USAir/FF Miles Driving Me CRAZY!

[plutospup]

I'm trying to book air from Pennsylvania (anywhere-IPT,MDT,ABE, PHL, ABE, AVP, even BWI) to MCO 2/27/04 to 3/6 or 7/04. USAir Reps, as well as their website says no coach seats are available. However, one rep said the "load has not been assessed". Does this mean seats may become available? Do I have a hope, even a prayer of using FF miles to get free seats?
Thanx for your help.

 

[DebbieB]

They do sometimes add seats. One time I got seats for early December at the end of May. USAir seems to change their flight schedules the first Sunday of the month. This is the time to check. One nice thing now is you can check online rather than keep calling. I know I checked for this December awhile ago and they had no flights on Saturday but now they do. The only problem is now they don't have any for the return date!

 

[CarolA]

It looks like you may be booking at least one of these on a holiday date. That could make it harder. Make sure you are not hitting any of the blackout dates. My advice is to book 330 days ahead if at all possible.

 

[plutospup]

Thanx DebbieB. Hopefully, I'll find "free" seats. Worse case scenario we'll have to purchase the seats. Either way, we'll be cruising on the Magic 2/28/04!

 

[TeenaS]

In January, one of the guys I work with had enough miles for his entire family to fly from MDT to MCO. The only way he could get 4 free tickets with his dividend miles was to fly a round-about way. I believe USAir had them go from MDT to Pittsburgh, then somewhere else and then MCO. But he told them he was willing to fly all day as long as he could use his dividend miles. They worked with him and got him there. They told him there was no way they would release that many free tickets on the days he was flying to Orlando because those flights were always filled from MDT so they flew him somewhere else where he picked up a commuter for the last leg of the flight and it turned out that route was available for free dividend mile tickets.

I personally save my miles for upgrades. I pay my daughter's college tuition on my USAir VISA. I find I can normally get a ticket from MDT to MCO for around $175 and if I fly from BWI or Philly even less. I purchase them and save my miles for upgrades to the west coast. I feel I get more for my miles that way. We fly out to visit Disneyland and also visit Vegas at least twice a year. I wait for a sale (usually around $225) to the west, buy the ticket and use my miles to upgrade to first class. I recently purchased Vegas tickets for $225 each. I priced the same flights for first class and it was over $2000 each. So I bought the $225 tickets and used my miles to upgrade to first class. I hate that 5 hour flight and it makes it much more pleasant to fly first class. I feel I get more out of my money that way. I have also found that when we fly to MCO, I always book a flight at the busiest time (Saturday mornings are good). 75% of the time it is overbooked and they ask for volunteers. I always volunteer, end up getting to Orlando about 2-3 hours later than anticipated but I have a free roundtrip ticket in hand for my next trip somewhere.

 

[RobinLyn]

We just flew to MCO out of PHL non-stop, 9 FF tickets with USAirways, 4 adults and 5 teens (two families) round trip, April 30 - May 6, 2003. Don't give up hope, it may be to early yet for released FF seats for those flights/dates. Keep trying and ask questions about release dates. Sooner or later you will get someone with a bit of knowledge to help you

 

[plutospup]

Thanks everyone for your support, and suggestions. It gives me hope!

 

[Goofy Fan]

IMO, it is far too early to be booking FF miles for those dates in '04. The airline will sit back and watch reservations and adjust FF seats accordingly. I had a recent experience with trying to use FF miles to upgrade to first class for a trip to WDW. I could use a website whete I could see seat assignments, and the first class seats were empty 5 months out. They would not redeem any FF miles for me until I got past the 2 month mark. I don't think you'll have to wait until 2 months out, but I suspect you won't get any positive info until about 6 months out.

 

[mcnuss]

Plutospup - I am Chairman's Preferred with US so I gave the website a quick try to see what I could get just in case you were hitting a blackout (excuse me if I overstepped and you are CP too) and the best I could find was PHL-MCO on 2/25 return on 3/9!! I understand your frustration, unfortunately, you are dealing with airports that have seen major cutbacks in service so there are fewer flights to begin with. Fridays and Saturdays are the most peak days, and that is prime spring break time, so you may have trouble. I like the other posters idea of using your 20k miles to upgrade your purchased tickets. Before I made CP, I did that a lot.

It's true that they may re-assess the load factors but you will have to keep checking a lot.

Good luck.

 

[Letsbgoofy]

I called 331 days out for our trip to CA this summer. At that time, no seats were being released for weekend travel. I took the weekday flights, and changed my mile earning card to Delta.

I have been calling weekly trying to get a Saturday flight, and USAirways still has not released any weekend flights (for my travel plans). At one point the fare was down to $285 (from the $601 we paid for our extra ticket) and they still were not booking seats on weekend flights.

 

[plutospup]

mcnuss, thanks for checking!

Letsbgoofy, I hope you got a credit voucher for the difference in price for your extra ticket.

I'm going to continue to keep an eye on USAir & United's FF seats. However, as we get closer I'm going to take a look at SE Airlines from Allentown (ABE) to Sanford, as well as other local carriers. I might just use those FF miles for some other off the wall trip somewhere other than Florida.