using FF miles to Europe

[Hawaiidan]

This is a heads up on at least UAL ff miles. This is coming from a guy who has always been able to snag award saver business and first class tickets to anywhere... This summer and Fall something changed and the availability of any business /first seat to Europe is just about non-existent.

 

I say this if you are planning to use your miles for discount points you had betterhave a plan B and C and D and E because its that tight Seats when open are lasting less than 3 hours and you have to be a mid-night marauder days upon days in a row to get a shot.

All this changed about 60 days ago about the time UAL got a new CEO... who knows why or how but things changed big time. It now looks that UAL will be releasing the discount seats not at 330 days as before, but 7 to 14 days before the flight when they know what flights are undersold..

 

Good luck to all... but this year its a battle...be prepared like never before

[Paulchili]

This is a heads up on at least UAL ff miles. This is coming from a guy who has always been able to snag award saver business and first class tickets to anywhere... This summer and Fall something changed and the availability of any business /first seat to Europe is just about non-existent.

 

I say this if you are planning to use your miles for discount points you had betterhave a plan B and C and D and E because its that tight Seats when open are lasting less than 3 hours and you have to be a mid-night marauder days upon days in a row to get a shot.

All this changed about 60 days ago about the time UAL got a new CEO... who knows why or how but things changed big time. It now looks that UAL will be releasing the discount seats not at 330 days as before, but 7 to 14 days before the flight when they know what flights are undersold..

 

Good luck to all... but this year its a battle...be prepared like never before

 

I have noticed this as well.

That is why I collect UA & AA miles to be more flexible.

Forget DL's Sky Pesos :D

[rallydave]

This is a heads up on at least UAL ff miles. This is coming from a guy who has always been able to snag award saver business and first class tickets to anywhere... This summer and Fall something changed and the availability of any business /first seat to Europe is just about non-existent.

 

I say this if you are planning to use your miles for discount points you had betterhave a plan B and C and D and E because its that tight Seats when open are lasting less than 3 hours and you have to be a mid-night marauder days upon days in a row to get a shot.

All this changed about 60 days ago about the time UAL got a new CEO... who knows why or how but things changed big time. It now looks that UAL will be releasing the discount seats not at 330 days as before, but 7 to 14 days before the flight when they know what flights are undersold..

 

Good luck to all... but this year its a battle...be prepared like never before

 

I can second Dan't comment based on recent experience, last week where was trying to get return business saver seats on United or Delta from Amsterdam. Delta was looking bleak and would not be available if at all until Oct. 1 so on Sept 27, almost a week before seats would normally be available at the 330 day mark, took another look at United and were about 2 weeks earlier, there weren't any Saver Business seats from Amsterdam to Houston for the entire months of July or August and found the week including the day, a Saturday were all available for Business saver seats.

 

Now, there were no seats non-stop from Amsterdam but, there were seats connecting in Frankfort with Business on Lufthansa as well. Booked them as soon as I saw that easy connection. There were a few other connections thru the Eastern US but, absolutely no First Class seats on any of the connections and that has been normally available, especially when the seats open.

 

Strangely I could not reserve my seats on the United flight so I contacted Customer service and the lady could not understand that either so she checked and found that seats could not be reserved until the usual 330 day mark. She further commented that she was amazed that I had snagged 2 saver business seats from Europe to the US and even more amazed that I got them on a Saturday as those are as scarce as Hen's teeth. Seats did remain available for a couple of days and I even got shipmates to book seats on our same United flight so at least 4 seats were available and I believe more since the availability was there for a few more days.

 

Conclusion is to check more than 330 days prior to your flight and you might get lucky with United. You do have to be flexible in connecting and IMHO better to fly Business to your connection and then Business home rather than mixed seats which seem to be having more availability than Business thru to destination.

[newlondon]

This is an interesting post because I had absolutely no trouble using AA miles BOS/LHR 1st class next August. Although I couldn't get on my 1st choice flight the other 2 were available. Same was true returning.

[wripro]

BOS/LHR seems to be an easier route to redeem AA miles. Trouble is that by flying through LHR you are paying horrendous taxes and fees.

[PaulMCO]

Have to agree with Dan that it is much harder to book a saver international award at 330 days.

 

It took me 7 days of searching (at 330 days) to book MCO to HKG in UA First. There was no saver business available and had to settle with a routing via PEK. This is OK will use this as Plan B and book something last minute direct if something opens. As 1K there is no fee for redeposit of miles.

 

On our return from IST to MCO -- zero savers. Forced to use my Virgin Points for the Upper Class flight from the UK and booked using $$$ IST to Gatwick.

 

Of note -- you can get waitlisted for a saver business. You just must book a saver economy and you can then be waitlisted for business.

 

 

Strangely I could not reserve my seats on the United flight so I contacted Customer service and the lady could not understand that either so she checked and found that seats could not be reserved until the usual 330 day mark.

 

Dave that is normal. You can book the flight when they first open up. But seats cannot be booked. It takes around 10 days for them to load the seat maps for some strange reason.

Edited October 7, 2015 by PaulMCO

[rallydave]

While 330 days used to be the norm for United and remains the 330 for seat assignment very recent (last week) searches indicate it is now about 340 days for ticketing and seats were all gone at 330. May be an abberation but that's what I saw and booked last week

 

Thanks for the seats info Paul. Not a big deal as we have the only assigned seats so far with all saver business seats sold

Edited October 7, 2015 by rallydave

[coldweathergirl]

For anyone that is using Aeroplan, they have recently announced that January 1st it will cost a lot more miles to fly business to most destinations and unless you're fortunate enough to get on an airline that has little to no surcharge you're paying almost the equivalent of an economy ticket for the free seat.

[nyfeds]

I have experienced the very same issues and frustrations when looking to book saver award tickets with AA and/or UA, where we have the majority of our miles. It has gotten worse over the years. One must be very diligent in returning very frequently to the sites and snag award tickets - even with more complicated routings - when you see award space offered. If you find better flights down the road, you can always re-book.

 

BA not only charges outrageous fees, but they also charge if you want to reserve specific seats ahead of time. If you don't pay to reserve specific seats, you have to get your seats assigned 24 hours prior to your flight. A major ripoff!

 

The airlines don't make it easy to use miles. When we do find award tickets available, it's cause for celebration!

Edited October 7, 2015 by nyfeds

[findacruise]

Another situation I just ran into with UA was a downgrade after I had booked due to a change in plane. Had been fortunate enough to get saver fare in Global First from Singapore to Honolulu via Tokyo. Got an email saying the flight from Tokyo is now a 2 class plane and mileage credit for the difference will be re-credited after the flight. At least they are giving us 10,000 extra miles for the inconvenience.

 

Just put down a deposit for 2017 Sydney to Sydney on Sirena and planning to try to use mileage and take air credit. Guess I'll have to be very diligent next year and jump on it at the 340 mark. Of course, by then, things will probably have changed again!:eek: and maybe again.....

[Hawaiidan]

Amigos....In all my years...even as 1K Iwasnever ever able to get access to any flight more than 330 actualy 329 days out............I don't know how you could do it when they don't even post the seats and flights And as MCOPaul said you cant even get the seats of 330/329 day flights till 320 days out.........

More power to ya Dave...its just you are the first guy I ever heard of that was successful at booking over the limit !

J just got my tickets from LAX to Malta... by getting a LAX /FRA Business/first for57 K and then getting a separate FRA/Malta ticket Business for 30K

It beats all to heck 150,000 or $8570pp revenue

 

I still horde about 900K UA miles for a rainy day.... don't want to spend needlessly

[ronrick1943]

I use United, not a problem. Do you put in your FF number---after I do that I can find what I need in the SS section. I'm a lifetime Premier Platinum (2million Miler, all most 3 million, but being retried we don't pay yet-just using the build up of miles I have) on United.

 

Rick

[rallydave]

Dan,

 

For full disclosure my flight will be on Aug. 27, 2016. I booked the flight on the evening of 9/28/2015 and got my seats on 10/1/2016. Putting the dates into excel shows 334 days prior to the flight for booking and 331 days prior for the seats.

 

I'm thinking the fact that 2016 is a leap year might have a bit to do with this. As to status, being retired I have no status on United (I do have the Chase Explorer Card which does give me the same visibility if I am logged in) and don't remember if I was logged in on the 28th when I booked but, do remember going in on the 29th without being logged in and the flights were still showing at that time as available. I do not know when the flight on the 27th actually was available as I hadn't looked earlier because I was waiting until Oct. 2 which would have been 330 days.

 

I'm as amazed as you are Dan first that the flight was available to book early and also that it was available on a Saturday in the summer as well. I'm simply guessing that the flight might have been available earlier but, for sure 334 days out it was there. Suggesting 340 days only so that people start looking daily so as to not miss their flights being available. Interestingly Lufthansa made intra Europe flights available for booking but, no non-stops to the US have been released to UAL.

[Gardyloo]

There seems to be a persistent notion, particularly on Cruise Critic, that getting mileage seats requires one to watch the clock and at precisely 331 (or 334, or 330, or 360) days, pounce on the seats because they'll vanish before dawn, or something like that.

 

But that's not how it works. The airlines, like any business, don't want to give away something that might be worth a whole lot more later.

 

I just went on United's website and looked for award seats in business class to Europe for next August, out at the extreme of UA's current booking period. Very few seats at "saver" rates.

 

Look for next week, gobs. April or May, still a bunch. Even June. And trust me, if you look for seats in June for flights leaving in June or July, you'll see even more. Why? Because by then the airlines' computers will have told them that those seats aren't going to sell for $4K apiece, so might as well fill them with mileage pax, and get those miles off the balance sheet.

 

Airlines release seats into award inventory on the same basis that they adjust fares throughout the life of the booking period. The yield/revenue management systems constantly monitor sales, competition, and dozens of other factors, and when certain parameters are met, they'll throw a seat or two into the redemption buckets. Those get taken, then the computers re-evaluate and release more, or not, depending on all the other factors.

 

Here are a couple of articles to read if interested.

 

http://milecards.com/10070/the-business-of-your-miles-a-revenue-management-perspective/

http://www.airfarewatchdog.com/blog/17695985/confessions-of-an-airline-revenue-manager/

 

Bottom line, early birds might get worms, might get cats. But award seats are made available from Day 331 up until an hour before it's wheels up. You have to be persistent, flexible, patient. If you can't be those things - and many travelers can't - then suck it up and pull out the credit card.

[Hawaiidan]

Total agree why release seats a year out when you have a year to sellthem for $$$ Then when and if you get close to the actual flight date , and you still have a big inventory... then put them out when they wont be excluding paying passengers!!!

My measly 57,000miles just got me a $8000.00 seat that cost me less than $4000 to accrue .... not a bad deal .

[CruiserBruce]

Had no problem getting Saver Award on UA SFO-FRA 320 days out, for next August, in Business. However, unable to get Saver Business back from LHR.

Edited October 7, 2015 by CruiserBruce

[Twickenham]

For anyone that is using Aeroplan, they have recently announced that January 1st it will cost a lot more miles to fly business to most destinations and unless you're fortunate enough to get on an airline that has little to no surcharge you're paying almost the equivalent of an economy ticket for the free seat.

 

Just to clarify, the changes at Aeroplan will go in effect December 15th. However, you can still book for travel beyond that date up until then at the old rates.

 

Fortunately, I have already booked our business class AE awards for next year. I agree with the OP that UA saver awards are incredibly scarce for Europe next year... so I feel fortunate that we managed to snag 2 biz tickets on the DUB-EWR flight for the date I wanted (Aug. 16). Going via IST on Turkish Airlines, which means the taxes are $165.10 each.

[ptrpanpens]

Several months ago was able to get UA business class LAX to EZE at the end of December for 55,000 miles with one stop in Houston and on the new Dreamliner. Lucked put on that one. Seats much higher now.

[waterbug123]

Forget DL's Sky Pesos :D

 

Delta FF's routinely bash the decreasing value of Sky Miles, or Sky Pesos as they are sarcastically referred to, but thus far I really have no complaints. As a general rule, we don't use them for ourselves; we prefer to to buy our tickets and earn miles and status/perks in the process. But when family vacation time rolls around and we need to get 5 kids across the country or to Mexico or the Carib, and don't feel like spending a big lump sum of cash on top of a vacation that will already cost a pretty penny for 7 people, the miles have come in handy.

 

There seems to be a persistent notion, particularly on Cruise Critic, that getting mileage seats requires one to watch the clock and at precisely 331 (or 334, or 330, or 360) days, pounce on the seats because they'll vanish before dawn, or something like that......Airlines release seats into award inventory....... throughout the life of the booking period. The yield/revenue management systems constantly monitor sales, competition, and dozens of other factors, and when certain parameters are met, they'll throw a seat or two into the redemption buckets. Those get taken, then the computers re-evaluate and release more, or not, depending on all the other factors.

 

Bottom line, early birds might get worms, might get cats. But award seats are made available from Day 331 up until an hour before it's wheels up.

 

^^^This.

 

Contrary to the general rules I mentioned above, we did decide to use miles for a trip to Africa next summer. With 20-ish total hours flying time, we wanted to fly first/biz, but didn't want to spend $20k (approx. total for 2 people, round trip) so saved our Sky Miles.

 

We started looking at the 331 day mark in Aug for one way tix going over next July. It took a couple of days of seeing nothing viable, but then we found some for 165k miles each. We booked them, but we kept watching, hoping for a better deal. Sure enough, a few days later tickets with a better routing showed up for just 70k apiece so we switched them immediately (thanks to status, we were able to redeposit the miles and re-book with no redeposit fee or change fee). I don't know what Delta's "saver" rate would be because they have removed the reward chart from the website, but I think 70k miles to fly First/Biz from Ft. Lauderdale to JFK to AMS to Kigali, Rwanda is a heck of a deal, and our experience shows that tickets can come and go in inventory from one day to the next.

 

For the record, we have currently booked the return in all biz/first for 145k miles each, with a slightly more cumbersome routing. So again- we will keep watching, optimistic that at some point between now and then, a better routing and/or lower redemption rate may well open up.

[6rugrats]

This is a heads up on at least UAL ff miles. This is coming from a guy who has always been able to snag award saver business and first class tickets to anywhere... This summer and Fall something changed and the availability of any business /first seat to Europe is just about non-existent.

 

I say this if you are planning to use your miles for discount points you had betterhave a plan B and C and D and E because its that tight Seats when open are lasting less than 3 hours and you have to be a mid-night marauder days upon days in a row to get a shot.

All this changed about 60 days ago about the time UAL got a new CEO... who knows why or how but things changed big time. It now looks that UAL will be releasing the discount seats not at 330 days as before, but 7 to 14 days before the flight when they know what flights are undersold..

 

Good luck to all... but this year its a battle...be prepared like never before

It's been pretty difficult finding saver award seats in business class to Europe far in advance for several years now, even if you have fairly high status. Nothing changed in the last 60 days. Seats could be released at any time before the flight.

 

I often track US-Europe, and note many times, availability for these seats really opens up about a week or two before the flight.

Edited October 8, 2015 by 6rugrats

[6rugrats]

Several months ago was able to get UA business class LAX to EZE at the end of December for 55,000 miles with one stop in Houston and on the new Dreamliner. Lucked put on that one. Seats much higher now.

I can't tell you how many flights I've had booked on the Dreamliner with UA. Every one of them had an equipment swap (one to a 757) before the flight. Was offered an upgrade for a great price on that and was glad I didn't take it. Good luck!

Edited October 8, 2015 by 6rugrats

[CruiserBruce]

Several months ago was able to get UA business class LAX to EZE at the end of December for 55,000 miles with one stop in Houston and on the new Dreamliner. Lucked put on that one. Seats much higher now.

 

You might note the OP was referring to Europe- Saver Awards are generally most difficult to get going to Europe. Other UA International destinations are usually easier. We had no problem getting Saver Awards for Business/First, two class plane, SFO-IAH-LIM last November.

[plane2port]

Occasionally I will fly in business to Europe if I find a good deal points wise. For example last spring, for some inexplicable reason American Airlines opened up availability on their partners in business class to Europe. We were able to get two business class seats on USAirways from Charlotte to Athens for 50k AA miles each. Didn't have enough AA miles for business class on the return, so flew Lufthansa using 30k United miles in coach per person.

 

We're flying round trip Atlanta--Venice in November for a Med cruise, using 60k Delta Skymiles per person round trip in economy.

 

Award tickets are readily available if you are willing to settle for the back of the plane! We figure we can put up with some discomfort knowing we'll be relaxing in our cabin before long.

[PaulMCO]

You might note the OP was referring to Europe- Saver Awards are generally most difficult to get going to Europe. Other UA International destinations are usually easier. We had no problem getting Saver Awards for Business/First, two class plane, SFO-IAH-LIM last November.

 

Also as the OP stated this is a change from past practices as 2 - 3 years ago it was alot easier - especially for flights to EU. This is a result of the Smisek era at UA. UA would rather give a Kettle the chance to purchase an upgrade on a L ticket than upgrade an elite flier with points.

 

Also Smisek introduced the Miles/Co-pay scheme plus increasing the number of miles required to redeem for awards. Just his way of reducing the exposure and accounting charges for the number of outstanding miles.

[6rugrats]

Also as the OP stated this is a change from past practices as 2 - 3 years ago it was alot easier - especially for flights to EU. This is a result of the Smisek era at UA. UA would rather give a Kettle the chance to purchase an upgrade on a L ticket than upgrade an elite flier with points.

 

Also Smisek introduced the Miles/Co-pay scheme plus increasing the number of miles required to redeem for awards. Just his way of reducing the exposure and accounting charges for the number of outstanding miles.

 

I think you are discussing three different things. The first is about upgrading a ticket purchased with cash, to a higher class of service.

 

The second something I don't understand. What is "Miles/Copay"? There was a "Miles & Money", but I haven't seen that for quite some time. You do pay money when you book an award ticket, but this is taxes and fees, and an award ticket has always had that. UA did increase the number of miles needed for some award tickets, especially booking business class awards on other carriers.