Posted by Seth on December 13, 2011 under frequent flyer, News, points | 
Ethiopian Airlines became the third African carrier to join the Star Alliance network this week, growing the alliance to 28 carriers. Of those 28, 16 provide service to Africa, covering 110 airports in 48 countries. The move also integrates Ethiopian into the fare and award products, though some integration on fare products won’t occur until January 2012.
The move also integrates the carrier into frequent flier earning across the alliance. Thus far I’ve seen earing details for Asiana, Continental, United Airlines, Turkish, TAP Air Portugal, Air Canada, Lufthansa‘s Miles & More and Agean Airlines. Those earning rates have been incorporated into the calculators on the Travel Tools site. Generally speaking most of the carriers are providing 100% earning rates for all economy fares and a bonus for business class fares. Full details about the rates can be found on the Travel Tools Update here.
Tags: Africa, Agean, Air Canada, Asiana, Continental, Ethiopian Airlines, frequent flier, frequent flyer, Lufthansa, points, Star Alliance, TAP Air Portugal, tools, Turkish Air, United, United Airlines
Posted by Seth on December 9, 2011 under Flying, frequent flyer, points |
Honestly, these changes have been a long time coming. Turkish Air changed their fare classes a while ago, adding in their "Comfort Class" premium economy product and pulling out their first class cabin. Many of their partners were quick to update the earning charts; Continental and United Airlines weren’t. That has finally been resolved as of today.
The new earning rates are mostly downgrades on the Continental side of things. Y and B fares no longer earn 150% EQMs and G fares – one of the most discounted economy class tickets – now earn nothing at all. There are a few other changes, with F, W and Z fares also no longer earning but I believe those fares are also no longer published so less of an issue.
The Comfort Class fares will only earn at 100% (US Airways and Air Canada both have an earning premium assigned to those fares) which is unfortunate. That said, the change does at least add all three of the Comfort Class fares to the list; previously one was absent.
On the United side of the coin the earning rules are similar, with one additional downgrade. Elite members will no longer earn the 500 mile minimum credit on flights operated by Turkish. Not a huge deal, as most TK-operated flights are longer than that, but still a minor downgrade.
Also of note is that with both programs the V fare class will be deprecated as an earning bucket come January 1, 2012. This is another discount economy fare bucket and losing it will be unfortunate.
Finally, there has been an addition to the earnings tables. Flights marketed by Turkish but operated by AnadoluJet (a regional/express carrier) will be eligible for earning in both programs. The cheapest economy fares (L, Q, T, V) do not earn while non-discount fares (Y, B, M, K, H, S, E) earn at the 100% rate, again with no 500 mile minimums.
All of these earning rate changes have been loaded into the mileage earning calculators on the Wandering Aramean Travel Tools site.
Posted by Seth on September 17, 2011 under Flying, frequent flyer, points |
There are lots of different ways to maximize the value of award redemptions. Some folks look only at the cash value of the ticket were it purchased directly. Others look at the cabin of travel. Or the total distance covered. Or the number of points required.
I’ve used all of those metrics at one point or another, but my most recent redemption doesn’t hit on any of them. The goal of this particular redemption was to maximize the number of cities I could visit on a single one-way redemption. Officially the rules say a one-way award can have only a starting point and an ending point. I’ll be visiting four different cities on my current schedule.
I’m taking full advantage of the fact that a connection on an international itinerary is defined as anything less than 24 hours in the same city. Combine that with the relatively short travel distances in Europe and it turns out that there are a lot of ways to hop scotch across the continent without paying all that much extra. Here’s what my trip looks like:
Flying from Stockholm to Istanbul is a hair under 1400 miles; my routing is 1855. Not all that much longer in total travel distance but I’ll be spreading my travel out over 4 days rather than just a few hours. Stops are currently scheduled in Berlin (20 hours), Ljubljana (22), Skopje (23) and Istanbul (destination). Only one of the hops requires a connection – 30 minutes in Munich. I also get to fly some fun aircraft types and a new (to me) airline, along with new airports and countries. Not too shabby for only 12,500 points plus about $100 in taxes.
Building the award was surprisingly easy. I started by looking at flight timetables and route networks for the various Star Alliance carriers in Europe. The goal was to find mid-day flights that would allow me to get between cities while there was still a bit of daylight but also to be able to wake up each morning at a reasonable hour rather than silly early. Avoiding the early morning flights also makes it easier to actually keep the 23ish hour connections alive as the earlier flights make it harder and harder to stack the flights.
Once I had a framework for the trip I searched out the award inventory directly using ANA‘s website. Every single flight I wanted had award inventory available. With the specific flights in hand I called the reservations line at Continental. I fed the flights to the agent one at a time and when she pressed the magic "go" button it priced correctly automatically. No need to go through manual pricing or anything else for this one; we were both quite surprised at that. But it is booked and confirmed.
Now I just need to get my flight to Stockholm and home from Istanbul booked. But that should be easy, right??
Tags: ANA, award, Berlin, Continental, EuroHopping, frequent flyer, Istanbul, Ljubljana, Lufthansa, Munich, points, Skopje, Star Alliance, Stockholm, Turkish Air
Posted by Seth on December 30, 2009 under Trip Reports |
I should be in the air over the Atlantic Ocean right now, curled up in a First Class suite on Turkish Air. Instead I’m on an Airbus A321 over the Mediterranean on a non-stop flight to Barcelona. Indeed, the trip has taken a much more direct routing and quite substantial turn. In the end, I still get to celebrate New Years in Barcelona with the splendiferous missus and we even get to sleep in a real bed tonight rather than in coach on a Delta 767-300ER. Still, the scene today in Istanbul’s airport can only be described as frustrating and trying, with a bit of misery thrown in as well as a reasonably successful tactical retreat.
Last night, while waiting in Luxor for the departure of the flight to Cairo, I learned that the Istanbul-JFK flight for that day had been delayed pretty badly. Over three hours, in fact. That plane was turning around to come back to Istanbul and then would be used for the flight that we were scheduled to be on. Except at the time I didn’t know that it would be that plane, and there was no one in Luxor I could ask. There wasn’t really anyone to ask in Cairo, either. So I went into the flight to Istanbul hopeful and optimistic, as well as truly exhausted.
As first class passengers we were greeted at the end of the jetway with a sign and a golf cart to whisk us away to the security checkpoint and then the lounge. It took them a while to round up the necessary supplies for us to shower but we managed to get that done and settled in for breakfast. Everything seemed OK.
Failure
And then the bottom fell out. The lounge agent came over to me and handed me the house phone. An agent on the other end of the line was explaining that the flight would be rather delayed and that she had arranged for a day room at the hotel in the terminal for us. Ruh roh. Just how delayed would the flight be? At least 3 hours (it turned into 5 by the time we left the airport). That completely ruined our 3 hour connection in JFK. Time to scramble.
There was a flight to Frankfurt leaving in 40 minutes that would get us to the early Frankfurt-JFK flight by the woman could not (or would not) make the change for us. While I tried desperately to negotiate through the language barrier and explain my predicament the minutes ticked away and the flight was closed. That was our last chance to make it to JFK in time for the Delta outbound flight. Game over.
It is also worth mentioning that at this point my laptop decided it didn’t want to power on and my BlackBerry went into a reboot cycle every 5-10 minutes. Ouch.
Recovery, Part 1
The Delta tickets we had were bottom of the barrel priced sale seats. The change fees for them were more than the actual tickets cost. That money was now gone. Poof. Still, I had a mind to celebrate New Years in Barcelona more than I cared about getting the Istanbul – New York flight in Turkish Air first class (a five day vacation is always worth more than an eleven hour flight) so it was time to start making things happen. The lounge had no phones available for customers and there was no means for me to reasonably call the United States to get in touch with Continental, the carrier that issued our tickets. Things were getting worse, not better.
There was a flight leaving for Barcelona in 45 minutes and the agent was willing to put us on that flight, right up until she realized it was a reward ticket. Then she was quite willing to sell us a walk-up full fare ticket and let us deal with our “travel agency” to handle the flights that were missed. Not gonna work. Still, I managed to revive my laptop and get the Skype client working and continental.com’s reward search inventory up on screen. Even more amazing, I actually found two seats available from Barcelona to New York in business class on the date we were scheduled to go home. A glimmer of hope.
Karla answered the phone for Continental and was incredibly patient with me as I explained my needs and desires over a rather questionable voice quality connection. I was able to feed her the flight numbers and she saw the inventory available. She just wasn’t sure if she could change the flight as I had already started the return trip. She had to call a supervisor and in the mean time the 45 minutes to the Barcelona departure were ticking away with great speed. Karla made the necessary changes, inserting an open jaw into the ticket and leaving the Istanbul – Barcelona segment open for us to fill. She was still working on confirming it but we had to go immediately to catch our flight. I gave her my credit card number without knowing the charges and hung up to hop on the plane to Barcelona that was now 30 minutes away from departure.
No can do. The agent was reasonably polite about the situation but it was quite clear. We weren’t getting on that plane. Rebooking the Continental tickets took a bit too long and that flight was closed for sales, even with 30 minutes remaining. I had made the changes that she agreed to and now I was still stuck in Istanbul.
Recovery, Part 2
At this point we had some time to play with. Continental was already reissuing the return ticket so we just had to find a way to get to Barcelona at a reasonable price. There were a number of options, including overnight connections in Amsterdam, Riga and Athens. All were slightly cheaper than the non-stop afternoon flight to Barcelona. In the end, however, we settled on the non-stop flight. Better to go for a relatively sure thing. Besides, we don’t have winter coats with us so Amsterdam or Latvia would be pretty unpleasant tonight.
We booked the flight through Travelocity because is was half the price that the agent wanted in the lounge. Such transactions are normally completed pretty quickly but after 20 minutes we still only had a reservation, not a ticket. Time to make another call. The Travelocity agent initially just wanted me to wait it out. Only when I explained that the flight was 4 hours away did it get properly escalated. Apparently they were worried about fraud for a last minute, one-way ticket purchased from Istanbul to Barcelona. I can’t say that I really blame them. Another 10 minutes on the phone assuring them that I really was me and that I really was buying walk-up tickets and the ticket was finally issued.
The agent had also previously offered us that hotel room for our wait. I now called that one in, asking that we be able to still use it. She agreed and we soon were laying down for a couple hours’ nap time that was much, much needed. Everything seemed OK at this point. We had our flights to Barcelona and the onward flights from Barcelona to NYC, albeit on a somewhat circuitous routing. And we had a bed for the first time in 30 hours. Not all bad. Except one little thing.
Recovery, Part 3
For some reason, Continental couldn’t actually make the change to our reward ticket. The agents I spoke with (and there were several of them) all insisted that we were still checked in for the Turkish Air flight from Istanbul to JFK. As long as we were on that flight they couldn’t remove it from the itinerary and substitute in the three segments to get us home from Barcelona. Time and time again I approached the agents at the counter and asked them to confirm that we were not checked in anymore on that flight. Each time they said we weren’t but the folks at Continental said we were. My worst nightmare at this point was getting to Barcelona and having Turkish reporting us as a no-show for the flight, canceling out the remaining value of our tickets. The price for Istanbul-Barcelona was bad enough. Shelling out for Barcelona-NYC on top of that probably would have driven me over the edge.
I finally had our Turkish Air “handler” from the morning back at the counter so I called Continental one more time with the plan of having the two of them talk it out so I didn’t have to stay in the middle. By coincidence I managed to get Karla on the phone again.
“Karla with a ‘K’?” I inquired. Yes, she said, somewhat befuddled. “I talked to you earlier with the crazy re-route from Barcelona to New York via Brussels and London; remember me?”
I’d like to think that she has fond memories of me now, if for no other reason than I’m pretty sure I was the most entertaining customer she had today. In reality, I’m just really happy that I didn’t have to explain my story one more time. The minutes were now starting to tick away on the afternoon departure to Barcelona and I had already paid for those tickets and I wasn’t about to lose them, too. Fortunately Karla proactively got another supervisor on the phone while I was talking to the agent at the desk. The supervisor apparently has some magic “refresh” button (Karla’s words, not mine) that made the reservation sync up again and show that we were no longer checked in for the flight.
Finally.
Karla then was able to issue the new ticket, collect the $40 additional in taxes and confirm the new flights for us.
Success
And there we were, six hours after the bottom initially fell out, with our flights rebooked and a new itinerary ready to go. Sure, it cost us some cash and the price actually went up as the rebooking process continued. Still, the overall goal was met. We’re going to celebrate New Years among friends in Barcelona and we’re going to experience some fun times on premium cabin flights along the way. The new return flight gives us about four hours at the Virgin Atlantic Clubhouse in Heathrow along with our Upper Class seats across the pond. I’m sure that we’ll be exhausted on Tuesday when we get back to work but overall the adventure remains mostly alive, even if it means no Turkish Air first class. Based on their ground handling I’m not entirely sure it would be worth it.
Lessons learned from this experience:
- Betting on Turkish Air arriving within 3 hours of on-time for the NYC route is a rather large gamble. I lost.
- Creativity and flexibility can find all sorts of reward seats if desperation sets in.
- Sometimes the adventure costs a bit more than expected, but the stories are generally worth it, especially when the rest of the travels are happening on the very cheap side of the ledger.
- A good agent at the airline can really make things happen. Karla did it for me today and others have in the past. They make this whole game run just a bit more smoothly.
Posted by Seth on December 29, 2009 under Trip Reports |
I sit in the airport in Luxor, Egypt pondering the absolute insanity of the trip I’m beginning. Nothing quite like a 36+ hour adventure to travel from Luxor to Barcelona, Spain. It is just across the Mediterranean. It really isn’t that far. But I’m crossing the Atlantic Ocean twice – three hours apart – to make the trip. Yeah, it is crazy.
versus
Back over the summer Delta offered up a sale for flights to Spain so we bought a couple for the weekend over New Years. Celebrating in Barcelona seemed like a good idea. A few months later, we learned that my wife got a few extra vacation days for the time between Christmas and New Years. Use ‘em or lose ‘em, so we used them. A quick search of various reward inventory showed Egypt as a destination with premium cabin seats available and a destination where the country doesn’t shutdown over the Christmas period. Plus, it is a pretty soft introduction to travel in Africa. We were sold, and the trip was phenomenal.
But we still had to be back in New York City in time for our flight to Spain. No need to spend any extra time there. Three hours should be more than enough for an international to international connection. So we’re off.
We’ve got an 11:10pm flight from Luxor to Cairo followed by a 3:30am flight from Cairo to Istanbul and then a 10:30am flight from Istanbul to New York’s JFK airport. All in premium seats including the first class suites of the Turkish Air 777-300 wet-leased from Jet Airways. That should be quite nice. We follow that up with coach seats on a Delta 767-300ER. Probably one of the worst long-haul products out there today that crosses the Atlantic (likely still better than a Lufthansa 747-400 in the back), but the price was right. And there is plenty of potential fun and crazy along the way. Just the way I like to travel.
Images from Great Circle Mapper
Posted by Seth on June 22, 2008 under News |
I hate surcharges. I’d much rather just see what the cost of an item is and make a decision based on that number. The airlines seem to disagree, trending towards surcharges and fees to generate revenue in pretty much every situation. Airlines have actually raised fares a dozen times so far this year, so they’re doing that, too, but the fees can get out of hand. The most egregious fee, in my opinion, is the fuel surcharge.
The fuel surcharge is unlike the checked baggage or assigned seat fees in that it actually applies to everyone. If I don’t check bags or care about my seat assignment I can fly for just the cost of the plane ticket. By when fuel surcharges come in to play the cost cannot be avoided. It is essentially part of the fare, but the airlines hide it as an extra fee, helping them advertise fares lower than what they are actually charging.
And now the fuel surcharge has broken into new territory, surpassing $1,000 for trips between Sydney and London on Japan Airlines. That is $1000 in addition to the actual fare. The flight is about 10,000 miles each way routing via Tokyo, and the $1,000 is a round trip fee, so the fee is only $500 each way. That’s about $0.05 per mile flown. Considering that the airlines pay about $0.03-0.04 per seat mile flown for fuel (based on CASM numbers published by the airlines) this fee will actually more than cover the fuel costs for the flights. Plus passengers are still going to pay the rest of the fare, meaning that the airlines should be able to cover their costs OK, but without charging higher fares, at least not officially.
Of course, if the airlines just raised the fares the folks paying money for their tickets wouldn’t really see any difference, as the end number is the same. But for passengers looking at reward redemptions they have to pay all taxes and fees as part of the redemption, in addition to the miles. So if you participated in the JAL frequent flier program and were looking to redeem your points to go from Sydney to London you’ll also have to pay the $1,000 fuel surcharge, since it is not part of the fare. That just sucks.
Interestingly enough, the fees vary from airline to airline, even for the same flights. I’ve just booked a flight on Turkish Airlines using some of my US Air miles. If I purchased the tickets outright from Turkish Air the taxes would be ~$70 for one person. Using my US Air miles the taxes were $6. Even with paying the US Air fee of $40 to book the ticket through the call center despite the fact that the online site doesn’t even recognize the destinations I still came out ahead on the cost by using the miles.
