aquanine

Just called to change an LAX-HND RT F 3/13-3/24 to a LAX-HND NRT-LAX F 3/13-3/29. Agent went to talk to the ticketing team about it (put me on hold), and was told that the taxes and fees were "exactly the same" and that I would only need to pay the $50 change fee.

Unlucky that I didn't receive a refund in the fuel surcharge, but VS has been slow with refunds anyway and this is the best sweet spot ever so I'm not too miffed. Now just need to cross my fingers that VS won't liquidate.

dhoward

Managed to change 2x F from MUC (Oct) to LHR (Feb) which I’m really happy about. London never usually has 2 x F and hopefully this will be new F too... no change fee and only about £40 extra tax so very happy with that, such a bargain

also keeping fingers crossed re Virgin

freakazoid

Where would those extra taxes come from? The fuel surcharge has been scrapped this month, which should reduce the "taxes" by ~£150 per return flight.

CosmicGirl

UK Air Passenger Duty.

Boringbarry

Booked an award ticket for F in the end of October of this year. As there is some uncertainty of travel reopening in that time, I am wondering what my options are if travel does not reopen by then.

If travel does not reopen by then, will I be able to only change with F award availability (which is probably ~1 year out), or will I be able to rebook as long as there is F seats open? If it's the case that I need to reschedule 1 year out to get the F seat, I'm guessing it would need to cancel the ticket and then ask me to create a new one?

Thanks

standbyalldtime

Edit: double post

standbyalldtime

You would need to be rebooked on award inventory. However, I've been surprised to find the amount of space that is available. If you have flexible dates and flexible departure/return points, it's quite likely you can find an alternative within a few months of when your travel was originally booked.

FlyerBeek

Just booked NH F JFK-NRT/HND-JFK for next year. Same easy experience as in the past. Despite 3+ hrs on hold, had a great VS phone agent, as usual. He was even willing to wait for me to transfer in some miles after the award space was held so that I could have it ticketed immediately. 120k VS miles and $58.25 in taxes for 27hrs in NH new F has got to be one of the few remaining F award gems still out there. Hopefully VS remains solvent.

-FlyerBeek

louie-m

New to ANA and Virgin.... looking at SYD - HND in business. The only available flights I can see (using United) in either direction are in the next three weeks. Does anyone know if this is normal or do ANA usually (or even ever) make award flights available beyond that window on this route?

FlyerBeek

louie-m - there's definitely more award availability out there. While I cannot speak in terms of historical award availability on this route, I can certainly see business class (I) inventory for dates beyond the next three weeks. In just five minutes I used EF to randomly search the last week of every calendar month, and found at least one award seat available on SYD-HND and HND-SYD every month between August 2020 and April 2021 - except for December 2020 and January 2021 (and even those months might have space on other weeks). Most weeks have more availability than just a single flight. Who knows if those flights will actually operate, but there's definitely award inventory out there. If you don't have an EF subscription, try using the Calendar view while searching for awards on United.com.

-FlyerBeek

louie-m

Wow. Really kind of you to look for me. Thank you very much. I did forget one pertinent fact in my post though - I'm looking for 2 seats. Looking again on United, I can see single seat availability as you say, but still nothing at all for two seats.

Deep1312

Just scored my first big win on ANA using VS miles. IAH->HND->IAH on J. 95k + $55 on taxes. Thanks to all the experts here for their guidance.

FlyerBeek

Two J seats on the same flight will be tough on this route. On some days, NH operates two flights/day HND-SYD and during my previous search I did see single J seat award availability for both daily flights on some days. Your best bet might be trying to book on days where there's space on both daily flights, and then hoping an additional J seat will open on either flight. Fortunately, changing these VS awards is pretty easy and inexpensive ($50 USD).

-FlyerBeek

pitflyer

I booked round trip first class tickets via text message. Took four days for someone to respond but once they did everything was done in five texts in five min including secure online payment.

Since the miles we're stuck in VS already from an earlier canceled redemption it's just anothrr $50 gamble that I will be able to go next year.

tripmaster

I'd love to take my son and wife next summer to Japan -- any advice on hunting for 3 biz or 2 biz/1 first class award tickets on ANA? How many days in advance do they open?

I assume if I want Jul 1-Jul 14 2021, and if it's 365 days in advance, I'd need to start a search in Jul 14, 2020?