Thanks for the report, it should now show NCL. If you come across any others, please do send a quick note using the Help/Contact link in the Mobile Companion.

I'm getting:

Datasource Error RD
(Engine Error)

Diamond/6.7.0 R3
Searching ITA: Awards/AC-StarAlliance
LHR-JNB 22nd Dec

Any thoughts?

The [Awards/AC-StarAlliance] Engine does not support all possible routes -- please use the 'Classic' [Awards/StarAlliance] Method for this query:

[KVS Availability Tool 6.7.0/Diamond - SNT: Awards/StarAlliance/JP-ANA-SP1]

Is there a way to search availability by Alliance in the KVS desktop system like there is in the mobile tool?

Wanted to clarify a billing issue:

If I am gold now with 3 months remaining and I want to upgrade to diamond. Will I now have 9 months of diamond remaining once I contribute?

IIRC correctly from my upgrade, your 3 months of Gold will get prorated down based on some formula (probably based on the relative cost of Gold vs Diamond) and then added to the months of Diamond that your purchase. Probably something like 7 months of Diamond total (3 months of Gold prorated to 1 month of Diamond + 6 months of purchased Diamond). Note that I have no idea what the formula for prorating is, so the above is just an example.

That is correct.

Based on the actual formula, it will be a total of 7.4 Months (i.e. 1.4 Months [which is the equivalent of 3 Months Gold] + another 6 Months).

Not at the moment, but you can use the Alliance [Filter] buttons in the main KVS Tool application.

Thanks for the suggestion, jasonvr - downloaded and installed it.

I did a screen capture of browsing the ANA site (around 4s search then 2s per day change):
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/647010/ANA%20website.wmv (2.7MB)

and also did one of KVS Tool:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/647010/KVS%20Tool.wmv (4.7MB)

Hopefully this shows how speedy things are when looking at fares/timetables compared to the slowdown when looking at award inventory. The >30s times I got previously thankfully don't seem to be the norm but it remains 3-4x slower than the ANA website at around 15s or so/search today).

Thanks for uploading the screen captures, from which it can be seen that your actual timings for the *A Award Searches are:

• Using a Regular Web Browser: 20 seconds (starting at 00:00, ending at 00:20)
• Using the KVS Tool: 15 seconds (starting at 00:41, ending at 00:56)

LOL I agree with the KVS one, but not quite sure how you get the web browser timings! :) You seem to be counting the time to type in details on the webpage, which isn't a fair comparison - so it's actually from 00:15 when the 'Next' orange button is clicked to 00:20.

I appreciate KVS allows for other items to be changed between searches but realistically I just want to find dates I can get an award booked! It's the day-to-day search that is particularly problematic - in a practical sense when I'm searching for an award then what I need to do is keep clicking through to find a day with the award - the website seems to be much quicker at doing this. The interesting thing was that when it was taking >30s for a KVS search the website one was no different in time - thankfully this seems to have improved a bit but I'm on the same machine so I don't know why.

why is the payment system to get KVS designated as a "contribution", rather than a "purchase". is this to skirt tax laws?

You need to start at the beginning of the process (i.e. Step 1 at 00:00) for comparison.

Even if you subtract the time it took you to do the typing in that video (i.e. ~5 seconds from 00:07 to 00:12) from the 00:20 total search duration using a [regular] web browser, that will still make your website timing 15 seconds (which is the same as the KVS Tool).

As mentioned previously, the [Previous/Next] functions in the KVS Tool are different (and more powerful) than those in ANA. They cannot (and should not) be compared directly.

Likewise, as mentioned before, that is a technical impossibility.

Once again, thanks for taking the time to create the video screenshots, which have now fully confirmed that the timings are within their normal ranges and the discrepancies you had previously reported cannot be substantiated.

I appreciate the point you're attempting to make, KVS, but I disagree. In the practical way I want to use it - ie. searching for availability on a known route over a number of days - KVS is slower than ANA. TBH on my most recent award booking it was the free AwardNexus.com that did the trick, mainly as it can search multiple dates at once.

Anyway, we'll just need to agree to disagree - you've received my 2 months Diamond fee but I won't be renewing once this time is up.

The Beta for Award Availability on Etihad Airways [EY], is now underway.

Those, who have already signed-up for this Beta, should have received the relevant instructions. Otherwise, please be sure to check your Spam/Junk e-mail folder.

If you are interested in joining this Beta, but haven't yet done so, please complete the EY Beta RSVP Form on the KVS Tool Homepage at http://www.KVSTool.com/

For EY Beta feedback, please visit the http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/other...-searches.html thread.

And if you are redeeming AADV miles, please also see the http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/ameri...advantage.html thread.