I don't think that you can necessarily take that for granted. There is a valid Z fare for the other flight combination. But there may be some reason why it isn't valid for the combination that you'd like - flight restrictions, DIF considerations etc. It's not necessarily the case that a fare either is or isn't valid for all flights on a particular day. Nor is it necessarily the case that if you can see seats in a particular booking class, they are bookable using the fare that you'd like to use.

At any rate, as I said above, when I looked yesterday ITA pricing was actually accurately matching AC pricing on those two sets of inbound flights, so your primary sources are not being misleading.

Why is EF showing Seats Blocked?
 

I checked UA 362 for 7/31. EF shows 8 F seats blocked, while UA shows them open and available for booking.

What's up?

Maybe I should dig up more example screenshots in the meantime. ITA has given me routings with 2h and 6h layover options at YVR for the same price, but AC prices the 2h layover at a premium over the 6h one. So clearly something is wonky there. Either ITA is wrong or AC is not offering the best possible price - it doesn't seem that both could be offering the best fare. But I guess until I dig up a screenshot, nobody will believe me.

BTW - what is DIF?

Seat Maps have nothing to do with ticket inventory. "Blocked" means that physical seat is blocked from being assigned, it doesn't mean that there is a seat blocked from being sold.

The issue is they are not F seats, they are J seats. If you request the cabin as Business then you see the available seats as available. If you do a Flight Availability search you'll see that UA isn't telling "First" on the flight, that cabin is sold as business. On UA.com you'll see the cabin class as "D" which is a Business class fare code.

As to why UA is returning the available seats as blocked if you request First vs Business that you would have to ask United.

As we explained, if you request it as the Business cabin they do show as selectable, please try that.
Yes they are being sold as Business because if you look at the details of the flight on UA.com and look at the booking class it's "D" which is a Business fare, not a first Fare, which is likely why UA is only showing the seats as available when the Business cabin is requested. Either way it's not an EF issue, we are returning what the UA response is for the cabin requested.

Now I understand. I just tried searching the EF seat map and check F and Y. I now see that the F option shows blocked and the J option shows the correct seat map. I did not understand that this distinction was important in seat map review in EF. Learn something new everyday. Thanks.

EDIT: Nevermind.

Has tEF eliminated the option to search for RTW and similar fares?

I keep getting the following error message on EF: The Departure and Arrival airports must be different.

I just tested it - it's working fine for me
- I entered PER as the origin and destination airports and QF as the carrier
- Got the expected Oneworld RTW fares listed

The Fare Information page still displays "To perform an Around the World (RTW) fare search, use the same Departing and Arriving airport codes."

So, are you sure you were on the Fare Information page?

Pretty sure I was on that page since I tried multiple times, but either way, I just tried again and it's indeed working fine.

Help interpreting flight comments in EF
 

Hi all,
Expertflyer returned the following additional comments regarding my delayed flight today. Can I ask for help interpreting them? My hypothesis is that AA took our plane in order to use it for another flight whose incoming plane was delayed, but I don't know if that's what these comments mean or not.

Thanks so much for your help,
saunders111


ORD 1014A T3 K6
ABQ 4 B3 1217P 107P B3
ORD - T3 H12 510P
3ORD/ETD1137 LAE-PREVIOUS DELAY OF THIS AIRCRAFT *0848
7ORD/AUTO REACCOM DLY FLT COMPLETED SEE N*P1AA1356ORD18JUN *0907*CRCYMG
2ABQ/PRE1340 *0848
3ABQ/ETD1425 LAE-PREVIOUS DELAY OF THIS AIRCRAFT *0850
7ABQ/AUTO REACCOM DLY FLT COMPLETED SEE N*P1AA1356ABQ18JUN *0910*CRCYMG
2ORD*/PRE1828 *0850

ExpertFlyer Newbie: Business Seat Availability
 

I am a newbie and looking at flight J2 016 for Aug 10 and looks like there are 12 business seats available (C6, Z4, A2) but the jet is an A319 with only 8 seats in business class. Then upon further investigation, this seems to be the norm, at least with J2. So what's going on here? Do they keep more than normal biz seats available and in case they sell out all 12, they swap the plane? Do all airlines do this?