plummie

Am trying to book first class Mpls to Hawaii for NEXT September using flyer miles. If we don't want to use the "Rule Buster" option, can't get non-stop scheduled to HNL and can't get any first class return at this point. Any advice? How far ahead is something likely to open up?

Thanks

DTownBrian

I would look in this thread...

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum35/HTML/004122.html

To simplify the answer...to guarantee a chance at a seat you've got to book it 352 days out...Otherwise it is hit and miss.

[This message has been edited by DTownBrian (edited 11-20-2002).]

Andy100

i've been trying to book ORD-HNL for a few weeks. I dont EVER see availability (my NW miles are worthless for every location I want to go..)

the thread above looks pretty intesting. But, wont you get hit with a $100 fee for changing the award ticket dates (or is that only on other airlines..)?


[This message has been edited by Andy100 (edited 11-20-2002).]

goblue

Not to defend NW, but my experiences are different. I was able to book standard award MSP-HNL via SEA for late Jan/early Feb. Could not get the direct flights (connecting in SEA outbound, IAH inbound), but got the days I wanted more or less and only made the reservation in late October (less than 4 months out). Probably my experiences were positive because I am not moving at peek dates.

FT wannabe

Well, I just try to help here... I assume most of you know already; there's a website that help you to book award flight on NW.

http://usr.v7.com/wpaa/

I played around the date and route a little bit and did find some open seats for the MSP-HNL and ORD-HNL routes. While it is true that NW doesn't release any seat on the direct flight from MSP or DTW, they have connecting flights out of LAX and SEA that have quite a few seats open routinely. Take a look!

YesHyM

FTwannabe,

You may have found some open seats for those routes on that web site, but they may be available for one person. I found some open for LAX to HNL and then went to NW's award site, entered one passenger flying and it worked. But when I entered 2 passengers, nothing was available. But it's still a good web site because you can get availability up to 6 days. I also go to the www.aeroplan.de/ web site and hit Galileo CSR
on the side bar and bring up availablity for awards by entering "W" in the Buchungsklasse box. This is a German web site and the information you have to enter is Abflughafen for airport of departure (3 letters), Zielhafen for airport of destination, and 2 letter code for the airline. The Datum (date) format is ddmm. In about 5 seconds you'll get an answer. If no flight is listed you'll get an answer in German to that effect or your flight will be listed and under Klasse (n)/Platze (Class & Seats) it may list W2, gesamt 2 Platze. "W" is NW fare code for standard mileage awards.

Radiocycle

Unless you book at 11 months before the flight your options will be limited.

I used the rulebuster option for my wife to avoid a double connection.

It's worth the points if you have them.

Good Luck!

moltmans

I would check every morning about 10:00 and I got 7 tickets for the 2 week Christmas holidays to HNL from MSP about March, before that nothing had been available. Just booked award tickets for HNL/Kona this past week. It was another 5000 miles per person but their was availability now. Last Christmas we got award tickets to Chorpus Christi and Florida the year before, all for 7 people. Be persistant and check often, but if you want a lot of tickets I'd call worldperks to set it up because the award tickets disappear fast and they can block them out.

magic111

If *I* was doing the award reservations for myself I would book two of the available days and waitlist than to get flight together. Did this for my wife and I recently for wbc seats to Europe for the summer and cleared the waitlist within two weeks. btw neither of the original award tix were on the day we really wanted to go.
My thanks go to socrates who last year posted the definitive way of getting a large number (six I believe) difficult award tickets all at the same time to Hawaii.

bwallet

There is no fee for changing dates as long as the origin(s) and destination(s) remain the same. My wife and I have two standard award WBC seats to FCO leaving on 22 December and returning on 31 December. We originally booked in August when a bunch of Christmas time availability to Europe opened up. I then used the WPAA lister mentioned above to adjust flight times as better options became available, e.g. not having to catch a flight out of Rome at 6:30am. We even added a stop over in AMS for free since the origin (LAN) and destination remained the same.

I've messed around the WPAA lister a lot for practice. You can often get WBC seats at the standard award level if you know what you are doing. For instance, NW's site (as accessed by the WPAA lister) will not generally try to route a connecting flight through SEA. So, there tend to be a lot of seats available going SEA-NRT. So, you just manually put together a routing through SEA, and voila. You get transPacific WBC at the standard level.

brians51

JUST CALL ******** I was running into the same problems according to the internet there were no First Class seats for a week be4 or after my dates. 10/7-16/03. I said what the heck I'll call and see what I can find out after 5 mins ( the rep had to e-mail the hawaii department [ she said because travel agents where reserving the tickets and not letting them go until just be4 they were gonna get billed for them] so i chit chatted with her she was very very nice and low and behold I got the exact dates I wanted MSP-HNL straight flight) this was about two weeks ago.

***Also the Fare/taxes were $10.00 cheaper on the phone 36.80 instead of 46.80 on the net, for both tickets together.

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Sorry mama i gots to get all the miles i can

Brian

socrates

Your welcome...btw: it was 8 on 1 day...and 2 the following day

magic111

my humble apologies but thanks for explaining that it was even better than I stated

socrates

:-)

Hey after everything I've learned on flyertalk the least I can do is share my own learnings

deelong

Hey Everybody-

Thanks! I really learned a lot from all of your posts, especially Socrates. We're booked through to Hilo on the day following our desired departure and waitlisted for the previous day. Returning on Continental via
Houston on a pretty decent schedule also.

Thanks again!

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plummie