akandt

I'm wanting to book three tickets from DEN to HI using miles and one (mine) with cash. We're wanting to fly into Kauai and out of Honolulu. Trying to minimize flight costs. This is becoming a complete pain. Many questions here:

On the outbound, is it possible to fly DEN-LAX in the afternoon, spend the night, the fly out LAX-LIH the next morning, all on one ticket (three booked with miles one with cash)? How do I book this?

The direct return flight (HNL-DEN) we want is available for 22500 miles BUT when I go to book the cash fare as a one-way there are no economy seats available, and the cheapest is over $1000. When I input it as a roundtrip (DEN - HNL, then HNL-DEN) it shows availability in economy for the return flight and the cost $433. But I don't want DEN-HNL and back, I want LAX-LIH and HON-DEN.

Is there a workaround here? If dates would help, or if anyone has creative suggestions, let me know. We're happy to fly through LAX, SFO, or SEA (spending a night there) as long as we can have a direct from there to Kauai, but I am loosing my mind with all the permutations of this and the searches.

WineCountryUA

Yes possible but it will cost extra as any stop over 4 hours in LAX that skips a flight option is considered a stopover which has extra costs.

You can use the multi-city flight search option to more tightly control your routing.

Multi-city will allow you to force routing -- but don't be surprised with the pricing.

Hipplewm

As far as Den-LAX and LAX-LIH. use the multi city search and depending on times you fly it should work. I did the EXACT same thing on my HNL tickets for next July and it worked as a single ticket as one RPU upgraded both flights.

For the return, try booking the entire trip as a multi city search and see what comes up

I know this sounds like a broken record, but in the past 2 years any time I had a problem and couldn't get .bomb to do what I want, multi city search has made it possible. Be prepared that there might be fare rules that just make the one way prohibitively expensive as a one way.

akandt

I've been trying multi-city. I have been doing LAX-LIH and then HON-DEN and it is not showing me the economy return flight option. I think it is because I have different departure (LAX) and return airports (DEN)? If I book every single leg, using the multi-city search (DEN-LAX, LAX-LIH, LIH-HON, HON-DEN), THEN it finally displays the cheaper (economy) return option, but I don't want to book the DEN-LAX and LIH-HON legs on United. ARGH.

If I do multi-city for the outbound (DEN-LAX and then the next day LAX-LIH) it is charging for two tickets (12.5k and 22.5k miles).

WineCountryUA

fare and routing rules can be funny
Did you try DEN-LAX-LIH-DEN? BTW its HNL

That's correct - consequence of the stopover.

jsloan

(HON is Huron, SD :-).

Without knowing your travel dates, I can't be 100% sure, but I'm 95% sure that I know what's going on. The itinerary you're trying to price -- LAX-LIH / HNL-DEN -- is a double open jaw; not only is your return airport (DEN) different from your origin (LAX), you also have an un-flown segment in the middle between LIH and HNL.

UA has been tightening up its fare rules. The cheapest coach fare between DEN and HNL -- for the random midweek dates I searched, anyway -- is a round-trip fare that has a minimum stay component and allows en-route stopovers, circle trips, and a single open jaw. However, double open jaws are expressly forbidden, and I think that explains the behavior that you're seeing -- LAX-LIH / HNL-DEN is a double open jaw.

Some UA fares allow you to fly HA or WP for inter-island flights, which would clear this right up. Unfortunately, the fare that I'm seeing isn't one of them, so, in order to get the lower price you want, you would need to do one of two things:

1 - Fly DEN-LAX on UA. It needn't necessarily be the at the start of your HI trip -- you could fly it a month ahead of time, return to DEN on a separate ticket, and then take your preferred DEN/LAX flight, so long as the total trip duration doesn't exceed the fare's maximum (60 days on most of the cheap fares I'm seeing).
or
2 - Fly LIH-HNL on a UA codeshare.

Whichever option is more palatable, give that a try in multi-city search and you should see the discount economy options.

Good luck!

char777

The post above is good advice. I'd also suggest that, if you have enough flexibility, there is a nonstop DEN-LIH that runs on Saturdays only.

Or, you could just book DEN-HNL-DEN all on UA and then book HNL-LIH-HNL separately on HA. The inter-island Hawaii flights are usually pretty cheap on their own, and that plus the cost of UA on DEN-HNL r/t would probably be better and cheaper than trying to force a bunch of fare breaks on DEN-LAX-(unnecessary overnight)-LAX-LIH-HNL-DEN.

rabilancia

Then there's the option to use SFO instead of LAX.

artvandalay

Weather permitting.

akandt

Ok, thanks for this. I tried every single leg on UA but didn't try just one of the extra two (DEN-LAX or LIH-HNL)

Oh and I started the post using HNL, but somehow apparently veered into wanting to go to Huron. Ha ha.

akandt

Travel dates would ideally be DEN-LIH on 4/29, LIH-HNL on 5/6, and HNL-DEN on 5/9. We have two little kids and want to minimize connections and also do not want to be getting into LIH at night, so it's limiting the options. But like I said, we're happy to overnight in LA, SF, or Seattle on 4/28.
Thanks everyone for your thoughts!

IAH-OIL-TRASH

You mean 5/6 and 5/9.

Doesn't look like a big deal.

akandt

Yes, edited. Geesh I'm having significant difficulties with this thread. I apparently need to not multi-task, it's a complete failure today.

FortFun

IME the DEN non-stops are a PITA due to the 3 night min stay, which isn't apparently satisfied by the DEN-LIH/HNL-DEN routing (or else there is some other component of the non-stop fare that's breaking it--I haven't looked into the details in a while).

If you can do LIH-HNL-DEN it will probably offer you the n/s at the lower fare, but sometimes that LIH-HNL leg can be not so cheap. But I also value being on the n/s red-eye pretty highly.

akandt

I'm trying to get on the HNL-DEN direct (overnight) flight home (5/9). That's the flight causing the problem.