I'm not sure this is the place to ask this question, if it's not, I'm sure someone will tell me.

I may be traveling to Kuwait and the UAE for the next 6 to 9 months, possibly monthly. I'm not sure of the exact place in UAE, either Dubai or Abu Dhabi and when there flying between Dubai (or Abu Dhabi) and Kuwait. What is the best airline and partners to fly on to be able to upgrade the cheapest? My company says it will only pay coach prices. FWIW, I'm DL PM and US Gold. Thanks!

[This message has been edited by Traveller (edited Jan 16, 2004).]

You can earn DL miles if you fly on Emirates Airlines to the Middle East. I think they're the best airline in that part of the world. Another option would be flying Air France via Paris. I'm not a fan of Air France, but you can also accrue DL miles with them. The third, and final option for accruing DL miles, would be to fly El Al. It'd involve a connection in Tel Aviv, but if you're looking for an airline where you don't have to worry about security problems it's El Al. I found them to be alright, but I wouldn't fly them again only because of the security hassles.

Thanks!! I haven't flow internationally since 2000. What are the rules for upgrades these days on Delta/Air France/Emerites? Do I have to buy a certain class ticket? Do I need to use miles then to upgrade?

I don't think your suggestion to use ELAL would work - the connections to UAE and Kuwait are a little "spotty".

Ok, I'm a newbie at international travel. I just called Delta and the lowest fare to Dubai from MLB is $2118 (H) and the lowest upgradable fare is $3263.80 (B), and it takes 20k miles each way to upgrade. DL doesn't offer M on this route. She also told me that the AF portion of the flight is not upgradable on this route. She said it's only 6.5 hours.

I now can't find flights on DL to KWI or AUH, I thought I saw them earlier.

Is this the best I can do to obtain upgrades? I might have to decide tomorrow if I want to do this middle east assignment, and being able to upgrade is a big factor for me.

Would USAir be better? How do I upgrade there? I have no US miles, how much would it cost to buy miles to upgrade each flight?

Thanks in advance for any advice!

I was actually researching flights on US & LH to TLV for March. Unfortunately for me, only full fare seats were left for the FRA-TLV legs, at a cost of about $2,300, so I don't think I'll be making that trip.

Flying to FRA in (upgraded) Envoy and then connecting to LH is the best option, IMHO. However, since US does not have reciprocal upgrade priveleges with LH, you may want to credit the LH legs to UA, which does have reciprocal upgrade priveleges with LH. I assume you can use UA miles to upgrade the European-Middle Eastern routes, but I'm not sure. In any case, if you fly UA & you do get stuck in Y on the transatlantic legs, at least you'll be on an A330.

Or...you may want to consider joining the LH Senator program, and crediting the LH flights to an LH account. That would offer you better flexibility in upgrading to the U.A.E.

When I went to the Lufthansa website all I saw was a program called "Miles and More". is this the same as LH Senator?

I believe that Senator is the name for the elite levels on LH.

IIRC, MLB isn't that far from MCO. You might have more--and cheaper--options from there. For example, you could perhaps combine a non-stop on VS or BA (anyone else non-stop MCO-London?) with BA or EK (Gulf Air is a VS partner, but does not appear to fly to London) or another carrier for the most direct routing, if the connection times work. Emirates is a BA EC (albeit not OneWorld) partner. As much as BA EC gets slammed on this board, if you are flying any of the "full" coach fare classes on both BA and/or EK you will earn 100% mileage credit (albeit no tier points for flying EK). EK requires a connection in DXB to both AUH and KWI, but BA from MCO requires a LGW to LHR transfer to KWI or AUH. Another option might be MCO-ORD/MIA-LHR on AA, with the connection LHR-KWI/AUH on BA.

The above doesn't make use of your current DL/US status, but it wouldn't take too many RTs to earn status if you are paying Y/B fares (or the equivalents on the relevant carriers).

[This message has been edited by chalf (edited Jan 19, 2004).]

[This message has been edited by chalf (edited Jan 19, 2004).]

In order to upgrade you'd need to buy a full fare coach ticket. If it's that important to you than it's worth the extra money.

Air France is a terribly uncooperative airline. I really don't understand their rules for upgrading on codeshare flights with Delta. I've had so many problems with them that I refuse to even fly them anymore. I guess that I'm trying to say that I'm not surprised you can't upgrade on Air France.

My advice is to check flights with Delta out of MCO (since MLB isn't that far away) and see what they can do for you. You might be able to fly DL from MCO - ATL - FRA and then connect to Emirates in FRA.

Good luck!

You can fly MH from EWR to DXB direct. They offer a very good Y product. You can get miles for a variety of programs (NW, Continental, KLM, etc.) but you can't upgrade unless you use MH miles.

If New York is a reasonable US getaway point, than I would consider award-winning EK as my favourite carrier to the Middle East. On June 1st 2004 (subject to government approval) EK will start daily non-stop flights from New York to their Hub DXB (with connections to DXB & KWI) on a brand new Airbus A340-500 in a three class configuration.

Besides his own FFP, award winning Skywards, EK participates in FFPs of the following program operators: BA, CO, DL, JL, SA, SQ & UA.

If you want to earn US miles, then LH is your best option. Although things aren't looking so good for US right now.

LH's own program is also a good possibility. I joined them last year specifically for international travel beyond Europe, and I've been very impressed. I believe they allow you to upgrade on every fare class, though don't quote me on that.

I would definitely say Emirates. I am able to buy really good Business/First (usually Business as low as full-fare Y or just 10% above) fares on Emirates through "ethnic" travel agents to DXB, DEL, BOM from London. And almost always I have had a choice of AA, UA and Virgin across the Atlantic. I usually pick AA to LHR since I am Executive Platinum with them. I get my EK flights posted to UA and have never had a problem with the miles not showing up.

a connection to where?
El Al does not fly to any of these countries.

We've had pretty good success flying to Kuwait via

United/American to LHR, then Brit Air to Kuwait

or

Northwest to Amsterdam and then KLM to Kuwait.

Not much help with your programs, but that's what the military seems to settle on.