Very nice.

I happened to look at UA 628 on 5/25. As it happens, this flight number is applied to three consecutive segments (at least two of which are actually different aircraft). There is no View Extended Comments. Does this only apply to single-sector flights? Is there a way to limit the flight status search to a particular sector?

I love this!

Can anyone offer guidelines or suggestions for what threshold to use when determining when to book?

Aside from looking at what cabin the fare books into vs the booking class/fare basis code, no. The GDSs don't really allow that kind of search. FareCompare can do it because they get direct fare feeds from ATPCO, however that is unfortunately cost prohibitive.

The View Comments uses GDS data and GDS flight status generally only works for flights +/- 1 day from today. So for a flight for 5/25, the option isn't available.

Thanks! Just keep in mind that the inventory can go from 3 to 0, as an example, without going to 2 or 1 first. One use would be to see when an inventory class starts to come down from it's maximum value (e.g. less then 7 or 9).

ExpertflyerVoice Can you give an explanation of the following anomaly with Oneworld RTW pricing on EF.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/16587073-post35.html

An AONE6 ex-KRT priced in $AU on Expertflyer returns $AU8080 which at the current Rate of Exchange is $US8600. But if you price the fare in $US on Expertflyer it returns a fare of $US9870

Let me put in here a big plug for ExpertFlyer. Even though I'm very much a travel geek, I resisted paying the bucks to get this service until a few months ago. Man, is this useful. I'm quickly finding the award and upgrade information that used to be such a laborious process.

If you look at your miles as your ticket into the premium cabins, EF is well worth the fee.

Hi 3544quebec, the fares are correct, you're just not comparing apples to apples on the exchange rate as you're not taking into account the SDG->AUS rate. We replied to the original thread with a more detailed explanation.

Thanks dhuey, we're glad ExpertFlyer has been able to help you out!

Thanks for responding but despite the explanation I still have difficulty understanding how a fare can cost $AU8080=$US8600 and at the same time cost $US9870 and that both prices are correct for the exact same fare. I must be very thick :confused:

Because GDSs can calculate exchange rates using either the real exchange rate or the IATA one. Please read our response on the thread as it explains it with examples.

Can I find YQ for IT fares on Expertflyer? The published IT fares are quite a long way short of what you actually pay due to I think YQ.

I'm trying to understand, I truly am (and have read the explanation in the other thread) When I look at the routing details for this fare I see:

V FARE BASIS BK FARE TRAVEL-TICKET AP MINMAX RTG
1 AONE6 A‡R 8548.00 ---- - 10/12M RW01


What does the 8548.00 reflect obviously not the $US price of $9870?

If they are published in the rules, you can look at the Surcharges section in the Fare Rules of the fare. However some fuel surcharges only show up once an itinerary is priced, it depends on how the airline files the surcharges.

Yes. The GDS we use for the fare display is different then the one we use for the Rules/Routing, that one doesn't try to do the BSR conversion, only the ICH. The $8548 is the more exact "$US8600" value that you posted in the other thread.

Since this is a conversation that is taking place in another thread, please continue it there if you have any further questions, or email us at [email protected]

I signed up for ExpertFlyer's trial just to see how it works and I'm trying to see how to get from MCO->VCE aboard AA and it's partners and which flights have seats, etc.

If I put in MCO->VCE for 05/10/12 and just select the award flights on AA, there are a lot of AZ (DL) results, but nothing showing IB. I then added in connecting cities to MAD and then IB shows up and it shows seats available.

I tried to call the reservation line and they don't see IB's seats.

What am I doing wrong? :x

Neither AA nor IB fly from MCO-VCE. If you do a regular Flight Availability search, you'll see the only way to get there on Oneworld is to fly BA thru LGW (1 connection). If you want IB, then you need to make 2 connections. Therefore, the only way to do the award search is to use the BA.com award search tool or call AA.

That aside, as is stated at the top of the Award & Upgrade results page:

•American Award & Upgrade availability is not valid for codeshares. Click here for more information

If you click on the link you will see:

•Codeshares: When requesting AAnytime award classes (F/J/Y) or the A upgrade class, American may return codeshare flights because they also represent regular fare classes on codeshares. AAnytime awards, however, are not valid on codeshare flights.

This also applies to any award class if the GDS can't find AA flights that have Z/U/T etc inventory on them, it may insert other airline flight connection that have those classes just to satisfy the search critera. That is why they show up as blank (without any classes) as ExpertFlyer filters them out as we know that it's not a valid result for your search.

We need your help - Please vote for ExpertFlyer
 

ExpertFlyer has been named a finalist for the GBTA Business Traveler Innovation awards and it would be great if you could help us out by voting for us. The People's Choice winner will get to present to the entire GBTA conference and it would be a great opportunity for ExpertFlyer.

The information on all of the nominees is here: http://www.gbta.org/BusinessTravelIn...nNominees.aspx

To go directly to the voting (open until July 15th), click here: http://www.gbta.org/BusinessTravelIn...ting/Vote.aspx

Thank you for your support!

I just tried this:

Search Departing MIA on 12/28/11 12:00 AM ± 3 Day(s) for LON
Flying BA on booking class S O
Direct/Non-Stop Only
Don't Show Interline Connections
Point of Sale: UK

However it's showing me the flight BA (AA) 1527 and also MIA-LGA, JFK-LHR (with 2 hours in between), both of which seem wrong. Also showing 1-stops using Iberia....

Hi meester69, the connection flight shows because BA sometimes ignores the "non-stop only" directive (we talk directly to BA when you specify it as the only airline) and a codeshare isn't the same as an interline.

Expert Flyer Tricks
 

Hi,
Q1. Are there any plans to add award flight availability for
A) BA - British Airways
B) VS - Virgin Atlantic

Q2. Are there any tricks or current ways to find out award flight availability for
A) BA - British Airways
B) VS - Virgin Atlantic

For example.... look at AA codeshare awards for BA flights ?

Thanks
LamboRich

Hi LamboRich,
1. We can not discuss specific airline plans, however adding more airlines for awards is always a work in progress

2. Codeshare flights are not valid indicators of award availability, the Award & Upgrade search tool works for metal flights of the airline searched.

Clarification
 

Just to clarify :
Does this mean that currently through ExpertFlyer there is no way to find out award flight availability for British Airways or Virgin Atlantic ?

At the risk of going off topic, these 2 carriers are both fairly easy to check for free. Just sign up for the Qantas FF program to check BA, and the Virgin Atlantic program to check them. It's not much effort. (Note that you can use BA to check for BA availability, but it has been extremely slow and unreliable of late.)

Correct.

Correct, the BA and QF websites are free resources for Oneworld award searches.

Agree, but it's worth pointing out that besides being more cumbersome to use than EF (and therefore less productive), these websites don't offer alerting.

Having BA & IB award inventory on ExpertFlyer would be super!

DL 180 missing?
 

Problem:

When searching for V availability from DTW to LGA on 7/8, DL 180 doesn't show in the results (? due to fact it is really 2 flights, an international leg first on a 744, then the domestic leg). Is there any way to force the search?

There is no first class on DL180, DTW-LGA. It is business class, probably for the reason you mention that it is an extension of an int'l flight. A search for X inventory (Biz upgrade) shows 1 available.

Correct, if you do a general Flight Availability search (or add F and J "other" classes to the Award/Upgrade search) you'll see that DL 180 has a J class but not an F class.

Newbie having trouble even after searching; just started using ExpertFlyer and see the reference of class codes for Delta but only for First/Business - looking for the domestic coach award code to search for? See lots of Economy codes but can't tell which one is for Skymiles Awards.

Appreciate any help, thanks!

The full list of airlines we show Award & Upgrade information for is here: http://www.expertflyer.com/sessionlessClassList.do You'll note that for DL, we don't show award inventory, just upgrade inventory (an ExpertFlyer exclusive). All award & upgrade searches are done with the Award & Upgrade search tool.

I could've sworn there used to be an option to check for China Airlines (CI) availability but don't see it anymore. Was I always mistaken, or did it just disappear recently?

No, CI was never a supported airline for Award & Upgrade searching. If you email us the details of the class codes you are looking for, we'll take another look and see if the information is available now.

Will do. FYI, China Airlines has O for biz awards and S for coach, unless something has changed in the past year or so.

Thanks!

We have researched this and found that we do have the S class coach award availability for CI, it has now been added to the Award & Upgrade search tool.

At first, we thought we had O class as well, as it was being displayed on the Galileo GDS, however we have confirmed that the inventory it shows for O class isn't real, as it always shows O4. We checked with CI directly about several flights showing O4 and none had availability, therefore if you see O class inventory thru a Galileo based source, it isn't valid.

Thanks for your help spikyone in getting to the bottom of this.

Reading flight status
 

What do the 1.23L and 1.09L mean here? I think I understand the rest of it.

Also, what does it mean when the flight is on decision?

Thanks.

It indicates how Late the flight is in departing or arriving. 1.23 is 1 hour 23 min late in departing, for example. This is reflected in the general Flight Status results in the Scheduled vs Estimated/Actual times.

Where did you hear that term being used?

I could have sworn the record said "DISC" or something of the sort. It was a flight delayed for MX.

How did you retrieve this information using EF? I only see sched./est./actual.

Click the "View Additional Comments" link

That's when mechanics are troubleshooting an issue but don't have a diagnosis yet. The decision time is the time when they expect to have a clearer view on what needs to be done, and therefore make a decision on either a new ETD or a cancellation (or, in case the troubleshooting isn't done, a new decision time).

AA codes it as DCSN; I don't know what UA uses.

Thank you - I didn't realize that option existed.

Can you please explain why not all of the information is being used to populate the est./actual fields?