Delta Skymiles Award Ticket - Skysaver Question

[missmulan]

I just earned two free "skysaver" awards (25,000 miles each RT)...I want to redeem the miles for two RT tickets in December but unfortunately, there are no award travel seats coming home.

My question: what are the chances of Delta opening up more award seats from now until December? How often should I be checking??

 

[seashoreCM]

You might wnat to investigate what it costs to cancel or change your reservation. If the penalty is not too bad, book now with a bogus return date, then check back every now and then to modify the return date to your liking.

Also see if the return could be booked on a partner airline, I think United is one of Delta's.

If you don[t mkae a ressie now, the outgoing flight could become unavailable too.

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[missmulan]

thanks for your response! i am just wondering how often they release award seats....*sigh*.....anyone know??

 

[cassie]

Good luck to you. Those sky savers are not the best flights from Ct. Since the best flights now are the sky choice, I've had a hard time redeeming 25,000 miles. Weekends are hard to find, and I was looking since last Dec for my May trip. My son lives in Orlando, so I booked an early evening flight on a Tuesday, and I will spend a few days at his home, then head over to Disney for a week. My return flight is on a Saturday at 8:00am, not happy about that, but that was the only option.

 

[cruiseonmagic]

When in Dec? If you mean Christmas, it probably won't happen because the flights will sell out anyway, however, award seats can be released anytime. I was a supervisor for UAL's mileage plus program for several years, and can tell you that the ones who can never use their miles are the ones who call once, complain, and give up. Remember, people only have so long before reservations cancel, and that happens every day. You can check for tickets on line, so check whenever you have time. If you can change dates by a day or two, each way, I would check that too. Be patient, don't panic and you have a good chance of getting what you are looking for.

One more thing--delts allows open-jaw trips--flying into one city, and leaving from another. Check into leaving from tampa or melbourne (just over an hour away).

 

[missmulan]

When in Dec? If you mean Christmas, it probably won't happen because the flights will sell out anyway, however, award seats can be released anytime. I was a supervisor for UAL's mileage plus program for several years, and can tell you that the ones who can never use their miles are the ones who call once, complain, and give up. Remember, people only have so long before reservations cancel, and that happens every day. You can check for tickets on line, so check whenever you have time. If you can change dates by a day or two, each way, I would check that too. Be patient, don't panic and you have a good chance of getting what you are looking for.

One more thing--delts allows open-jaw trips--flying into one city, and leaving from another. Check into leaving from tampa or melbourne (just over an hour away).

Cruiseonmagic: OMG, thank you, thank you for your advice. I was hoping someone with airline mileage job experience can answer me. I am going mid December....not quite Christmas time. I will be checking everyday because I could just kick myself for choosing Delta. It will be hard leaving from any other airport with two small children. It has to be MCO.

Cassie: you are right about those supersavers seats....no luck at all getting good flights or ANY flights for that matter. i diligently saved up 50000 miles on my Delta Amex just to do this and I am sooooo disappointed. It's not even a non stop flight!

Last year I turned in for 3 RT American Airlines tickets with no problems whatsoever....nonstop. Very happy with AA. I think from now on, I will focus on earning my miles with them instead.

Anyone else have any experiences to share with regards to award travel seats??

 

[AllyBri]

Anyone else have any experiences to share with regards to award travel seats??[/QUOTE]

We book 2-3 flights a years with Delta miles (skysaver) I like to book them online because they give you more miles. For January 06, nothing too good was showing up online, I took a chance and called Delta, they had exactly what was I looking for.

 

[missmulan]

when you talked with a delta rep, were they able to override the system and give you supersaver seats?? let me know if you think they have the authorization to give me supersaver seats.

 

[AllyBri]

when you talked with a delta rep, were they able to override the system and give you supersaver seats?? let me know if you think they have the authorization to give me supersaver seats.

I have only used my miles on Delta for Skysaver seats (25,000.)

 

[missmulan]

OOPS...

I've been saying "supersaver"....I meant "skysaver"....

Thanks for your response!

 

[rsschneck]

Anyone else have any experiences to share with regards to award travel seats??

We book 2-3 flights a years with Delta miles (skysaver) I like to book them online because they give you more miles. For January 06, nothing too good was showing up online, I took a chance and called Delta, they had exactly what was I looking for.

[/QUOTE]

Since Delta is charging for tickets booked with an employee did you get charged for booking Skymiles tickets through Delta and not online?

 

[AllyBri]

Since Delta is charging for tickets booked with an employee did you get charged for booking Skymiles tickets through Delta and not online?[/QUOTE]


Yes, I was charged $5. a ticket.

 

[cruiseonmagic]

when you talked with a delta rep, were they able to override the system and give you supersaver seats?? let me know if you think they have the authorization to give me supersaver seats.

The agent can not open 25k seats, and a supervisor will not open the seats--especially with over 7 months to go. The only time I ever did it is when a plane was basically empty with only a couple of weeks to go. I would confirm the passenger on an available flight (a flight that was acceptable for them), and put them on a wait list for the flight they wanted. Then I had to submit a request to inventory control to have the wait list cleared. Don't waste your time at this point. Just keep checking.

 

[mainelyj]

I am not happy with Delta and using our ff points. Anyway, I booked supersaver (25k) for 4 for our trip in August. I did this in January - thinking I had plenty of time. However, for the departure trip, after I booked 2 tickets, the flights were gone. I had to book the rest of the family on a different flight. For our return - which involved 3 transfers and getting into orlando 5 hours later than the rest of our part. There was nothing available in the 25k range for our return home. We decided to stay an extra day, which was fine with me. When I called Delta, there was nothing they could do to put us on the same flight, considering we are traveling with 2 children. Good thing I booked 1 adult and 1 child, first.

Anyway, because the flights I got stunk worse than a skunk, I paid $50 for each ticket to change our tickets and get the flights I really wanted. We still paid $60 per ticket, this was leaving Portland, Maine and flying into Orlando - which is an excellent deal and we got the "preferred" flights.

Bottom line, I was told by Delta to book tickets at the 365 day mark, to get your best ff seats. I heard this always does not work, either. Just keep checking, you never know.

 

[cruiseonmagic]

Bottom line, I was told by Delta to book tickets at the 365 day mark, to get your best ff seats. I heard this always does not work, either. Just keep checking, you never know.

Delta only goes out 331 days, and ff seats are not necessarily released on that 331st day.

 

[CarolA]

There is no method to when airlines release tickets. Check often. I find that tickets sometimes become avaialble when you wait!

Getting more then two tickets on a flight is not easy!

 

[Michelle2]

I don't know if this will help you, but since I used 4 skysaver awards and are going to MCO in December, I guess it is relevant even though we are in the West.
Well I had 4, and as you know that is alot to redeem especially when they are hard to come by and even harder in December. We leave on Thanksgiving day and return December 15th. At first no return flights were available, and the departing ones were not good times.... People are right when they say the closer to Christmas, the harder it is to get skysavers at all! I finally got a crummy 7:00 am flight returning on the day I wanted, but I noticed one day while I was checking online, they had changed the times of all their flights so the last 3:30 time slot with only 1 connection (the best we can get from Boise) suddenly became available for all 4 tickets I needed! I hurried and called and got them all. (I did have to pay a fee for doing it over the phone, and since I was combining a stopover and wanted to continue on SOng, I had to do it through their sales reps.) We were able to change from our 7 am flight without a penalty because we were on "waitlist" for the other one.

So call them and go on waitlist for the flight and time that you want, and you can always change it to a better flight if one opens up. And it does happen because it happened to us. So keep checking!

 

[cruiseonmagic]

There is no method to when airlines release tickets. Check often. I find that tickets sometimes become avaialble when you wait!

Getting more then two tickets on a flight is not easy!

Carol, I believe I hold the UAL record for ff tickets. I was able to help a "groom to be" get 37 tickets to Hawaii for his wedding. Using UAL, and Delta (who ual had an agreement with--I don't know if they still do), had all arriving within 8 hours of target time. Only took 3 weeks to get them

 

[ncbyrne]

If all else fails, you can also use 50,000 FF for one flight (depending on where you are flying from you might even get non-stop) and then just pay for the second seat.

 

[Lisa345]

I have also tried to book skysaver awards with frustrating results. Coming from CA I wanted 4 seats to MCO. I called 331 day ahead and there were no seats available. I was able to get to Gainesville. (I was willing to go just about anywhere in FL) I kept checking by phone (the website is not always up to date) and was able to get Sac - Melbourne (only an hour away from WDW). For the return, I again called 331 days out and nothing available. Was put on waiting list. They will let you waitlist for 14 days at a time. When your 14 days runs out they might extend your time depending on number of people on waitlist.
Long story-shortened.....I have 3 1st class tickets and had to buy one coach (husband gets coach). This was the only way I could use my miles. Thank goodness I had that many. Unfortunately I was looking in Feb. (Pres. week and Daytona 500) and I didn't realize that everyone was out of school this week. (We just started this vacation this year) Orlando is such a popular destination that they probably will not open award seats until closer to dates because they can usually sell them. I took the FC and bought one because I was afraid I wouldn't get anything, they were selling pretty quickly. You should check the website www.flyertalk.com. It is a forum for people who fly frequently and know all the tricks of redeeming miles.
Good luck and my best advice is be flexible. If we had been able to change our dates to midweek we would have had no problem.