Boleslav

Hello,
I would like to ask you for an advice.
We are looking for a reasonably priced flight tickets from DEN to DPS in May, returning back in approx. 30 days. When I do a quick search on engines like Kayak, Expedia, the price for "Multiple carries" or Delta etc. is around $1100 - $1200.

After I try my search on United, the price is more around $1700.
Would you have any suggestions, ideas, if there is a way to get to Bali on UA/its partners for similar price to $1100 - $1200? Perhaps somehow book segments independently etc.
Until now all my travels were simple affairs from point A to point B for a good price, this one is a bit more challenge and I am not that savvy.

The only reason why I try to push UA is that we will earn the PDQ etc. toward the silver status.

But it is not worth it, if the difference is this high.
Thank you.

transportprof

Look at DEN-SIN, and then try KLM's tag on leg SIN-DPS on a separate ticket. That can be very inexpensive.

IADFlyer123

Silver status on United is not worth much. You can get the economy plus subscription (if you plan to fly a lot) and a United Explorer card (to get the free bag). Everything else is a pipe dream. Many folks here would recommend that you choose what is comfortable for you - price and schedule wise. $500 will go a long way in DPS. So you can choose to save that money and choose the airline that suits your needs.

Alternately, if you want to stick to UA, look at flying to NRT, HND, TPE, SIN, HKG, ICN and then taking a local flight to DPS. Flights to these locations may meet your price criteria. But also remember that just miles wont do the trick to get Silver. You will also need $3000 in qualifying dollars (actual ticket cost minus taxes). A $1200 ticket wont do that.

Boleslav

Thank you will check it out.
what could be the disadvantage of buying it as 2 separate tickets in the terms of the flight flow and so on?

transportprof

If there are IRROPS and you miss your connection on two tickets, then the airlines are not responsible for rebooking. Using a credit card with travel insurance, or buying travel insurance for such a trip is a wise idea, as is booking >6 hour connections. SIN is the world's most pleasant airport to spend time in, so a long layover is no chore.

jsloan

Two major disadvantages:

1 - If there's a delay on your first ticket, you're not necessarily protected on your second ticket -- that carrier has the option to say "tough luck; you missed your flight." So, if you buy a ticket to SIN and a separate ticket to DPS, make sure you give yourself enough time in SIN -- in each direction -- to recover from any delays.

2 - UA will not check your baggage through to a non-Star Alliance airline on a separate ticket. So, if you take the KLM flight (or Air Asia, etc.) from SIN to DPS, you'll need to claim your checked luggage in SIN and re-check it with the second airline.. and you'll need to pay applicable baggage fees to each carrier.

IADFlyer123

We recently did this and will share what is my experience. Instead of DPS, we went to BKK. We went over on a non-stop ewr-HKG flight and purposely chose to spend the night in HKG to decompress. If not, we were faced with a 4 hour connection in HKG at a weird hour for another 2.5 hour flight. So my personal recommendation would be to spend the night (if you can).

If you can't, and are not able to price the connection on one ticket, you will need to ensure that the connection time is adequate enough for you to be able to retrieve your bags and re-check them with the next airline (if they are not able to interline the bags). Also, the other big issue is that if you are not on one ticket, you might have to deal with two airlines in case of a delay at the origin that could cause you to miss the connection. Hence the suggestion to spend the night

bigwings8

Now...How about how to get GPUs on this route? I'm looking IAH-DPS in April.

Eva air has some good looking biz saver awards for 80k miles each way through taipei but I'd really like to bank the 20k pqms toward 2018 1k

Routings are either iah-sfo-sin or iah-nrt-sin. But since UA got rid of their NRT Sin flight I don't think the GPU on the first leg could be shared with the ana portion? Is that correct?

Any one with idea of GPU success on sfo-sin? I flew it a while back and biz was booked full but 6 or 8 ppl no showed and there we lots of upgrades. I imagine that's uncommon for that route.

Boleslav

Jsloan - thanks for the reality check
IAD flyer- Ilooked at the Hongkong option, I would not mind spending a night in HK, it seems we would not even need any visa, but the cost of the flight ticket is $1700 for May

transportprof

Near zero chance for GPU SFO-SIN. And you're right GPUs don't work on the ANA NRT-SIN flight. Your best bet is to try and GPU to HKG and then ride E+ across to SIN, or maybe score a battlefield upgrade on that flight.

Boleslav

bigwings- we do not have that kind of miles, used lots of them recently for another trip.

PVDProf

DPS is a relatively low fare market in the region, and UA only flies to higher fare markets. Thus, to fly UA TPAC, you have to buy a higher fare, plus a connector ticket. I've done this several times over the last few years, and never found a way to combine long UA flights with short cheaper flights that was reasonably priced, or worth the hassle or risk of misconnect.

My preferred way to go is BR Premium Economy, which you can often get for under the cost of UA Y, and the PE on that flight alone is worth way more than a year of UA silver. Plus, you get all the PQM and RDM based on distance traveled, which is more RDM than I would get out of the revenue-based system, even as a Plat.

Boleslav

Forgot to mention that my final destination is not Bali, but Flores.
so flying to Jakarta (last year got a good price on the ticket for ANA/UA) does not mak sense as I will have to get another ticket Jakarta-Bali Bali-Flores (apprx. $190 one way pp) plus the hassle of missing the flight etc.
Hence looking into getting to Bali directly.

764toHI

I've done this frequently for my SE Asia trips - fly UA TPAC into HKG or SIN and take a LCC the rest of the way on a separate ticket. Note you'll need to overnight unless you take UA1 on the outbound - and definitely build in a cushion during the layover as UA will not honor the LCC ticket if you misconnect.

DA201

Options I see:
-DEN-HKG is ~$1000 on UA and then fly HKG-DPS on another carrier for ~$300.
-DEN-SIN is under $1000 on UA and then SIN-DPS on another carrier for under $200.
-DEN-TPE is under $1000 on UA and then TPE-DPS on another carrier for ~$300.