ga8riel

How's everyone coming along with positioning flights? The only decent itinerary I found besides usa-dxb-mle is with condor via fra as they fly direct.

Im avoiding IST, SIN and SVO and KUL. Any other suggestions?

jb831

I was able to book JFK-AUH-MLE in EY J with AAdvantage miles. (Shared my booking experience data point here as well: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/28375692-post2793.html)

Mrp Alert

The Maldives severed diplomatic relations with Qatar today as part of the GCC drama. Avoid Doha - I don't have issues with the other airports except SVO.

Clar

What's the reason for avoid SVO? weather or politics issues? my flight is going through there with 10 hrs layover. sux.

thanx.

jonk

i don't want to go too far off-topic but i recently stayed in the airside hotel at SVO -- def not luxury by any means but if it's 10 hours overnight, it's def worth it, imho. http://www.v-exp.ru/en/ (the "terminal e" option)

ga8riel

All cnxs through there were super long like that, and also politics...would just rather avoid that air space atm.

Clar

thanks for quick reply. 10 hrs layover is a day time one for me. wanted to go take a picture of that red square and have lunch near by, but didn't want to mess with transit visa(heard they won't give unless it's 24+ hrs) and potential weather issue. I also dont know if they just give me any temp visa for < 24 hrs. Might be safer just stay on the air side so i dont have to mess with any potential issues exiting that country.

i bought the round trip tix (JFK-SVO-MLE / MLE-DBX-JFK) after reading blogs but too late to cancel the whole things since emirates re-instated my tickets.

thunder007

I received a credit card refund from Emirates last week from my Priceline purchased MLE-BTV ticket after it was previously reinstated (without needing to call) a couple weeks prior. My ticket is still intact on the Emirates websites and agents saw it as ticketed when I called in. Is it possible that my ticket is still intact, but that Priceline refunded the amount paid accidently? I don’t want to arrive in MLE and find out that I have no ticket back. Suggestions?

bdtorp

I received another email from Priceline last night that said, "We have received notification from your airline that your reservation has been changed according to your request, or has been cancelled due to day-of-travel flight cancellation or traveler no-show." (Same email I received on May 20 after Emirates initially cancelled these tickets.) As of 2 days ago, the booking was still active on emirates - it's gone now.

Called Emirates and they said Priceline requested the cancellation.

Called Priceline and supervisor there told me Emirates never informed Priceline that the fares were being reinstated, so they just continued to process the refund. They are supposedly reaching out to Emirates for more info.

Any thoughts on how to proceed? I booked a hotel once Emirates announced that they'd be honoring the fares.

thunder007

We are in the exact same situation. Received a Priceline cancellation email today and booking is no longer visible on the Emirates site. Will call Emirates to see what can be done. From reading other messages in the thread, it seems that Priceline may have to call into the agents line to reinstate.

ncben

Don't bother calling Priceline. You'll waste your time. After many hours on the phone with Priceline, I was told that the account team of Priceline discussed with Emirates account team on a call, and decided against reinstating any tickets, to avoid accounting/legal issues and confusion. This is because they already sent out a cancellation and refund email prior to Emirate's decision to reinstate the reservations, which means they have no recourse but to cancel and refund everyone who booked on Priceline.

In the future do not book error fare with Priceline. If possible always book directly with the airline.

bdtorp

Thanks for the info. So you weren't able to get them to reinstated? No luck in trying to deal with Emirates either?

ncben

No luck after many attempts. Emirates would only refer me back to Priceline, as they don't have control over the ticket.

FlyerJudd

I booked one of these with cheapoair. I cancelled same day with cheapoair (which then charged me a cancellation fee of $75/ticket. Separate issue.). A week or so ago, I got an email from Emirates saying that they reinstated my tickets. So right now I have two tickets on Emirates that I never paid for. ???

(I'm not going to use, so will contact them at future date to clear up.)

Clar

Tried to ask Cheapoair to refund me the day Emirate cancelled the ticket but they just keep stalling, says they tried to contact airline but unable to refund. Pissed me off. I'm planning to go elsewhere and dont wanna go to MLE but can't until I get this mess settled.