Tag Archives: Air France

A System to Get to Europe with Delta SkyMiles

Posted on November 6, 2012 by | 12 Comments

I use three steps to get to my European destination with Delta SkyMiles. For each direction:

  1. Find transatlantic space.
  2. Find domestic space within the US on Delta or Alaska from my home airport to the international gateway.
  3. Find intra-European space to my destination.

Those steps are roughly in order of difficulty–though many times finding domestic space on Delta is impossible at the low-miles price. In those cases, I have to buy a positioning flight or look on different dates.

A few months ago I decided to make a list of SkyTeam flights to Europe, so that I could more systematically search for awards to Europe for my clients with SkyMiles (or AMEX Membership Rewards or Flying Blue points.) Having a list to refer to made my Award Booking Service run much more smoothly.

This is not every SkyTeam flight to Europe, but it is every Air France, KLM, Alitalia, Aeroflot, and Air Europa flight between the US/Canada and Europe. Plus every Delta flight to London and Paris and from JFK to Europe. (Correct me where I’m wrong please.)

Air France

CDG (Paris) to ATL, BOS, ORD, DTW, IAH, LAX, MIA, JFK, SFO, IAD, YUL, YYZ

Alitalia

FCO (Rome) to BOS, ORD, LAX, MIA, JFK, EWR, YYZ

MXP (Milan) to JFK, MIA

KLM

AMS (Amsterdam) to ATL, DFW, ORD, IAH, LAX, JFK, SFO, IAD, YYC, YUL, YYZ, YVR

Aeroflot

SVO (Moscow) to LAX, MIA, JFK, IAD

Air Europa

MAD (Madrid) to JFK

Delta

LHR (London) to ATL, BOS, DTW, MSP, JFK

CDG (Paris) to ATL, CVG, DTW, MSP, JFK, SLC, SEA and seasonally to BOS, ORD, PHL, PIT

JFK (New York) to AMS, BCN, BRU, DUB, FRA, LHR, MAD, MXP, SVO, CDG, VCE and seasonally to ATH, CPH, IST, AGP, PSA, KEF, PRG, SNN, VLC, NCE, ARN

Finding Transatlantic Space

I search Alitalia, KLM, Air France, Air Europa, and Aeroflot space on Expert Flyer. See Free First Class Next Month: Using expertflyer.com.

I search Delta space as a oneway award, just the segment I want. For instance, if I want to fly from San Francisco to Salt Lake City to Paris, I just search SLC-CDG oneway on delta.com.

Why they’re called SkyPesos. Only medium availability in April in economy class.

Unfortunately the calendar doesn’t match up with direct availability. For instance, April 5 has low-level business availability according to the calendar. That must be for an itinerary with a stop because SLC-CDG direct is at the high price of 325k miles.

Not a good deal

Low-level Delta space will display as 60k/100k oneway in economy/business because Delta charges the roundtrip price for oneways. If you see that price, note the flight number and time, so you can build your award around it.

All partner space will cost the low-level price.

Finding Domestic Space

I also search delta.com oneway at a time for this. There aren’t really any tricks, and Delta’s award space is pitiful.

The only thing to keep in mind is to check for both economy and first class domestic space on your business class awards. You can add domestic economy class to international business class without increasing the award’s price.

Finding intra-Europe Space

I use expertflyer.com to search for award space intra-Europe. It’s usually readily available.

I have two tips. The first is not to hold out for business class. Intra-Europe business class is economy class with a meal and no one in the middle seat. It’s worth about $15 more than economy class to me, so I’m happy to book an economy class seat to get a better flight time.

The second is not to check the box for a classic Europe award on Expert Flyer for KLM and Air France searches. Delta has access to Classic Award (X), not Classic Europe Award (T) for these airlines.

Air France’s fare classes. Delta miles can be used only for O and X.

Putting It Together

Once you’ve found your transatlantic, intra-Europe, and domestic award space, you can put it all together. If you’re lucky and delta.com can find it and price it correctly, you are set.

If delta.com can’t find it or price it correctly, call 800-323-2323 to book. But don’t pay the phone fee. See How to Avoid the Phone Fee on Award Bookings to save $25 per ticket.

Recap

Booking awards to Europe with Delta miles can be time consuming, but there is a systematic approach that yields results. First, find the transatlantic space. I’ve included a list of great flights to search on all SkyTeam partners.

Second, find domestic space. Third, find intra-European space. Piece it all together on delta.com or by phone.

Or save yourself the trouble, and contact my Award Booking Service.

For more great posts like this, sign up for the MileValue RSS feed, like the MileValue facebook page, or follow me on Twitter @milevalue. Get your friends involved too, so you can have more companions for your Free First Class Next Month.

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Posted in Air France, Award Booking, Best Of, Delta, ExpertFlyer

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Getting to Tahiti with Delta Miles

Posted on October 30, 2012 by | 13 Comments

See last week’s post on getting to French Polynesia with American miles.

This post will be about getting to French Polynesia–Tahiti, Bora Bora, and more–with Delta SkyMiles. This is an award I get asked to book frequently through my Award Booking Service, and I wanted to share some free tips.

French Polynesia is a French-speaking “overseas country” controlled by France. It is south of Hawaii and east of Australia. The main tourist spots are Tahiti, Bora Bora, and Mo’orea. People go to French Polynesia for the absolutely stunning beach-and-island landscape. File:Bora-Bora.png

French Polynesia has only one international airport, F’a’a’a Airport serving Pape’ete, Tahiti, airport code PPT. Other islands have airports with flights within the islands, but to get to French Polynesia, you must fly to Tahiti. Here’s a complete list of flights to and from PPT, according to wikipedia:

I’ve highlighted the best options for most of my readers, and I’ll go through the easiest ways to get to Tahiti with the types of miles you are likely to have.

Delta SkyMiles

Delta SkyMiles are the second best way to get to Tahiti behind American Arilines miles. Delta considers Tahiti to be a part of the Southwest Pacific, so it charges 100k/150k miles roundtrip for economy/business. SkyMiles can never be redeemed for three-cabin first class.

I’ve boxed the each way cost of a SkyMiles ticket in economy and business, assuming you book a roundtrip. Partner awards always price at the low-level (boxed) prices, so you can ignore the other prices.

Air Tahiti Nui

One way to get to Tahiti with SkyMiles is on non-SkyTeam partner Air Tahiti Nui, French Polynesia’s international carrier.

The humungous drawback with Delta SkyMiles redemptions for Air Tahiti Nui flights is the nasty fuel surcharge! Los Angeles to Pape’ete roundtrip costs in business class costs 150k SkyMiles and $522. On American, for the exact same flights, it costs almost $400 less out of pocket, meaning Delta is collecting a $400 roundtrip fuel surcharge.

But if you are willing to pay the surcharge, you can search for Air Tahiti Nui space for free by calling Delta at 800-323-2323. I do my research before calling on Expert Flyer. See Free First Class Next Month: Using expertflyer.com.

On Expert Flyer, search for LAX-PPT and PPT-LAX, using delta.com to search for your domestic segments. The fare classes to check are I and W for business and economy. If you check A, you can see first class space. But you can’t book first class space with Delta miles, so why torture yourself?

Your results will be returned in the normal way that Expert Flyer returns them.

This result means that TN 1 has one award seat in coach and none in business. TN 7, departing half an hour later, has one business class seat.

The pattern I see is that when the award calendar opens up 330 days out, most flights have 1/2/4 seats or 1/1/6 seats in first/business/economy on Expert Flyer. Those are picked over, and not replaced. I have never seen more two business class seats, or seven economy class seats on a flight.

When booking 11 months in advance, you can pretty much have any flight you want. The more time you wait, the more space deteriorates. By a few months out, there will be some seats left on some flights, but most business class will have been taken, never to reappear again.

So far I’ve been talking about LAX-PPT, but I see the exact same patterns of availability PPT-LAX.

Air Tahiti Nui operates afternoon flights and redeyes from LAX to Tahiti. Returns to the US are all redeyes. All flights are operated by Airbus A340s configured with standard economy seats, recliner business seats, and angled lie flat seats in first class.

I haven’t flown the product, but frankly it doesn’t impress me. I’m not sure whether I would pay the 50k mile premium for business class over economy roundtrip. Air Tahiti Nui’s business class is an underwhelming recliner, but it does have 15″ more legroom than domestic first class and 22″ more than Air Tahiti Nui economy class. And 50k Delta miles isn’t 50k American miles, it is much less valuable!

Air France

Delta’s partner Air France also flies from Los Angeles to Pape’ete, Tahiti. Air France award space does display on delta.com, but searching on delta.com is a pain because you can’t pull up the calendar view.

Because of that, I search on Expert Flyer. Fill out the form like I have, changing the dates to your preferred dates. O and X are the correct fare codes for business and economy class.

I tend to see good economy availability and bad business availability. When I do find flights with availability, the flight tends to have nine economy seats or one business seat. And I don’t know many people headed to Tahiti alone.

 

 

 

 

The 777-200 and A340-300 that Air France uses to operate the flights to Tahiti both feature standard economy seats and angled lie flat business class seats.

777-200

A340-300

Once you find the award space on Expert Flyer, head to delta.com to input your flights. The award space you found should be the only search result. A roundtrip economy ticket from Los Angeles to Tahiti costs 100k SkyMiles and $52.90 in government taxes.

For economy class tickets with SkyMiles, Air France makes way more sense than Air Tahiti Nui since the lack of surcharges saves more than $400 per person.

Getting to Los Angeles

To get to Tahiti with Delta miles you have to route through Los Angeles. To keep your award at 100k/150k in economy/business, you need to find low level award space domestically. This can be a major challenge with Delta miles even though you can use Delta metal and Alaska domestic award space–both searchable on delta.com. Here are a list of direct AA and Alaska flights to/from LAX, though you don’t need to route to LAX on a direct flight:

One tip is that you can use domestic economy space on business class awards. There may be economy space available on your domestic flight, but not business space. In that case, if you can handle a slightly smaller seat for a few hours, you can save a boat load of miles or dollars.

If you can’t find any domestic award space, you may have to book a separate award or cash ticket to Los Angeles. This is not only costly, but annoying because you have to worry about a misconnect spanning two separate tickets.

It is this major drawback–the difficulty in getting to Los Angeles–combined with Delta’s surcharges on Air Tahiti Nui awards that leads me to say that American Airlines miles are the best way to get to French Polynesia.

Free Stopovers and Free Oneways

Standard Delta award rules apply to awards to Tahiti. On Delta awards, you can get one stopover and one open jaw. If you save both of those, and routing permits, you can use the two in combination to get a free oneway. See Free Oneways on Delta Awards.

Or you can use the stopover to stop for free en route, possibly making it easier to find domestic award space.

Getting to Bora Bora, Moorea, and other islands

Air Tahiti–not Air Tahiti Nui, the AA partner–runs regular flights to other islands that you can purchase with cash. Or you can take a ferry to some islands.

Recap

Delta SkyMiles can be used to get to Tahiti, and from there, you can connect throughout French Polynesia. Roundtrip awards costs 100k miles in economy class and 150k miles in business class on either Air France or Air Tahiti Nui.

Air France has good availability in economy class, and there will be no surcharges, meaning a low out-of-pocket cost. Air Tahiti Nui has good business class space, but bad business class seats, and a $400 surcharge per person.

Both fly from Los Angeles to Pape’ete, Tahiti. Getting to Los Angeles on the same award with Delta miles can be quite difficult.

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Posted in Air France, Air Tahiti Nui, Award Booking, Delta, How to

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Free First Class Next Month: Using AirFrance.us for Award Searches

Posted on September 11, 2012 by | 3 Comments

This is the twenty-sixth post in a monthlong series that started here. Each post will take about two minutes to read and may include an action item that takes the reader another two minutes to complete. I am writing this for an audience of people who know nothing about frequent flier miles, and my goal is that by the end, you know enough to fly for free anywhere you want to go.

Yesterday, I talked about using delta.com for award searches. Delta is the US representative of SkyTeam–alliance affiliation list–but Delta’s website only shows availability for a few SkyTeam members. If you’re looking to unload your SkyMiles, you’ll often need a better tool than delta.com.

There are two reasons why an award booker needs to know about AirFrance.us. The first is that AirFrance.us shows more SkyTeam partners’ availability than delta.com.

AirFrance.us has an award search engine which displays at least Delta, Air France, KLM, Alitalia, Aeroflot, China Southern, and China Airlines. I say at least because I can’t find a complete list of the airlines it shows, but I have seen these in search results.

(Let us know if there is a complete list or other airlines you’ve seen on AirFrance.us in the comments. I haven’t seen China Eastern or Korean.)

Delta.com only shows Delta, Alaska, Air France, and KLM, so AirFrance.us shows far more SkyTeam airlines than delta.com.

The second reason is that booking with Flying Blue points–Air France’s currency–may be your best option on many awards. The reason is that Air France allows oneway redemptions for half the roundtrip price, something Delta doesn’t allow.

Plus Flying Blue is a transfer partner of American Express Membership Rewards that often runs transfer bonuses, like the current (as of 9/11/12) 35% bonus.

1,000 MR to 1,350 Flying Blue miles. Plus no excise tax of $6 per 10,000 on transfers like AMEX collects on transfers to Delta.

That means a oneway flight on Delta from LAX to JFK would cost 25,000 SkyMiles (or MR) and $2.50. The same flight would cost 10k MR transferred to Flying Blue for the 12,500 mile redemption with 1,000 miles left over.

Flying Blue does charge big surcharges on Air France and KLM flights, something Delta doesn’t do when the award originates in the US, so Flying Blue isn’t always the best redemption option. But when it is, and even when it’s not, its award-search engine may be your best option.

To search on AirFrance.us, you need a Flying Blue account. Sign up for one for free, or sign into yours on the top right of the home page.

Once signed in, click Award Ticket Reservation.

The search screen is not as well designed as most. For instance, you have to select an age from the dropdown menu for each passenger instead of just typing in how many passengers are flying.

To see a calendar view of availability, check the box that says “My dates are flexible.” The first search example I’ll show is oneway LAX-JFK. Remember that this would cost 25k SkyMiles because Delta always charges the roundtrip price.

That famous Delta (un-)availability

If you wanted to book a oneway Delta flight with Air France miles to take advantage of its oneway pricing, you would click “next, select flight.”

There is only one choice this day, so you would continue to the payment screen.

It is only 25k Flying Blue miles and $5 for two passengers to take a oneway from LAX to New York City. That’s only 19k Membership Rewards at current (9/11/12) transfer rates.

AirFrance.us isn’t just a place to search when using Flying Blue miles though. It’s a good, free place to search for partners Delta doesn’t show like Alitalia and China Southern.

It’s also a good place to search for Air France and KLM flights just because anything beats using the broken delta.com.

For instance I just searched for a oneway economy class ticket on delta.com and AirFrance.us from Montreal to Budapest on February 18. They both returned the same result:

Delta result

AirFrance.us results

But Air France’s site shows other itineraries–only one came up on Delta.com–and all cabins on one screen. Plus AirFrance.us showed me the calendar of February, so I could see what days the trip was available.

AirFrance.us says YUL-BUD has great availability in February

When I tried to check the my-dates-are-flexible box and view-award-calendar link on delta.com, the equivalent calendar did not appear, so I would have had to search each day individually on delta.com to see my options.

The one drawback of using AirFrance.us for this search if I planned on using Delta miles is that AirFrance.us is showing surcharges I would not have to pay with Delta SkyMiles. At least Delta gets one thing right, correctly listing the taxes on this leg as $75.

Tips and Caveats

There are a few things to know before charging off to AirFrance.us to practice.

First, ignore Premium Economy and three-cabin, international First Class if you’re using Delta SkyMiles because SkyMiles can’t be redeemed for those cabins.

Second, if an award is listed as a classic award, Delta will have access to the space also. If it’s listed as a flex award, you can’t get it with SkyMiles.

Third, AirFrance.us doesn’t have the most complete list of SkyTeam availability. That title would belong to expertflyer.com, a paid service. You can get free expertflyer membership for five days, so you can use it to research one award no problem. I’ll have a post on using expertflyer tomorrow.

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Posted in Air France, Delta, ExpertFlyer

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