We have a section in the forum called ‘Award Booking Help. Burn Here‘ started by KennyBSAT, One trend I notice in such award booking threads is that people have a ton of trouble booking “family sized” awards. A single seat is easy to snag, but 4, or sometimes 5 tickets are needed for a family trip. All that hard work to generate the miles; well OK maybe they just got 2 Citi Executive cards each, but let’s pretend they sweated for the points…. The problem people face, especially families, is competition for space. There simply aren’t enough seats available for a large block, and fighting over them at holiday periods is especially difficult. I’d be willing to say that it is very hard, if not impossible to snag 5 award seats on the same plane at a busy time without a lot of luck. So what is the solution?
Well, it is a puzzle, and you need to think about it like one. You might remember a certain math puzzle called The River Crossing, variants of it have been around since Alcuin first created the concept with a Wolf, Goat and a Cabbage…
Alcuin of York (c. 735 – 19 May 804)
We don’t have an accurate picture to hand, but based on research and artist impressions that I acquired, I believe this to be a reasonably accurate depiction. Alcuin was a student of the Arch Bishop of York, and later invited to court by Charlemagne. For the scholars among you, here is an interesting collation of his letters, compiled by Mr Rolph B Page.
Here is the original puzzle
You need to ferry a Wolf, a Goat and a Cabbage across the river, but if you should leave:
- The Wolf alone with the Goat he will eat it.
- The Goat alone with the Cabbage he will eat it.
- And you can only ferry over one at a time…
You can play the game here, though you might need a high end graphics card to render the super graphics
How does this fit into award travel?
Well, firstly, you need to start solving puzzles, and enjoy them, if you want to book awards like this. But to give a few pointers where I see the correlation I would suggest you consider exploring the notion of PNRs more closely. The post Splitting PNRs here explores the impact of this on drip fed Business Class inventory. What happens in this situation is that if one seat opens in Business Class and you are two people in Coach you cannot swap just one into Business, you have to wait for two seats to open.
A puzzle again… so, by having two separate PNRs you can both be on the same flight, in the same coach seats, but if just one opens up in Business then you can snag it, then when the other opens up, you snag that one too. Meanwhile the poor chump who didn’t split PNR is constantly waiting for both to open up, but they never do, because folk like you are taking them one by one for a larger party. For a family example I go into this in more depth for reader Nicole when she struggled to find seats for 4. Check out the post here: Am I right for this game?
The variation of the Goat/Wolf/Cabbage Game
Apparently, Goats, Wolves and Cabbages aren’t cool – so a variant of the game was made with a family, Mom, Dad, Boy, Girl. The rules here are:
The boat can only carry one adult, or two children at any time.
Making sense yet? I get it, its a little whacky… but perhaps the next variation will help, a family, plus a police officer and a thief:
The ferry can carry no more than 2 people.
Only the Adults (mom, dad and policeman) can operate the ferry.
Dad can not be in the presence of the girls w/out Mom
Mom can not be in the presence of the boys w/out Dad
The thief can not be alone with any of the family w/out the policeman.
Can you figure it out?
OK – how about this last one:
The aircraft offers no more than 2 seats at a time
The airline allows you to change route for no fee
The children cannot fly alone
Solve.
Here’s the answer to your family, policeman and thief puzzle.
M=Mom, D = Dad, d = Daughter, s = Son, P = Policeman, T = Thief, B = Boat
M,d,D,s,P,T (B) – None
M,d,P,T – D,s (B)
M,d,P,T,D (B) – s
d,P,T – M,D,s (B)
M,d,P,T (B) – D,s
M,d – D,s,P,T (B)
M,d,D (B) – s,P,T
d – s,P,T,M,D (B)
M,d (B) – s,P,T,D
None – M,d,D,s,P,T (B)
For the award travel scenarios, usually we have the following constraints :
– Entire family has to travel on the same flight.
– Time of departure is usually not flexible.
– Age of children. You can’t split family onto different flights if kids are below 5 yrs.
Low probability of multiple PNRs working in these circumstances.
You win top marks for the first puzzle, but I think you lose a few for the second… I get what you are saying but can’t we now make it DMsd >> (Ds) (Md) when we see two seats or.. can we go even further into potentially selfish territory and book (Dsd) (Msd) when there are 3 showing? The latter either being a free refund for Elites, or a ‘penalty’ (premium for the booking) to reload the points?
Of course there might be a ‘worst case’ where Ds arrive a couple of hours before Md – but if that gets you to a place you want to be, then is that something worth attempting?
Matt, your suggestions are right, smart and definitely the way to handle those. However, the sad part is most family that we are booking for would kick the solution for “worst case” out of the window in a heartbeat, because “family”.
Just saying.
Not to get all technical but…why would I want to leave my child with a thief?
Anyway, I feel like when kids are older splitting the family is a great idea. You could even market it as daddy/daughter father/son mother/daughter or whatever time. I think the challenge is the age, and the reality is a lot of families don’t want to split up. Not sure if I could even convince my wife to do it.
BUT, if you can do it, and you split PNRs, or even break flights down into one-ways on certain carriers, it opens up a world of possibilities like you are saying. Just gotta get myself some elite status (and older kids) to pull it off!