NH showing availability, but cannot redeem from SQ

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Jul 2, 2019, 5:00 am

tushark

Original Poster

Join Date: May 2019

Posts: 2

NH showing availability, but cannot redeem from SQ

I've used AwardNexus and award.flights to find availability for a flight routing from HKG - TAS. Both show the same availability on SQ's Star Alliance partners ANA and Asiana and I've double-confirmed by checking ANA's website (of which I'm also a member) to show that the award is bookable through them:

HKG - NRT on NH
HND - ICN on OZ
ICN - TAS on OZ

That being said, when I call into SQ's call centre and ask for availability, walking them through what I've found, they say 2/3 segments are available, but they have no availability for the last ICN - TAS segment on any class. I mentioned to them that ANA is showing redemption availability for an OZ (Asiana) business class flight and they said that they might have different allocation.

Is this possible within Star Alliance members? Or is it possible that availability hasn't opened up to SQ yet? I thought if availability wasn't open, it would be all or nothing, either all OZ or none. Any tips to secure the booking would be much appreciated!

Jul 2, 2019, 6:55 am

Kacee

A FlyerTalk Posting Legend

Join Date: Apr 2013

Location: PHX

Programs: AS 75K; UA 1MM; Hyatt Globalist; Marriott LTP; Hilton Diamond (Aspire)

Posts: 56,450

KF and SQ's partners do not offer the same award availability. Sometimes the partners offer inventory that is not available through KF.

RTWFF likes this.

Jul 2, 2019, 8:53 am

hclee01

Join Date: Aug 2003

Location: Singapore

Programs: SIA Solitaire PPS, IHG Royal Amb, Hyatt Globalist, Bonvoy Gold, Hilton Hhonor Gold

Posts: 2,207

i have tried before recently for a one-sector redemption on BR biz class from TPE to SIN. The results are as follows:

a) SQ website: No availability
b) OZ FFP website: No availability
c) NH FFP website: Flight is available

So it seems that there are different inventory assigned, just a guess based on my little experiment.

Jul 2, 2019, 7:12 pm

Unionruler

Join Date: May 2017

Location: SIN

Programs: AS MVPG75k, AA Plat

Posts: 741

Of course it is possible. In fact it is actively perpetrated by other airlines-- TK is a major culprit based on my experience. Reason being that they see SQ as a competitor, and that SQ releases little award space to their members so they figured might as well do the same thing back.

Krisflyer offers lousy value these days. Sure there are sweet spots on the *A chart, but limited partner availability makes them hard to exploit.

Jul 3, 2019, 12:28 am

RTWFF

Join Date: Sep 2005

Programs: Lifetime *G (MP), Lifetime PE (Bonvoy)

Posts: 1,465

SQ is notoriously .....rdly in making its inventory available to *A partners and they often reciprocate. NZ is the same (some would say worse)

Jul 3, 2019, 4:56 am

lokijuh

Join Date: May 2003

Location: Singapore

Programs: QF LTG, SQ EGTP, Bonvoy LTG

Posts: 4,847

Did you ask for availability for “HND-TAS”, or sectors individually? If the latter could you be coming up against some sort of married sector thing? Agents should know about this, but then again some aren’t all that proficient ...

Also this itinerary could contravene backtracking rules (not sure), but that wouldn’t be a reason for availability not showing - pretty sure other posters are correct in that SQ get more restricted inventory.