Assistance w/ Complex Award Booking
 

Hello!

I am planning a big trip for my wife and I using miles, but the options are making my head spin. I put my current flight plan below (its the best thing I could find on the united booking tool). Was hoping to get some input from the experts here on if I can improve on this. Have also been considering using lucky's award booking service, but at the same time I can book the trip on the united site myself so its a tough choice. My wife and I have only traveled internatinoally once before and had the opportunity to enjoy united BF one leg of the way.

Trip: Philadelphia to the Maldives with a stopover in Paris
Dates: March 1st - 14th

Current Plan (all in Business):March 1st: PHL-MAD-IST-MLE (Duration 27hrs / US, Turkish, Turkish)
March 8th: MLE-IST-ZRH-CDG (Duration: 15hrs / Turkish, Turkish, Swiss)
March 14th: CDG-PHL (Duration: 9hrs / US)

Balances:
United: 50k / 50k (seperate accts)
UR Pts: 220k
AA: 280k
US: 80k / 40k (seperate accts)

Would love to hear your suggestions for changes, and thoughts on using an award booking service here!

Thank you!
Marben

Lucky is great. Very responsive.
But it seems you have the dates, flights and points lined up
If you know what you want and have the dates lined up, you could do it yourself as well.

Option A
All you need to do is to call UA or place it on hold and transfer 70k points to each UA account.
Where you will need help is that you will have not enough points for the Hotels

Option B
If you can, I would call US and put it on hold
BUY US miles today = present 80k + new 20+20bonus for 800$ = 120k
BUY US miles today = present 40k + new 40+40bonus for 1600$ = 120k
Total cost = 2400$ for a ticket; the other is free with the miles you have
(or you pay average of 1200$ each for 2 tickets)

And use the UR for the Hyatts - great value at the high end at 22k per night
So you have 10 days lined up for free with 220k.

Option C
or to lower cost
A bit more risky with schedule changes
Share 40k US to your acct = 450$ cost
Transfer 70k to 1 UA acct = 1 ticket bought on UA for same flights

B
I would buy US, stay in Hyatt and save the UA AA for your next trip abroad or in the US where you have flexibility of oneways

ffI,

Love your ideas around the US miles, I honestly was not even going to include them in my post! I'd also like to save as many UR pts as possible.

I did not post my HHonors balances of 75k / 65k and SPG balances of 20k/20k. My hotel plan as of today was to bulk up on HHonors pts and redeem 5 nights at the Conrad Rangali. Its available now @40k/night (I'd use VIP award as a Gold and get the Hawaiian cards perhaps). The back-up plan in case I cant swing enough hilton points in the next few months is to stay at the Park Hyatt.

marben

By way of outbound routing, you should look at IAD options. IAD-DOH-MLE on QR is possible with UA miles.

Thinking it through, i would definitely go QR on the outbound given that J on that flight will be nicer than US and you get most of the flying done in 1 segment.

You would need to book QR on line before Sept 15. UA Agents are blocked to access QR because the relationship ends though award booking can still be done up to Sept 15 and good for a year.

My take? I would not book award on a partner that its relationship is ending, esp in light of the UA practice (blocking agent access). If there is any schedule change down the road on QR and you need help? You may need a lot of prayers and luck to get it done. Sometimes you have to look a bit further for possible / potential hiccups in the future and how you would be taken care of if the partner airline you travel on has ceased to be a partner even long before you book the award.

If you are traveling soon, by all means, get QR when it is still showing in the system. Good luck in using them for next year's plan with UA miles.

I was not aware of this. Good info.

My theory in life is.. if someone else can do it, so can you.
learn to do these things and you will be able to do much more in the future, save money, and learn something. My opinion, don't use booking services.

I'm not sure this applies to everything. Car repair, dental work, taxes, award booking, etc.

Don't forget AXON7 awards - 4nights for 145K if you hold a Hilton Amex.

Even though the QR relationship ends soon, I still might do that one way and look for EY redemptions using AA miles on the way back. This combines a one way UA award and a one-way AA award.

Have you also considered skipping Paris and doing something else in the MLE part of the world? India perhaps?

On this note, I'm booked for March at the Conrad Maldives.

Flight from NY to MLE, final leg on Turkish Air (United award, Business Class 60K UA)
4 nights axon7 for 145K Hhonors
hop flight to Colombo (paid, under 150 per person) for 4 more days exploring, elephant orphanage, temples, cup of tea etc.
Flight from colombo to NYC via HK 95K Avios for Cathay Biz.

Just food for thought.

Yes true most of the time. Thru a blog post came to know of one "Tashir" at something called Bengalmiles guru. Google to find it.

I like this thought.

Hey Bloodshot,
I understand the need to want to do things by yourself. Trust me, I do it all the time. The fact of the matter is, sometimes, you don't want to spend a lot of time doing things you know how to do. Some examples of this are: Painting your house, plumbing, having appliances delivered when you have a truck, and moving.

You see, you can do these things, but sometimes, you just don't want to. That's where an award booking site comes into play. Many people I book award travel for don't always have time. In light of Hurricane Isaac, many of my clients have turned to me to wait in the phone queue and talk to frustrated agents. In addition to the time cost, there is also the experience. I applaud you if you know all the stopover rules and HUB cities you can go into with a US Airways partner award, but if you don't, it would be easier to just let someone do this. Yes, you can always learn and I actually encourage people to learn this themselves on my blog.

I hope this doesn't strike any nerves because what I do is truly just a service to people. I help people get where they want to go and like any other service, I charge a very reasonable fee (the cheapest you'll ever find!)

Thanks for reading!