Help for award ticket to India

bayguy

bayguy

Level 2 Member
Its that time of the year to plan next year summer travel. I am challenged in finding award space for my family for next summer travel.

Requirement:

Travel Dates: Any time on/after June 10, 2017. Right now, its one-way and I need to use same tricks to find return availability.

Route: SFO-HYD(can be through AUH or DOH or any other place).

Planning to use my AA miles for this trip.

3 Business class seats on Etihad/Qatar(Can be 1 First and 2 Business class also). I can get 5 seats in economy with no issues but trying to see if i can find in Business. Alternate plan would be to: Book for 2 in Business and 1 in economy and hope something opens up or Break into sets of 2(we are family of 4 but I cant take long vacation like them).

I can get 2 Business on Etihad but no first class. Other challenge with Qatar is flights have 4 business class availability to Doha but nothing from there to Hyderabad.

Can anyone share any tips to get this booked?
 
bayguy

bayguy

Level 2 Member
Also, want to add that I have almost enough Alaska miles for a one way: SFO-DXB-HYD with no luck. Alaska site shows a mixed itinerary: SFO-SEA & SEA-DXB in coach and last short leg in Business.
 
HariOm

HariOm

Transcendent Level
I've booked several Etihad flights between SFO and India but have never tried booking this far out. I'm seeing the five economy seats but not the two biz; did you already have AA put the biz seats on hold? Otherwise, it looks like EY has only published the availability up to June 2017, or at least that's how it looks at Etihad.com, Kayak and ExpertFlyer. Maybe you've already done the research on how early EY releases their award calendar, but in any case, I'd take comfort in the fact that it's still pretty early with plenty of time for things to open up.

In my experience, Etihad has had SFO > India biz availability open from about 6 months to 4 months out, but that's the earliest I've ever started looking. Last fall, we had two biz seats and needed a third, and got it one week before the flight. Having been in your shoes, and actually wearing them from time to time, this is what I did, and am doing;

1. Etihad: buy the available seats and wait it out for the others, being mentally prepared to pay the $150 cancellation if a change becomes necessary.
2. Alaska: the DXB connection means you were talking about Emirates, right? In my experience, Emirates availability is spotty, but sometimes they come through. We flew EK biz from SFO to India earlier this year. One never knows, but at a guess, EY might have a higher likelihood of biz availability than EK.
3. Qatar: I've tried for several trips and never found a single biz seat from SFO to India.
4. Alternatives: If you have TYP or MR, it might be worthwhile considering Singapore's one-stop itinerary from SFO > SIN > HYD. SQ at least has a waitlist and sometimes good availability. Of course there are fuel surchages of maybe $450/pax but could be good use of A+ et al. And it you've got TYP or MR, then it might be worthwhile to check Cathay Pacific as well. Right now there's at least one biz award on CX for June 15, 2017 from SFO > HKG > HYD. Cathay too has fuel surchages but lower than SQ.
 
HariOm

HariOm

Transcendent Level
Meant to note at the end: set up automated AwardNexus alerts for all the potential itineraries. If the EY search option is not showing, just send an email to AwardNexus asking them to set it up or to give you access. EY search was in beta, not sure if they've fully rolled it out yet but it works great. Happy to answer any questions about the above.
 
HariOm

HariOm

Transcendent Level
bayguy said:
I can get 2 Business on Etihad
Click to expand...
Not sure how far you are from SFO, but if it's within 50 miles, I believe that's that's the threshold for the free Etihad chauffeur service, which is a very helpful touch. Emirates discontinued it for award passengers but Etihad still provides it. Not that it would deter you from taking Emirates flights if they became available; just a travel reminder in case EY works out.

One more: be sure to get the Etihad booking reference from American and then call Etihad to confirm directly (and get seats, meals, etc.).
 
bayguy

bayguy

Level 2 Member
Thanks for your replies. I put on hold 2 business and 1 economy seat on Etihad. I will check Singapore airlines option also. I am in east bay and think less than 50 miles from SFO.

I will try both Cathay pacific using AA miles but if I am right, you can't go to India over pacific, it has to be over Atlantic only. I also have this crazy idea to try Qatar: SFO - Lax - Doh - Auh - hyd. At least the major portion will be in Business class.

Pl. keep sending your suggestions.
 
D

dukerau

Level 2 Member
bayguy said:
I will try both Cathay pacific using AA miles but if I am right, you can't go to India over pacific, it has to be over Atlantic only.
Pl. keep sending your suggestions.
Click to expand...
Still mostly true but they added an exception a few months ago. You can now connect in HKG en route to India if you're flying on AA/CX.
 
bayguy

bayguy

Level 2 Member
I was able to search Cathay on British Airways site and then called AA to hold them. Once I put the seats on hold, availability immediately went down. Also, I released Etihad hold and the seats went back to available pool immediately.

Thanks again to you & dukerau suggestions.
 
bayguy

bayguy

Level 2 Member
Update: For the return: i got 2 Abu Dhabi -SFO and 2 Abu Dhabi -LAX-SFO on Etihad splitting my family. I was checking Etihad site daily and they opened up 2 more business class seats on San Francisco direct flight. I changed my flight to nonstop one and now, we are all coming back together.
 
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