As we previously mentioned via email, the alerts check several times a day, not every second, so if you check manually and take any available seat/inventory, there wouldn’t be anything left to alert you on when the alert is next checked. The alerts are designed to check when you are not.

If you want to see if an alert would notify you of currently available inventory, you can go to the View Saved Alerts page and click on the Quick Check button next to the alert. You will then be told if inventory is available, meaning if the alert was checked right then, you would be notified.

Flight Delay Codes
 

How do you search flight delay reason and how do you decode them?

Looking for BA249, 28th April, delayed 3+ hours so should qualify for EU261 compensation if Technical Reason

From Expertflyer.
DOBA249/28APR
* OPERATIONAL FLIGHT INFO * BA 249 -1 FR 28APR17
CITY INFO HOUR (LOCAL)

LHR ESTIMATED TIME OF DEPARTURE 1550
LEFT THE GATE 1612
TOOK OFF 1635
DELAY ZO
ESTIMATED TIME OF ARRIVAL 2342 GIG
GIG AIRCRAFT LANDED 2334
ARRIVED 2341
*1A PLANNED FLIGHT INFO* BA 249 -1 FR 28APR17
APT ARR DY DEP DY CLASS/MEAL EQP GRND EFT TTL
LHR 1230 FR FAJCDRIWETY/M 777 11:45


Delay reason ZO is 'operations'. There is a list of BA codes you can find by a Google Search.

Assume late plane change due to availability.

G-YMMK which is shown to have operated flight landed at 1145 after operating BA196 from IAH so no chance of getting away on time.

Thanks!
 

​​​​​​really appreciate you sharing, sounds like a €300/pax claim under EU261 is a slam dunk.

Been using EF a lot lately. Anyone else wish for the following features, in no particular order:

- Ability to recall a recent search to quickly redo a search on a subsequent session
- A smart date field (like SFDC and other websites) where you don't have to exactly nail the format
- Ability to click into a flight's detailed status when searching flight status by city pair
- Ability to quickly reset/smartly modify a flight alert. For example, you get notified that a certain seat you had been monitoring opened up, but you want to keep the alert on for the rest of the seats requested.

If you save an alert, you can pull it up and manually check them...

Just save the query, using the box near the top right hand corner of the page.

I just signed up for EF monthly premium. I am trying to use AA miles for family of four, from Chicago to Rome at Christmas. I've been reading the manual and threads on EF and want to be sure i'm using it correctly. Right now i have on hold an AA itinerary (held till May 19) the exact routing i want (ORD-PHL-FCO and same on reverse) but not the right dates. It's all AA metal too so my taxes are only $295. The itinerary on hold departs ORD 12/17 and returns from FCO (both via PHL) on 12/25. I prefer 12/25 or 26 departure and 1/4 or 5 return. I set up EF to look for the following:
4 coach on PHL-FCO on 12/25 and 12/26 ( i figure ORD-PHL would be easier to nab)
2 coach and 2 biz on PHL-FCO on 12/25 and 12/26
4 Coach return on 1/4 and 1/5

My wife and I would prefer the biz on the outbound PHL-FCO and kids can go coach.

My questions: does the way i set up the alerts as above make sense? Does my split of 2 biz and 2 coach make it more difficult for me? I'm worried that if only 2 of either class become available for the 25th or 26th, i run the risk of us being separated- eg EF finds two biz on the 25th but no coach. Should this be a concern? Any other advice? thanks so much!!

I think this is a better question for the AA board--this thread is more for EF tech support, and you're asking questions about AA inventory management.

OK - thank you. Let me ask this about EF itself. I saved my query (multi day search) and set up some alerts. Is it best to just run the save query when i wish to check AA availability? Or should i continue my search on AA itself?

How to read ExpertFlyer's Fare Routing
 

I just subscribed to ExpertFlyer, and I'm having trouble deciphering the "Fare Routing Results" screen. I read their help page, but it's not very detailed.

Here's an example:

/VIA THE ATLANTIC/
DOM ROUTE VALIDATION APPLIES WITHIN ORIG/DEST COUNTRIES
MAP CONSTRUCTED LEFT TO RIGHT AND RIGHT TO LEFT
1. CPH-AB/HG-BER/DUS/HAM/MUC/NUE/STR/VIE/ZRH-AB/HG-BER/DUS-
AB-BOS/CHI/DFW/FMY/MIA/NYC/ORL/SFO-AA/AB-LAX
2. CPH-AB/HG-BER/DUS/HAM/MUC/NUE/STR/VIE/ZRH-AB/HG-BER/DUS-
AB-DUS/FRA-AB-DFW-AA/AB-LAX

My best guess is that this means:

Variation 1

You start in CPH
You must fly on either Air Berlin (AB) or NikiFly (HG)
to get to BER/DUS/HAM/MUC/NUE/STR/VIE/ZRH
-- and from there --
You must fly on AB or HG
to get to BER/DUS
-- and from there --
You must fly on AB
to get to BOS/CHI/DFW/FMY/MIA/NYC/ORL/SFO
-- and from there --
You must fly on American (AA) or Air Berlin (AB)
to get to LAX

Is this correct? Presumably this means that the routing rules would allow an itinerary like CPH-MUC-BER-MIA-LAX (assuming availability of flights, etc). Is this correct? Is there any way to figure out what other cities this Fare Basis Code is valid for (other than guess-and-check)?

FYI, this is the full routing rule:


Search: Departing CPH on 10/15/17 for LAX
Fare basis code I1NCRDK
Flying AB
Routing via North Atlantic
V FARE BASIS BK FARE TRAVEL-TICKET AP MINMAX RTG
1 I1NCRDK I R 1642.00 ---- &#1 35;/&#1 35; SU/12M AT01
PASSENGER TYPE-ADT AUTO PRICE-YES
FROM-CPH TO-LAX CXR-AB TVL-15OCT17 RULE-5000 IPRA/1
FARE BASIS-I1NCRDK SPECIAL FARE DIS-S VENDOR-ATP
FARE TYPE-BRO RT-BUSINESS CLASS PROMOTIONAL
DKK 10969 0300 E31MAR16 D-INFINITY FC-I1NCRDK FN-
SYSTEM DATES - CREATED 30MAR16/1122 EXPIRES INFINITY

PUBLISHED RTG CPH-LAX/AB300 /TAR-TARG EF-31MAR16 DIS-INDEF

/VIA THE ATLANTIC/
DOM ROUTE VALIDATION APPLIES WITHIN ORIG/DEST COUNTRIES
MAP CONSTRUCTED LEFT TO RIGHT AND RIGHT TO LEFT
1. CPH-AB/HG-BER/DUS/HAM/MUC/NUE/STR/VIE/ZRH-AB/HG-BER/DUS-
AB-BOS/CHI/DFW/FMY/MIA/NYC/ORL/SFO-AA/AB-LAX
2. CPH-AB/HG-BER/DUS/HAM/MUC/NUE/STR/VIE/ZRH-AB/HG-BER/DUS-
AB-DUS/FRA-AB-DFW-AA/AB-LAX
.

Recently, my EF queries have been taking longer than usual and EF displays the following message when I search, "Please wait while we retrieve the Award & Upgrade data...
(May take up to 2 minutes)"

Have there been some recent changes to the EF website?

Thanks!

They may be doing some screen-scraping.

GDS queries should be a few seconds at most. Screen scraping can take longer, especially if there are multiple screens the scraper needs to move through to obtain the data.

GDS queries can take time as well, especially when you do 40+ of them and combine them into one result set, like we do.

However we changed the dynamics of the browser-server communications for the Award & Upgrade search a couple weeks ago to solve issues we were seeing with various proxys and ISPs that are quick to timeout connections for some of our customers.

Is there a way to search for Award space for a period greater than 3 days at a time?