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Guesses please on whether you think this fare may go back down


Zoey
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I had found a 54,000 Delta Skymiles, comfort plus, one-way ticket from home to Barcelona on November 3rd for a transatlantic from there to Miami. I guess I got some bad advice and was told by a couple of people that 50,000 seemed too high so I've been watching for it to go lower. Well, in just over a week the same fare has jumped to an astounding 115,000 plus for the same route on the same day. I had to quadruple check, thinking that just couldn't be right....but it is, unfortunately.

 

I've never purchased a one-way ticket to Europe before so don't know if this is normal.

 

Anybody with more experience....can you give me your best guess whether you think that fare will go down significantly anytime soon? I do fly a moderate amount so I'm aware it's a crapshoot - just asking for educated guesses.

 

My concern is I'm coming up soon on my cruise final payment date. I'd like to cancel the cruise and look for something else if I can't get a better deal on a fare.

 

Thanks in advance!

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...Anybody with more experience....can you give me your best guess whether you think that fare will go down significantly anytime soon? ....

When you mention the "fare will go down" are you referring to the number of miles needed, or have you also been looking at cash fares? If you mean number of Skymiles (aka Skypesos) my guess is that the number will not come down. For cash fares, the price may come down over the summer, or not.

 

Does your cruise line offer any discount air fares? Princess and the RCL family of cruise lines have such programs. Currently, o/w fares from Miami to BCN are ~$300 for a specific Celebrity cruise. Personally, I would rather pay that than cash-in 115,000 miles.

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Frequent Delta flyer here.....

54,000 for a Comfort Plus seat is not horrific. I'd squak if it were for a main cabin seat.

Frequent flyer points have been going up over the last year or so.I don't think you'd find any reduction before your final payment is due.

Also I don't think you would find a Comfort Plus seat for $300 either.

Good luck and I hope you do have a few extra days to enjoy Barcelona.

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Get the phone app, Hopper (you can research what it does on hopper.com), put your flight date in, your destination from and to. It uses algorithms using past demands and future projections to inform you whether a flight is likely to go up or down.

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There are some 64K comfort plus into Madrid around your dates. Or you could do 50K for economy into MAD and pay to upgrade...DL usually gives this choice. Train from Madrid to Barcelona is fast and not too expensive if you think of it as adding Madrid as an "excursion".

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Thanks! And great suggestions everyone.

One more question, please. Do the prices of Choice Air tickets fluctuate as the departure date gets closer? I was thinking.....maybe I can go ahead and make final payment in a couple of weeks on my November cruise and continue to watch Delta so I can use FF miles, but watch the price on Choice Air at the same time, and if Delta doesn't come down, as most of you predict, use CA. However, if prices on Choice Air are widely known to go crazy high, that may not be the right answer.

I also kind of like the idea of flying into Madrid, early morning, seeing just a bit of the city, then taking a train to Barcelona, as Buggins suggested.

Really folks - normally I'm not a big worrier about spending a little money for mu rare vacations. However, I travel solo, and booked a premium cruise for my first Transatlantic, and probably my only one, instead of say a Celebrity or HAL, so I already paid about a 175% supplement for just for my cabin. I wouldn't have done that if I thought I wouldn't be able to use a reasonable amount of FF miles for a one-way ticket.

Thanks again!

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Choice Air changes on a DAILY basis and often during the day. It is a crap shoot.

And sometimes, what customer service has as the price is different from the posted

price. (Ours was lower through making the phone call).

We recently and finally booked air for our October cruise and I have been watching the prices

since last Fall. We did pretty well and I think the prices are increasing again.

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Thanks! And great suggestions everyone.

One more question, please. Do the prices of Choice Air tickets fluctuate as the departure date gets closer? I was thinking.....maybe I can go ahead and make final payment in a couple of weeks on my November cruise and continue to watch Delta so I can use FF miles, but watch the price on Choice Air at the same time, and if Delta doesn't come down, as most of you predict, use CA. However, if prices on Choice Air are widely known to go crazy high, that may not be the right answer.

I also kind of like the idea of flying into Madrid, early morning, seeing just a bit of the city, then taking a train to Barcelona, as Buggins suggested.

Really folks - normally I'm not a big worrier about spending a little money for mu rare vacations. However, I travel solo, and booked a premium cruise for my first Transatlantic, and probably my only one, instead of say a Celebrity or HAL, so I already paid about a 175% supplement for just for my cabin. I wouldn't have done that if I thought I wouldn't be able to use a reasonable amount of FF miles for a one-way ticket.

Thanks again!

 

Well those MAD fares are now gone. DL changes constantly so keep checking.

 

Do you have any AA miles? Those can be used on Iberia and there seems to be some under 25K flight availability. Any Starwood miles that can be sent to AA? If you are short you can always buy AA miles at pretty decent prices for one way fares.

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Well those MAD fares are now gone. DL changes constantly so keep checking.

 

Do you have any AA miles? Those can be used on Iberia and there seems to be some under 25K flight availability. Any Starwood miles that can be sent to AA? If you are short you can always buy AA miles at pretty decent prices for one way fares.

 

 

I do have some AA miles through Citibank, but nowhere close to what I have with Delta. More than 25,000 though. I'll look into AA also. Is that Iberian flight into Barcelona or Madrid? Thanks.

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I do have some AA miles through Citibank, but nowhere close to what I have with Delta. More than 25,000 though. I'll look into AA also. Is that Iberian flight into Barcelona or Madrid? Thanks.

 

 

BCN, with a connection in MAD...November 1, 2 and 3rd are at 22,500 from MIA. It's economy, but the last time I used FF on AA they also gave the option to pay for an upgrade to comfort, on their website at seat selection. Since this is an Iberia flight I don't know if that option will be given.

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Thanks for all the replies and suggestions. An update on what I've ended up doing for anyone interested.

90% of my FF miles are with Delta but I have some with American. I actually found an Economy-Extra, one-way ticket from New York to Barcelona, on my preferred travel date for 22,000 miles. So I booked that with AA miles.

I've looked at the Delta FF mileage requirements between home and NY, then between Miami (where I get off the transatlantic) home, and will book both of those one-way flights separately and still retain about 75% of my Delta miles at the end.

The only negative I can think of is having to collect my suitcase from my Delta flight in New York, exit the terminal, and go back through security again for my American flight out. Yuck! At least I have about six hours between my arrival and departure flights...that is, if everything goes as it's supposed to.

 

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Thanks for all the replies and suggestions. An update on what I've ended up doing for anyone interested.

90% of my FF miles are with Delta but I have some with American. I actually found an Economy-Extra, one-way ticket from New York to Barcelona, on my preferred travel date for 22,000 miles. So I booked that with AA miles.

I've looked at the Delta FF mileage requirements between home and NY, then between Miami (where I get off the transatlantic) home, and will book both of those one-way flights separately and still retain about 75% of my Delta miles at the end.

The only negative I can think of is having to collect my suitcase from my Delta flight in New York, exit the terminal, and go back through security again for my American flight out. Yuck! At least I have about six hours between my arrival and departure flights...that is, if everything goes as it's supposed to.

 

Don't know if this suggestion will be helpful but will you have to pay a check luggage fee to each airline? If you do, then you may want to use one of the following: Luggage Forward; Luggage Free; Luggage Concierge to get your checked bag directly to your ship.



Ramona



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Thanks for all the replies and suggestions. An update on what I've ended up doing for anyone interested.

90% of my FF miles are with Delta but I have some with American. I actually found an Economy-Extra, one-way ticket from New York to Barcelona, on my preferred travel date for 22,000 miles. So I booked that with AA miles.

I've looked at the Delta FF mileage requirements between home and NY, then between Miami (where I get off the transatlantic) home, and will book both of those one-way flights separately and still retain about 75% of my Delta miles at the end.

The only negative I can think of is having to collect my suitcase from my Delta flight in New York, exit the terminal, and go back through security again for my American flight out. Yuck! At least I have about six hours between my arrival and departure flights...that is, if everything goes as it's supposed to.

 

 

 

Happy to hear you found a solution.

 

If you haven’t booked your FF on DL, do compare with an outright purchase each way. It might not be the best use of those miles ( although good skypesos flights can be difficult to find). In fact, an AA purchased flight to NYC might protect you a bit more on the unconnected tickets.

 

AA does have some great off peak redemption rates to Europe. I think I might have to start working on filling that bucket (AA miles) again, I love Andalusia in November.

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Happy to hear you found a solution.

 

If you haven’t booked your FF on DL, do compare with an outright purchase each way. It might not be the best use of those miles ( although good skypesos flights can be difficult to find). In fact, an AA purchased flight to NYC might protect you a bit more on the unconnected tickets.

 

AA does have some great off peak redemption rates to Europe. I think I might have to start working on filling that bucket (AA miles) again, I love Andalusia in November.

 

 

You're right about AA having reasonable off peak prices. I don't know if flatout cash tickets are as good a deal as the miles tickets - I didn't look. I was surprised that my ticket was tens of thousands of miles less on AA than Delta, which were around 95,000 for one-way - although the Delta flight was from home and the AA is from NY. Either way, I didn't have enough with AA to go from my home base. I'll check out what a cash ticket to NY on AA from home would cost - thanks for the tip.

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Thanks for all the replies and suggestions. An update on what I've ended up doing for anyone interested.

90% of my FF miles are with Delta but I have some with American. I actually found an Economy-Extra, one-way ticket from New York to Barcelona, on my preferred travel date for 22,000 miles. So I booked that with AA miles.

I've looked at the Delta FF mileage requirements between home and NY, then between Miami (where I get off the transatlantic) home, and will book both of those one-way flights separately and still retain about 75% of my Delta miles at the end.

The only negative I can think of is having to collect my suitcase from my Delta flight in New York, exit the terminal, and go back through security again for my American flight out. Yuck! At least I have about six hours between my arrival and departure flights...that is, if everything goes as it's supposed to.

The AA award mileage should be good from anywhere in the contiguous US to anywhere in Europe, so have you checked from your home airport to BCN via NYC? Where's home?

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We had the same experience in obtaining a one way from Toronto to Istantbul. We were going several days early.

 

As a last resort we shopped on a 'cheapo' consolidator site. As luck would have it we scored a two seats on a BA flight through LHR priced at exactly one half of what the return air fare would be. And on the dates and times that were our preference.

 

You might want to look at some consolidator fares. Quite often this is what you get when buying cruise air tickets.

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