I'll move this along to the Travel Tool forum where you'll see discussion of both this and other software tools for finding award inventory.

ExpertFlyer: frustrated in using it to find DL flights
 

I must be missing the point of the ExpertFlyer website. Nearly all my flying is on DL, and heavily international. For planning I use mostly the DL website, kayak, matrix.itasoftware.com, and occasional others. With sufficient time I find surprisingly similar fares among these sites, and can minimize a fare and get a reservation. My trips often emphasize distance (or distance per unit cost) in order to build mileage.

Despite having a premium membership in ExpertFlyer for several months, I have yet to find them useful for finding real flights. Flight availability and fare information seem to be completely independent functions, and mouth-watering fares a fraction of DL's fares are frequently shown. Yet these low fares are nowhere available on sites where you can actually book flights.

Is there any ardent fan who can point me to help on this?

There is a travel tools forum http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/travel-tools-701/

I'm going to move your thread there as Community Buzz forum is for discussion of Flyertalk meetings/Dos.

Willie
co-moderator Community Buzz

Perhaps these two guides can help you understand how to use Expertflyer more effectively and how best to interpret its data:

http://www.expertflyer.com/edu-guide.pdf

http://www.expertflyer.com/user-guide.pdf

The Fares section on EF will list all possible fares for a route and, just as important, the rules that need to be followed for that fare. But for a particular flight a particular fare may not be available because the inventory for that particular fare bucket may be sold out.

As a DL frequent flier, I feel exactly the same way you do! Does't seem to be as valuable for DL fliers.

As inlanikai pointed out, the EduGuide http://www.expertflyer.com/edu-guide.pdf will help you understand the relationship between the published fare tariffs and availability of those fares. ExpertFlyer wasn't built to be a low fare search website.


For Delta, one unique value point is that only ExpertFlyer shows Z,X,V,G upgrade inventory for DL flights. As a Delta PM, you might find that valuable. Also, since DL upgrades can require certain coach fare classes to be upgradeable, you would use the Fare Information search to determine the relative prices of the upgradeable coach fares vs others.

ExpertFlyer also shows award inventory for SkyTeam partners such as AF and KL. (full list here)

That is in addition to our other unique features such as Flight Alerts (alerting for fare/award/upgrade inventory), Seat Alerts, etc.

ExpertFlyer/UA website pricing discrepancy question (cheap surf trip?)
 

I'm new to the site, I found an inexpensive UA booking class K on ExpertFlyer $167 EWR-LIR round trip 19JUL12-01AUG12. When I force the K class on UA website it comes up slightly more expensive ($420 inc. tax) than the S class which showed a base of $306 ($417 inc tax)round trip on ExpertFlyer. Expert Flyer showed K availability on all segments. It appears all rules are met. Any ideas whats wrong or how to get the cheap fare? Thank you for your help!

You are looking at the fares without surcharges. If you look at the fares with surcharges added you get:

Results from ExpertFlyer.com

ExpertFlyer - assistance / help requests for newbies
 

Hi,

Just subscribed as premium member. How do i find booking class/fare for a given flight on given days for AA?

Thanks

What do you mean? Are you looking for published fares on a route, the availability of a fare for a route, or something else?

Welcome to FlyerTalk.

As this was posted initially in the ExpertFlyer Master Information and Updates Thread, we have moved your query into its own thread.

Please take a few minutes to go to the American AAdvantage Forum (link) and look over the "sticky" FAQ thread at the top of the Forum page; there are information and links to relevant threads there, as well as a Wiki, that will answer your questions.

JDiver, Senior Moderator

Welcome to ExpertFlyer batyam. First, go here:
http://www.expertflyer.com/new-to-expertflyer and read the EduGuide, it explains availability, fares and the relationship between them. If you still have questions, feel free to post here or email us.

Looking for published fares on given flight. Specifically, JFK to LHR on 5/1/13, flight 100. Did go over user guide but couldnt find it. Understand it is basic, i just seems not to be able to find the right page.

Thanks

You're looking for Fare Information. See page 8 in the user guide.

Please read the EduGuide (not the User Guide) which explains how to do what you are trying to do.