Redeeming Certificates - Need Help!
 

For the past several nights I have been trying to book an FFB travel award to Rome dated 352 days in the future (the furthest out TWA can book). I have been calling at 12:00am Central, which is the time that an additional day is added to their computers. It seems that no matter how soon I call, the awards are already taken!! Is there any tips on impoving my chances of getting an award? Are there that many people calling at the same time trying to book the same route 352 days from now?? Reservationists and Aviator service personnel aren't much help. They just don't want to give any details out and they play dumb!! How can you play the game if no one knows the rules? Thanks for any help.

You might try Milan or one of the other cities, then use one of the low fare airlines to get to FCO. The airlines are not always activating frequent flyer seats 352 days out--they need some time to see how bookings are going.

jl

Thanks. I booked to Milan as a holder and got on a waiting list to Rome. It has been very frustrating with TWA in that no one wants to give any difinitive answers (i.e., has seats been allocated, when they may become availible, etc.) Thanks again.

I'm surprised you couldn't be placed on a waiting list earlier... I think that feature, or the ability to be put on a list to "hold" the first available FF trip in situations similar to lQQkout's would be a nice feature of any FF plan.

I am aware of people faxing in requests, but I am uncertain how they are handled once they’re received.

Finally, if a FF seat is a non-revenue seat for passengers, I wonder where the seats come from for employee non-revenue seats? Is it from the same pool? If it is, that may explain why the Rome seats disappear so quickly... maybe it's because they're gone before they're released?

Buck, I think the point of non-revenue seats is that they aren't booked ahead of time.

I called TWA again (and after 45 minutes on hold)I was fortunate enough to speak with someone who was both sympathetic and knowledgable. I was told that TWA had not yet released any FF coach seats (although several first class FF seats were available). She put me on a waiting list and said that it might be several months before the first batch of seats are released. She also informed me (which is the first I had heard of it) that I needed to call back within 30-45 days to "renew" my waiting list status or else I would be removed from the list. I guess that's a good way to keep those truely interested on the list, but you would have thought that someone would have told me this when I first was placed on the list!
Finally, I am happy to report that when I called United, not only was the representative friendly and knowledgable, but he had seats to ALL of their Europe stops available through May 8th, which was the latest their system goes out to. This experience has said a lot about both TWA and United! Thanks again.

TWA does this call back every month to renew and it drives me crazy! I'm not quite that much of a FF afficianado to keep doing this for a year and sadly I can't program the computer to do it! It can wear you out since you must call on that day to extend it! I finally caved on my recent attempt to book 3 for Puerto Rico and just decided to use the mileage for California! I assumed they do not to this to their elite level flyers. Obviously, I've got no status here- not since the flight attendants struck in '96!

Hey lQQkout & Doc: unfortunately you have a couple things working against you right now on award travel:
1) TWA just had the Aviator plan kick in and I'm told quite a few flyers booked tickets at the old lower FFB rates. TWA award travel is even more backed up on the popular routes than normal.
2) Europe & Puerto Rico are hard to come by along with Hawaii... I understand there are just one / two daily flights to Italy and they book immediately... as for PR, we have had two FF award tickets in '97 and three FF award tickets in '98 to Puerto Rico... had to book those about four months early. When I tried this year back in March I was told PR was totally booked for the summer except for some Labor Day avails (which we didn't want).

Ironically, this year we picked up the Puerto Rico tickets on American... needed only about 4 weeks lead time but still had a lot of availabilities since they have several flights daily. STL - SJU on TWA is Saturday / Sunday only flights - otherwise TWA goes through NY / JFK.

I haven't heard about the call-back feature so I can't really comment on that.

Thanks buck - knew of the TWA program change but certainly not the details!

>"I was told that TWA had not yet released any FF coach seats (although several first class FF seats were available)."

Are there first class seats on TWA's trans-Atlantic flights again? I thought they'd gone to only business class and coach.