods, so
I would not consider the HKG option (even if you get the better
angled flat seats). Plus you will never get 4 seats in an NZ premium cabin.

Same holds for the LHR routing, award availability is tiny.
Plus then you will have to endure the vexatiousness of LHR with
their zero tolerance policy on hand luggage.

Is TG an option for you? In contrast to say MileagePlus, LH has
good availability of awards on them, the new seats look very cozy,
2-2-2 seating on BKK-AKL might be worth a look.

Rambuster

I don't think you will get that many seats on SQ, nor any other airline.
My recommendation would be to fly LHR-HKG-AKL all on NZ metal. The seat, AVOD and service is really great.
I don not recommend transiting in LAX for reasons discussed often enough here (APIS, INS staff, LAX TBIT mess, etc)

Rambuster

The new TG J seat is indeed quite comfortable. I tried it out a couple of weeks ago on the BKK-TPE route on the 777.
The only disadvantage I saw was that the seatbelt was not long enough thus making sleeping on one's side not so comfortable. (Have I gotten really fat?? I don't think so). Otherwise if you can get a new J seat I'd go with TG anyday on longhaul !

goliath

Thanks for the welcome all the helpful inputs so far.

I understand that 4 seats on the same plane might be very difficult, but I have managed to get 4 seats on this route on dummy bookings done earlier with the M&M hotline, on SQ it was easier than NZ.

However, this is not a must and as we are two couples travelling, it will not be a problem if we have to fly on different routes and / or 1 or 2 days apart.

As I understand the ZRH-SIN leg is already fitted with the new product today, but the SIN-AKL leg would be the 777-200 ER with spacebeds. I have never seen the spacebeds, but telling from other peoples experience, they seem to be good seats, too.

Rambuster

The Spacebed is just fine. The angle/slope is not as steep as LH new C or LX C, so you can actually get a good night's sleep in this seat (at least I can).

weero

No you haven't ... at least it was me who devoured all the desserts
after that lunch in Sydney !
This is what I read too. At the this time ZRH-SIN still is a high
revenue route. But making predictions on the seat upgrades
for the 772 may be a bit early.
But the spacebeds are great seats, nothing to fear about, not
even at your height!
However on some routes, such as PER-SIN where I ended up in,
the 772 still has old C seats with very limited recline.

goliath

So far I have managed to get the outbound flight on NZ for 2 pax: going ZRH-LHR-(HKG)-AKL with just a dummy flight for the return.

Now there would be an additional 2 seats on the NZ flight from HKG-AKL, but I can't get the other 2 pax a flight ZRH-HKG on this date - I don't know if the lady on the phone has really checked all possible options? I guess I'll call again.

DownUnderFlyer

Really try to have a look at the ANA tool which can help you point the "lady on the phone" in the right direction.
Re SQs new business class: SQ requires a surcharges of 100% for KrisFlyer FF as far as I know so it would surprise me if they let M&M members get away with the old values if you have a 777-300ER leg in your itinerary. (ZRH-SIN for example). And yes, I know that there is no such surcharge in the M&M T&C at the moment.

goliath

The problem I've found with the ANA tool is that it only shows flights 330 days in advance, while you can book at M&M 360 days in advance.

However, it looks like the time that individual airlines release their award (or all) seats varies. It appears that it is 364 days for SQ, 360 days for LH, 340 days - at least that's what I learned today. Is there a thread somewhere about the "days in advance" you can book an award on a given airline?
So far, my "dummy return flight" on the NZ inbound reservation is on SQ AKL-SIN-ZRH and I was given a price of the regular 160'000 miles. So it looks like it would be possible to be booked at the normal rate.

I have a hard time believing they would raise the "price" for such flights - how would they handle an aircraft change?


In the meantime I have also reserved the inbound flight for the 2nd couple on SQ: ZRH-FRA-SIN-AKL. However, this only worked at the 3rd call when talking to the 3rd person at the M&M call center!? I will hold on to this itinerary for now and once (if) LX seats for ZRH-HKG become available, I will try to get them to join us at HKG for the last leg (there are still 2 seats available on this leg at the moment).

This leads to my last question for today:

Can you hold confirmed reservations that would cost more than your available miles balance when issued?

Because right now I have confirmed reservations for 4 trips ZRH-AKL-ZRH in J, which is gonna cost 640'000 miles.

I have about 665'000 miles in my account. Could I now make another reservation for the HKG-AKL seats and hope for the LX flight ZRH-HKG to become available within the 21 days allowed to hold the reservation?

Or would they tell me I don't have enough miles for an additional reservation?

Kiwi Flyer

Not that I know of. A great idea for a thread - I've started one in *A forum.

f4freeJunior

Concerning the availability: Last October I checked for award seats on SQ's new J ZRH-SIN for early this year, and found some rare seats.
But it's very hard if not impossible to get seats in their new F on award flights. Normaly award availabilitiy in their new J is either 0 or 1 seat. But if you book it, another one might show up... They tend to release only one seat at the time - this is my feeling at least.
The award availability on LX can be very good. A friend of mine (SEN) just got 4 seats in F (!) on ZRH-NRT for his family this Spring. He also got 4 seats in J 3 years ago (this was STC of course). And I found not one single seat in F for SIN-GVA around Aug-1 this summer... so it really depends.

You could also consider flying with LX to NRT and then with NZ to AKL.
If you are a SEN, you might want to take a routing with LX or LH involved in order to use the SEN companion award perk (50% less miles for your travel compagnion on LX, LH sectors).

rafgva

Helo ,

if you fly a 2 class cabin jet from SQ ther charge you for business, the amount of the miles thas you need for first...

So bether fly first.....or avoid the 2 cabin plane.....

Kiwi Flyer

Welcome to Flyer Talk rafgva

Nope. That applies only to United Mileage Plus redemptions. Other partner FFPs, business awards get business class (assuming availability of course).