Any advantage in using a third party to book QFF award flights?

[armanie]

Hi,

Does anyone know if there is any advantage in using a third party, such as Amex Centurion Travel, to book QFF award flights?

Do they have a system which allows them to see available seats over a number of days, or do they have to do what I would have to, and search day by day?

I've tried to book a number of business/first class seats from SYD to LAX by myself and it is very time consuming when you can only search day by day.

I would be interested to know.

Thanks in advance.

armanie

 

[GDSman]

Any travel agent can see the classes used for awards bookings in their reservation system. The systems allow complex searches to be completed quickly across multiple dates, so in terms of advantage I would say using an agent simply means that someone else does the searching for you (in return for a fee), but they don't have any 'special' access that shows them more availabiity than the QF site.

 

[Evan]

If you have an Amex Centurion card i guess you could try, do they charge for the service or charge a lot (Is that a silly question ?)

A lot of us use tools like Expert Flyer (Although thats no good at the moment either) to look for seat availability in the required fare buckets.

The main problem you will face of course the flights your after, all very busy and very booked out at the best of times, i think a lot of people have suggested alternative routes that are less popular for this reason as well.

Evan

 

[straitman]

Hi,

Does anyone know if there is any advantage in using a third party, such as Amex Centurion Travel, to book QFF award flights?

Do they have a system which allows them to see available seats over a number of days, or do they have to do what I would have to, and search day by day?

I've tried to book a number of business/first class seats from SYD to LAX by myself and it is very time consuming when you can only search day by day.

I would be interested to know.

Thanks in advance.

armanie

Try ringing QF and asking. The service will only cost (2500 points) when you actually make a booking. Also from my experience the FF desk only sees the same availability as what you'll see.

 

[armanie]

Thanks everyone for the info.

I think I'll get Centurion to do it.

They'll be much quicker, and it'll save me a lot of time.

Once again, thanks.

armanie