Need some help to get started on my research

Linda marshall

Linda marshall

Level 2 Member
I am a great researcher and I learn quickly, at least once I know where to begin. I'm currently stuck in my efforts to figure out booking award travel for a trip to Europe with my daughter this summer. I'm particularly confused about the reason for checking out alliance partners--here is the question: is it simply to find more availability, or is it actually possible to save miles? If I want to fly business class from US to Paris, London, or frankly any other western european city (we have very flexible travel plans at this point), am I pretty much locked into the 57,5K mile rate chart provided by AA or is it possible that by researching alliance partnerships, I may be able to fly to Europe for fewer miles?

Another question- I have an Amex Business Plat card, which I understand offers a 50% reimbursement of travel miles if I buy business class on my preferred airline. If I don't have enough points for both of our tickets (currently I have about 120K), how can I use that benefit to my advantage (2 one way tickets? or find the same ticket for my daughter using another source?)

I have plenty Chase UR miles which I could transfer to United (or a SA partner), are the United open jaw tickets still an option if we wanted to travel from US to Paris (layover) to our final destination (wherever that would be in western europe)? Seems like I read somewhere that those were not as available as they once were . . .

Finally, is there a basic resource available to help me make sense of all of this? Has anyone written the definitive guide to booking award travel?

Again, I recognize the value of time and money and it probably would make the most sense for me to enlist the help of a professional award booking service, but then I would miss out on the learning part, which is not only good for my brain, but also the part that makes travel feel rewarding (having put in the work to put it all together).
I am grateful for any thoughts or suggestions to get me going on this- I'm not asking for specific results (i.e. what is the best option?) rather, where should I begin looking to FIND the best options myself!

Thanks!
 
K

knick1959

Level 2 Member
I am no expert and hopefully those folks will chime in. However, it sounds like you have miles in various pockets similar to my collection. If you don't need the stop-over for a UA round trip (if that is still an option, and if it is, you might want to consider that. You would have to book RT on UA if that still works) ... you could (and I would) do 2 one ways. AMEX MR will transfer to Aeroplan where you can find SA availability. UR to UA, and you mention AA so I'll assume you have those miles, too. So, search for each way on all 3 airlines. I would have checked a couple of months ago for "summer 2018", but that doesn't mean you won't find something.

If you can get to Europe it might work just to find a cheap short pay flight to your final destination. You didn't really say where in the US you were starting from ... but search on the main overseas segment first then see what you can add on.

There may be more exotic answers ... but not from me!
 
GetawaysRus

GetawaysRus

Level 2 Member
I'm particularly confused about the reason for checking out alliance partners--here is the question: is it simply to find more availability, or is it actually possible to save miles?

I'm guessing your main mileage account is AA. I use AA and AA partners regularly, so:

1. If you are booking through AA, whether on AA metal or a partner's flight, you will "pay" the same amount of miles.
2. By expanding your search to include partners, you increase the potential number of award flights you can find. You're thinking Europe. There's lots of USA to Europe flights.
3. I actually prefer flying AA partners, for several reasons. In recent years, AA has gotten stingier about awards. It has gotten more difficult to find 2 seats on AA metal in business class. I find that partner airlines more often release 2 seats in business. Also, the experience of flying on many AA partners is just superior to flying AA metal. I've taken award flights on Air Berlin, Iberia, British Air, and Royal Jordanian - all of these were more comfortable flights than most of my AA flights.
4. Be aware that British Air will often charge a significant fuel surcharge for BA flights.

It's difficult to give you an up-to-date web resource for AA. Frequent flier programs are moving targets, and things change frequently. Here's a link, but remember that this blog post is from 2014 and portions may be outdated (never mind the typo in the URL - that's the correct link):
http://viewfromthewing.boardingarea.com/2014/06/06/how-to-constructl-award-ticket-using-american-miles/

I'll typically start my search on Google Flights (flights.google.com). Pick your departure and arrival cities, specify business class, and then you can cone things down by selecting the alliance you want to search. This will give you some basic ideas about what flights are available.

Yes, it's possible that your AmEx Plat Business card points may help. If you can only find one seat using your miles, perhaps you'd be able to grab a second seat as a paid seat thru AmEx.

I've never used a paid award booking service for the same reason you mention. I enjoy the challenge of booking an award flight myself using my hard-earned miles/points. But I sometimes do use Expert Flyer. For a small monthly fee, Expert Flyer will allow you to create an ongoing search for award flights. I confess, however, that so far Expert Flyer hasn't done any better for me than my own research.
 
B

BuddyFunJet

Level 2 Member
I'm not a booking pro either but my first thoughts are:

1. Unless there is an extremely good sale, the 50% MR rebate won't help but keep MR as a potential transfer to Flying Blue.

2. My first thought is United going and AA back. Here is a link with stopover UA info:
http://onemileatatime.boardingarea.com/2016/10/31/united-stopover-rules/

3. I'd book as two one way sets to avoid risk of losing availability when trying for 2 RT.

4. Consider a short paid positioning flight if it enables long award availability.

5. I also use expert flyer to keep checking for award availability. They check more often than I do manualy.

6. With awards, I book the best that is available that I'm "willing" to take and try to change if something better opens later.

7. Best airline/alliance will depend on where you are flying from and to so hard to say in general.

8. Availability is usually better with an airlines own metal if using their points.

Hope this helps.
 
MickiSue

MickiSue

Level 2 Member
If it helps, here's what I'm planning to do this summer. Two AA F seats to ATH. Use either TYP or MR for seats from Athens to VCE, then DL J seats either from VCE or MXP back to MSP.

With AA there are a couple of ways to get there, I can use the TYP or MR on a regional airline like Aegean, and while VCE would be easier, as it's close to Daughter's home, it's only a couple hour train ride to MXP, and there are hotels there that will work for an overnight stay.

Looking at VCE, I can go backwards with KLM and or Air France, and see what they have available with miles. Alitalia would be the last choice as their service is pretty sucky.

I don't have a lot of UA miles, so flying through Germany isn't a real possibility, unless I use the TYP or MR for that, as well.
 
smittytabb

smittytabb

Moderator
Staff member
If AA is your main miles currency, I would look for award availability on other One World European airlines such as Iberia, Air Berlin and Finnair in addition to AA. BA adds surcharges and is not as good a value generally. If you are willing to fly over the pond to other cities besides Paris and fly there from that city, you can use Skyscanner.com to look up budget airline flights which you cannot find on other search engines. You could pay for those with Arrival if you have it.

For the future, I recommend collecting a variety of flexible points (UR, MR, Citi TY, Starwood) to give you more options.

Star Alliance is great for Europe and having other points means you have some more choices. You can transfer URs to United, but not just to any Star Alliance partner.

I have really never done much with SkyTeam in Europe, but I am sure there are others here who might have. Since you want to go to Paris, you might take a look at Korean Airways chart. You can transfer them directly from UR to Korean. Since they are SkyTeam and partners with AirFrance it might be a possibility. I have only used Korean for flights on Korean Airways, but it is always good to explore a lot of options just to learn what is out there.
 
R

Robert Turek

Level 2 Member
Linda marshall said:
I am a great researcher and I learn quickly, at least once I know where to begin. I'm currently stuck in my efforts to figure out booking award travel for a trip to Europe with my daughter this summer. I'm particularly confused about the reason for checking out alliance partners--here is the question: is it simply to find more availability, or is it actually possible to save miles? If I want to fly business class from US to Paris, London, or frankly any other western european city (we have very flexible travel plans at this point), am I pretty much locked into the 57,5K mile rate chart provided by AA or is it possible that by researching alliance partnerships, I may be able to fly to Europe for fewer miles?

Another question- I have an Amex Business Plat card, which I understand offers a 50% reimbursement of travel miles if I buy business class on my preferred airline. If I don't have enough points for both of our tickets (currently I have about 120K), how can I use that benefit to my advantage (2 one way tickets? or find the same ticket for my daughter using another source?)

I have plenty Chase UR miles which I could transfer to United (or a SA partner), are the United open jaw tickets still an option if we wanted to travel from US to Paris (layover) to our final destination (wherever that would be in western europe)? Seems like I read somewhere that those were not as available as they once were . . .

Finally, is there a basic resource available to help me make sense of all of this? Has anyone written the definitive guide to booking award travel?

Again, I recognize the value of time and money and it probably would make the most sense for me to enlist the help of a professional award booking service, but then I would miss out on the learning part, which is not only good for my brain, but also the part that makes travel feel rewarding (having put in the work to put it all together).
I am grateful for any thoughts or suggestions to get me going on this- I'm not asking for specific results (i.e. what is the best option?) rather, where should I begin looking to FIND the best options myself!

Thanks!
Click to expand...
JMHO- Wait for a sale and be ready to jump on it. I have traveled on a similar itinerary each of the last three summers with several family members and each time it was on a award sale. If I recall correctly, 2x the sale occurred in late Jan/early Feb. No guarantees of course.
 
SJCRussell

SJCRussell

Level 2 Member
Something to watch out for if you end up on BA (and probably any of the AIG partners, like AirBerlin etc.): Since last November they will not check through baggage on connecting flights if booked with separate reservations, even if all legs are on BA metal and BA tickets. Their terminals have been setup so even if the agent is willing they can't do it for you. This forces you to clear immigration (at 1st entry point), baggage, re-check in and security.
 
Linda marshall

Linda marshall

Level 2 Member
Thank you all for your help. I did make some sense of things using AwardNexus and ExpertFlyer and I was thrilled to find 2 business seats flying from LAX to Madrid on Iberia!! I patched together segments to get us from PDX to LAX and from MAD to FCO. However, when I called the AA agent, I was told that the LAX to MAD seats weren't available. NOTHING was available as far as she could see from any of several US cities to several Europe destinations! I explained that the IB flight showed up on AwardNexus AND expertflyer, but she said they must be wrong. I hung up and checked the British Airways site- sure enough- seats show as available. I called back AA again, this time a supervisor happened to be who answered the call, but as before, the flights don't show up on their end (?). I even asked about several other trans-atlantic flights I had seen on AwardNexus, but according to the agent, none were available. Is this an AA agent issue or are the seats really not available? And if that is the case, What is the benefit of using, let alone paying, for ExpertFlyer or AwardNexus if the information isn't accurate? Any suggestions?
 
SJCRussell

SJCRussell

Level 2 Member
It is possible that it is the type of award visibility. Usually partners can see saver awards but not standard awards.
 
Linda marshall

Linda marshall

Level 2 Member
Hmmmm.... not sure. I do want saver awards so I'm pretty sure that is what I was looking at. Looked again and yes- was saver award.
 
B

BuddyFunJet

Level 2 Member
Linda marshall said:
Hmmmm.... not sure. I do want saver awards so I'm pretty sure that is what I was looking at. Looked again and yes- was saver award.
Click to expand...
It's pretty common for a saver award to be available to members of that carrier's program but not to partners.

If the tools show availability, think of it as a maybe for partners. If not available, see if there is a way to use the carrier's own currency via point transfers or something.
 
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