Mel to ADD to EBB, Dar to Mel : United Web Site and booking Award Seating

[kmcgreg]

I am waiting for award seats to become available for Dec 13/Jan14 . We are a family of four and I have a heap of KRISFLYER points.
I am hoping to try to fly us to holiday in Africa- We need to get Melbourne to Addis Ababa in Ethiopia (ADD) then ADD to Entebbe (EBB) in Uganda then to return to Melbourne from Dar es salaam (DA).

I have searched the united site to see if there are star alliance award seats and no seats are shown yet for that time. However when searching other dates earlier, there are seats available.

So what are the chances of award seats becoming available for around Dec 14 and Jan 28th? Additionally, how do I book this? Do I ring the Krisflyer call centre? Do I get charged to do so?

Cheers

Kmcgreg

 

[albatross710]

You can easily call the Krisflyer call centre and speak with the agents. For the SQ call centre if you don't get what you want today, do more research and call back to speak to a different operator.

For pre-call research I use the ANAtool which might be another option for you. This is only an indicator though as quite often SQ will have different partner redemption availability. Also, I think additionally availability will become available during the year - don't panic if you're not locked away this month.

There is also a booking form on the KF website - https://www.singaporeair.com/pdf/ppsclub_krisflyer/forms/PartnerAL-ResRequest.pdf. You can submit that so that they have all of the details. Do your research and have a good set of flight numbers on hand to assist the KF agent find the flights for you.

holiday in Africa- We need to get Melbourne to Addis Ababa in Ethiopia (ADD) then ADD to Entebbe (EBB) in Uganda then to return to Melbourne from Dar es salaam (DA).

I'm not familiar with how to route through these ports. My impression is to keep your options open. For your itinerary, keep an open mind as to routing. Maybe some of the trip could be paid 'side trips' or paid sectors. In May I flew a redemption to Bahrain and couldn't get any of the KF redemption routings that suited me. I decided to take the more convenient route via Dubai and just paid cash for the DXB-BAH sector. Holiday travel you do want some certainty.

Also, how many people are travelling? I always have problems getting a confirmed itinerary for 4 pax until just a few weeks out.

Alby

 

[kmcgreg]

I am happy to do paid routes. What are the chances of getting 4 Business savers on the same flight to Dubai? I can easily get 2 - 3 or 4 pax goes to waitlist. How long do you need to wait normally to find out? I am entirely flexible.

 

[albatross710]

I am happy to do paid routes. What are the chances of getting 4 Business savers on the same flight to Dubai? I can easily get 2 - 3 or 4 pax goes to waitlist. How long do you need to wait normally to find out? I am entirely flexible.

I am generally travelling with 4 pax on J Savers. It has always been done for me.

However, at the moment I am two weeks out for departing on the next 4 x J saver trip. Everyne has a way of travelling, one person leaves 6 hours earlier on departure but the rest of us catch them in Singapore. On the return leg, we all leave Europe together and then one person has to stay in Singapore for an extra 12 hours. Not a problem for our family as we don't have young ones.

Being flexible is good, get some bookings in the system and see what happens.

Alby