US Dividend Miles - post your SUCCESSFUL award bookings here.

[MEL_Traveller]

Destination is INN, stopover SZG (4-5 days each).
I have ~21 hrs in VIE and 12 hrs in BKK on the way home.

i was wondering about that! otherwise the train would have potentailly saved a whole lot of time (ie doing it as an open jaw into INN and out of SZG)

 

[smit0847]

Not sure if I'm going to be applauded or criticised for this but here goes:

HWMBO wants to go to HK for NYE. We were going to do a standard GUM booking with a HKG stopover but we only have a week to do the whole trip and HWMBO only wants to go to HKG 'and stay there, not race around Asia taking flight after flight'. I've got an F GUM booking locked in for October which is a race around Asia with my best mate.

So, was considering the best way to get there and home. Rev Y tickets during this ultra-peak period are $1500+ return pp. Had written off the GUM option as we wouldn't have time or desire to physically visit Guam but then remembered you can book one-ways for the same price as a return and that got me thinking. This is much cheaper than buying a North-Asian one-way J through UA or AV.

So, booked the following as my final *A USDM for 30k plus a very low $73 taxes + $50 booking fee pp:

MEL-BKK TG J
BKK-HKG TG J
HKG-GUM UA Y.

You can probably guess what my plan is......

This is much cheaper than buying a North-Asian one-way J through UA or AV.


To get home I'm dipping my toes into Aadvantage going CX and MH J via KUL as I'm a bit bored of TG J (I have 13 J and F award flights on TG this year).

By the way - I've started my full GUM trip report here - http://www.australianfrequentflyer....guam-visiting-somewhere-obscure-no-57830.html

 

[sanchdog]

After much fear and trepidation, I have just made my first booking using US Airways Dividend Miles.

I rang the service centre in American using Skype, on 800-428-4322, which is a free call. The call was answered by an automated service that asks for all of your details so that it can route your call to the most appropriate place. This involved giving all of the dates and destinations of the various sectors that I wish to travel. After going through all of this rigmarole, it then told me that they were experiencing significant difficulties dealing with the number of calls due to the bad weather in America. It then told me to ring back later and hung up on me.

The second time I tried asking the service to direct me to an operator, however it would not do so and had to go through the same rigmarole. Again, it told me to call back later and hung up on me.

The third time I asked to speak to somebody with regard to Star Alliance redemptions. It then put me in the queue for an operator. I waited in the queue for 45 min, and was then greeted by a very polite and efficient operator. Despite that, it took another 45 min to secure the booking.

The operator asked me had I researched it and if I had any preference for flights, which I gave her. She then went labouriously through each leg to check availability and book it. She then had to do the same process for my wife, and hence the delay. After she had booked the outward leg, she saved the details and gave me a booking reference number in case we should be disconnected. The legs were exactly as I wanted, so I chose to pay whilst I was online. Unfortunately, this also seemed to take forever. It cost me USD$142 for taxes and USD$50 for a service fee per person.

I had researched my flights online using the ANA site and the United airlines site. I found that the United airlines site was quite good at giving me the various sectors, however the planned number of points that United site said that I would require was 200,000 miles. The actual miles that US Airways requested was 150,000 miles per person.

The sectors that I booked were Brisbane to Moscow via Bangkok and Vienna, returning from Venice to Brisbane via Frankfurt and Bangkok. All sectors were in business class, except the sector from Frankfurt to Bangkok, which is in first class. The operator thought that I was wasting my points on the first class given that I could not do the whole return journey in first. My curiosity to sample first class though meant that I had to try. It was only an extra 30,000 points to change from business to first class.

Overall, despite the whole process taking me over an hour and a half, the operator was friendly and efficient and I was happy with the outcome. I was surprised that I did not receive an e-mail from US Airways, however she did give me the booking reference numbers and I was told to look these up through my US Airways Dividend miles account. One snag is that the booking reference number that is used by US Airways, is not used by the airlines that the flights were booked on, namely Thai Airways, EVA Airways and Lufthansa. I found it difficult to find the booking reference number that was used by these airways, and as I was doing it after hours, I wasn't really able to ring the airlines for assistance. What I did find was that Eva Airways site has the ability for you to enter your ticket number, which I did have, from the US Airways site, and this gave me a booking reference number that is used by all of the other carriers in the Star Alliance network. I was then able to go to the Thai Airways site and use this reference number and reserve seats for all of the carriers.

I trust that you find this helpful

 

[bcworld]

There is no common currency across *A airlines so you shouldn't expect to pay what you see on the UA site if you aren't using UA miles.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

When calling you can go directly to an operator by saying the following at the prompts:

• what do you wanna do? (respond) 'award travel'
• ok, let's get started, where do you want to fly from? (respond) 'agent'
• is this for travel within the USA? (respond) 'no'

It would have been quicker and better to book as a single PNR (searching for two pax) and then split the PNR. This way you get around the potential that someone will take the other seats while you are completing the first booking.

The United and ANA tools display miles which are only valid for bookings made by United/ANA customers. If you are using USDM then the USDM chart applies.

It is common to not receive an email from USDM. You should however check your booking frequently (via the USDM site) to ensure there have been no changes. You should also review other sites such as airlineroute.net to get a heads-up for any schedule changes that may affect your booking: the earlier you call USDM to fix it the better availability you'll have to make changes.

 

[sanchdog]

Thanks for the info about airlineroute.net, I will keep an eye on the booking. Wrt the prompts, I tried "award travel" and "agent" but with no success. The operator said that there had to be two PNRs as the miles were coming out of two separate accounts.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Thanks for the info about airlineroute.net, I will keep an eye on the booking. Wrt the prompts, I tried "award travel" and "agent" but with no success. The operator said that there had to be two PNRs as the miles were coming out of two separate accounts.

2 PNRs is correct. but they can be booked as a single PNR to start, then split when you come to ticket.

 

[sanchdog]

I got you, sounds sensible and I think that it would have saved a lot of time.

 

[ozbeachbabe]

I was surprised that I did not receive an e-mail from US Airways, however she did give me the booking reference numbers and I was told to look these up through my US Airways Dividend miles account. One snag is that the booking reference number that is used by US Airways, is not used by the airlines that the flights were booked on, namely Thai Airways, EVA Airways and Lufthansa.

I found it difficult to find the booking reference number that was used by these airways, and as I was doing it after hours, I wasn't really able to ring the airlines for assistance. What I did find was that Eva Airways site has the ability for you to enter your ticket number, which I did have, from the US Airways site, and this gave me a booking reference number that is used by all of the other carriers in the Star Alliance network. I was then able to go to the Thai Airways site and use this reference number and reserve seats for all of the carriers.

I trust that you find this helpful

I did a booking that involved travel on four carriers UA/NH/TG/BR & US DM agent not only gave me the US pnr but also the GDS pnr.

What you can do is once you have the US pnr is retrieve it on www.usairways.com then print out a copy of the itinerary however the font is a bit small to read so you can email it to yourself & what gets sent to you is a much easier format to read.

The US DM itinerary also displayed the UA pnr so I was able to log on via www.united.com & allocate the seats & also remove the US DM freq flyer number & enter my TK *A Gold ff which is a higher tier status even though these are award tickets will no earn.

The BR site Homepage - EVA Air | America accepted the GDS pnr & I was able to select seats & addin the TK ff nbr.

Like BR the TG site Thai Airways | Smooth as Silk accepted the GDS pnr so I could do TG seating & add the TK ffn plus also displayed the BR seats I'd already done. It will also do the NH seats although I elected not to do seating via the TG site as it doesn't show the preferred forward seating on the whY flight CTS/NGO so I will have to contact NH for the pnr as I'm hoping once the TK *A Gold ffn is entered I'll be able to access more forward seats.

So it looks like the TG site can be a 'one=stop stop' to do all the seating depending on the carriers involved & some airlines also display the US etkt nbr so you know they've received it.

The only airline the GDS pnr didn't work with was NH so I'll call them to get it as the Check My Trip site didn't display the airline pnrs & I forgot the other websites that do this.

 

[sanchdog]

Thanks Oz, most helpful

 

[get me outta here]

My recent experience for those who may want to change flights due to an upgrade becoming available.

I booked to GUM and got all the flights I wanted except the last BKK-SYD which I accepted in Y thinking that if I saw it I'd call and simply change it. This coincided with all the storm probs. I was ok the USD150 change fee.

Last night, got through and spoke to agent number 1 who immediately said it was against policy to change the cabin class and went off the the helpdesk and came back saying yep, can't be done. HUACA straight away and got another more friendly agent who tried hard to do it and went off to the helpdesk and came back and said it can't be done. There was even a concern that I had even lost the Y seat, as ironically now there was only F available but got Y back, and went off to bed.

Got up this morning and tried again. Agent 3 was doing well and them went off the the helpdesk and I knew I was cooked. However, she came back and changed to two new flights on new dates in F/J.

The value of the HUACA.

 

[bismarck]

Thanks to the advice of all here, have managed to book and ticket my first USDM redemption.

Pretty simple, but very happy to be doing it in J after a RTW 140k on *O over Christmas.

SYD-BKK TG J (747)
BKK-FRA TG J (A380)
FRA-VIE LH J (A321)

LHR-ICN OZ J (777)
ICN-SYD OZ J (777)

Taxes were $603 pp (booked for 2 people) which felt a little steep but J availability out of Europe was pretty limited for the dates I needed (only Air China which I didn't want) so had to go through LHR.

Thanks to all for the advice on these threads - not the greatest value trip I've seen, but still pretty darn happy with the result.

 

[Foreigner]

Thanks to the advice of all here, have managed to book and ticket my first USDM redemption.

Pretty simple, but very happy to be doing it in J after a RTW 140k on *O over Christmas.

SYD-BKK TG J (747)
BKK-FRA TG J (A380)
FRA-VIE LH J (A321)

LHR-ICN OZ J (777)
ICN-SYD OZ J (777)

Taxes were $603 pp (booked for 2 people) which felt a little steep but J availability out of Europe was pretty limited for the dates I needed (only Air China which I didn't want) so had to go through LHR.

Thanks to all for the advice on these threads - not the greatest value trip I've seen, but still pretty darn happy with the result.

LHR bumps up taxes. Looks like you have open jaw plus one of those cities is destination. But Europe in J should be 120k miles, no?

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Thanks to the advice of all here, have managed to book and ticket my first USDM redemption.

Pretty simple, but very happy to be doing it in J after a RTW 140k on *O over Christmas.

SYD-BKK TG J (747)
BKK-FRA TG J (A380)
FRA-VIE LH J (A321)

LHR-ICN OZ J (777)
ICN-SYD OZ J (777)

Taxes were $603 pp (booked for 2 people) which felt a little steep but J availability out of Europe was pretty limited for the dates I needed (only Air China which I didn't want) so had to go through LHR.

Thanks to all for the advice on these threads - not the greatest value trip I've seen, but still pretty darn happy with the result.

as foreigner said - the APD ex UK is very expensive. Actually Air China might have been a good option ... if you can live with a lesser standard of food, the full flat beds the whole way would have been potentially preferable.

 

[bcworld]

But Europe in J should be 120k miles, no?

Yes it should...but the OP didn't mention the miles cost of their US itin.

 

[bismarck]

LHR bumps up taxes. Looks like you have open jaw plus one of those cities is destination. But Europe in J should be 120k miles, no?

Yep, I think it worked out as LHR being "destination" as it is the farthest (though VIE is actually our destination). So 120k per person.

I did try to avoid departing from LHR, but SWMBO was not a fan of the number of connections required to do so.

as foreigner said - the APD ex UK is very expensive. Actually Air China might have been a good option ... if you can live with a lesser standard of food, the full flat beds the whole way would have been potentially preferable.

She also wasn't a fan of Air China. We usually fly QF/CX/EK so she is a bit skeptical of the tier 2 carriers. TBH, I have also not heard good things re: English skills of the cabin crew.

I went back and forth on it for a while but decided to steer clear this time.

 

[Kangol]

My recent experience for those who may want to change flights due to an upgrade becoming available.

I booked to GUM and got all the flights I wanted except the last BKK-SYD which I accepted in Y thinking that if I saw it I'd call and simply change it. This coincided with all the storm probs. I was ok the USD150 change fee.

Last night, got through and spoke to agent number 1 who immediately said it was against policy to change the cabin class and went off the the helpdesk and came back saying yep, can't be done. HUACA straight away and got another more friendly agent who tried hard to do it and went off to the helpdesk and came back and said it can't be done. There was even a concern that I had even lost the Y seat, as ironically now there was only F available but got Y back, and went off to bed.

Got up this morning and tried again. Agent 3 was doing well and them went off the the helpdesk and I knew I was cooked. However, she came back and changed to two new flights on new dates in F/J.

The value of the HUACA.

Did they end up charging the $150 change fee? In theory you have to pay it but there have been some reports saying if you get a good agent, you don't have to pay...

 

[get me outta here]

The one thing they were all consistent with right from the initial agent putting the flights on hold, was that there would be a $150 fee, and I did have to pay it.

To cancel the whole fare would also apparently have cost $150 plus the loss of the initial charges.

 

[bigsleep55]

The one thing they were all consistent with right from the initial agent putting the flights on hold, was that there would be a $150 fee, and I did have to pay it.

To cancel the whole fare would also apparently have cost $150 plus the loss of the initial charges.

I ticketed my flights today. Realised dude put me on Air China instead of Air Canada, called up just then and managed to get them to change it without any costs. I just played stupid and tried being super nice. I also said the agent booked me on the wrong flight.

 

[smit0847]

I ticketed my flights today. Realised dude put me on Air China instead of Air Canada, called up just then and managed to get them to change it without any costs. I just played stupid and tried being super nice. I also said the agent booked me on the wrong flight.

In fairness a lot of people think Air China's airline code is AC....