Vegas with miles advice

[Neil]

quote:Originally posted by Guy M
Am I right in thinking that any Upgrades or Companion Flights need to be booked over the phone rather than online? I certainly couldn't find a way to do it all online unless I was missing something.


Upgrades with miles currently have to be done on the phone.

Neil

But you can book a qualifying fare over the internet and then call up and ask for the upgrade over the phone? And hope that in the few minutes it's taken you to do this (and get your Qudico tracking cashback) someone else hasn't done the sensible thing and snaffled up those seats over the phone?!

My experience of booking over the phone with VS UC was really good. They took the time to check the various dates and permutations I kept throwing at them and in the end booked us an upgradeable fare out (into G) and then the cheapest fare (O) back as we weren't upgrading the return section.

Interestingly (or not) the ticket for the return section actually says Class Y, but having check the e-ticket again, we were definitely booked in O and seeing as my return flights cost 375 in total plus taxes of 305.10, I reckon 680.10 plus 30,000 miles isn't too bad for UC to and Economy from Vegas.

Still think I should possibly have spent the extra 180 per person to come back PE, but they didn't have any 2-seats available at the time. And don't want the missus getting TOO accustomed to the high life. She's only 5ft4 and so there's always plenty of room in economy for her!

[Neil]

You can call VS in advance and ask them to hold you a G fare, which they will do for 24/48 hours. Booking the qualifying fare online is possible, but at times the system can be funny and not show you L or S fares, and will only show a Y or W fare. I personally do it all over the phone as it is easier, but guess you are looking to do the quidco thing.

I suppose that was one thing I could have tried, asking them to hold the G fare to upgrade into for the outward section, but am still pretty sure it wouldn't let me book the two legs of my flight in different fare categories online as the very helpful person on the phone was able to... so I'm fairly happy to have foregone my Quidco and paid the extra 20 to pay with my VS Amex and not had to book the return section on a more expensive category too.

[HighFlyer]

quote:Originally posted by clayts
Is BA just as painful for booking CW Reward flights as Virgin is for UC?


From my recent experience looking for J rewards, its swings and roundabouts. There was good availability for an upcoming trip late in the year that we want to book and on a selection of flights, which is an advantage of BA. As they have more flights a day to some destinations there is more reward availability on occasion. Other trips I have looked at have been good if you are flexible also. Trying to get myself into J going to my conference in Seattle, limited availability - none at all to SEA on multiple dates and none VIA SFO or LAX or YVR for the date range I needed. Only realistic option was VIA BOS. We also want to spend our miles on J to SYD - only a handful of dates are available when looking at the entire year!

I don't necessarily think switching carriers changes the issue. BA also usually have limited availability traveling on Fridays and Saturdays, same as VS but the wider route network does help.

Note you can also only MFU up one class with BA - no Y to J.

I have just looked up BA's reward availability to LAS for late Jan/early Feb 2011 and as a lowly silver its wide open!

For next month (March 2010) there are a wide number of dates with 2 seats free, though you'd likely have do Tuesday-Tuesday for a week or extend your stay.

So on the surface, BA does look tempting ...

Thanks,
Sarah

[RichardMannion]

Though ironically I as looking for availability in Upper to come back from the West Coast in J in late March, and there was nothing on the day I needed for SFO (even though there were loads of Z seats), LAX only had the late flight but LAS had availability!

Though in time honoured traditional, it all changes - I left it for a few days and then all of a sudden there are stacks of reward seats in Upper from SFO on the Saturday I needed - so now all booked for SEA via SFO both ways.