I hope it does finally happen this year. The initial announcement was made about 2 years ago http://www.fodors.com/forums/threadselect.jsp?fid=4&tid=34633149

That would be nice, but as Patty says, it has been in the works for years, always rumoured to only be a short while away.

If they do join, I would love it because I am currently using Delta miles to fly to Nairobi later this year in late December returning early January, and the other rumour is that when Kenya Airways joins, either Delta or Kenya Airways may initiate service between JFK or ATL and NBO. It would be great to fly directly to Nairobi from the US and skip Europe.

With my luck it will all be up and running, new routes and all, around mid-January next year.

A non-stop flight from the States to NBO would be great regardless who flies the route.

But, first Kenya has got to do something about their international airport. Word has it that they're upgrading, but there is no sign of it and improvement is dearly required. There is no signage at the departure gates, arrival/departure screens never seem to be operating, the air conditioning is almost (if not completely) non-existent. Honestly, they should be ashamed.

Hey, don't fix the current terminal. There's plenty of land to simply build a new one and they had better get cracking on this.

My two-cents - on this recent return seeing passengers and crew almost passing out from the heat inside a totally non-air conditioned, no window shades/protected gate, awaiting departure.

TIA - "This is Africa" is getting old when it comes to the JKIA terminal!

An "associate" is not the same as a member in terms of joint mileage earn/burn schemes etc. It may mean nothing more than schedule synchronization and improved interline ticketing and baggage provisions.

Well that's too bad if they don't do more than that. But I guess even that will help me, since I am flying from NBO to CDG on Kenya Airways, then connecting on AF to IAH. Even being able to check my bags NBO-IAH would be a benefit.

This article mentions September http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2007/06/26/215192/skyteam-plots-slot-trade.html

Meanwhile, SkyTeam says China Southern will be ready to join as its 11th full member in November, while Spain's Air Europa, Panama's Copa and Kenya Airways are on track to join as associate members in September.

We'll see!

That's only two months out. The story probably has more credibility than previous ones since it makes a prediction so close away.

Does anyone have info on what it will mean to be an "associate member"? Will we be able to redeem Delta SkyMiles in Kenya Airways flights from September 2007 (assuming they are elevated to associate member status in two months)?

Michael

I would guess that to be the case. KQ is already a WP partner with NW, but not SkyTeam, of course. You can accrue miles by flying KQ but not EQM, and you can use NW FF miles for KQ tickets/legs, as I did for my upcoming trip. DL doesn't show any affiliation on their website right now, so my guess would be if they are made associate members, you will be able to accrue/redeem miles, but accrued miles may not be EQM/MQM - or perhaps only certain fare classes will qualify for EQM/MQM. I suppose the possibilities are endless where airlines and their rules are concerned.

I don't know the answer, Michael, but I was planning to redeem my 2008 tickets next month and am considering holding off until an official announcement. It would certainly open up a lot of possibilities if we could redeem Skymiles on KQ flights, many more destinations, being able to combine different African regions, not to mention linking Africa and Asia on a RTW award without going through Europe. I need to stop salivating

SkyTeam adds three new associate airlines

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Today, September 4, 2007, SkyTeam welcomed the first ever SkyTeam Associates: Air Europa, Copa Airlines and Kenya Airways. SkyTeam Associates participate in the frequent flyer mileage program (accrual and redemption) and enjoy airport lounge reciprocity with all SkyTeam members. All other policies and procedures follow standard interline guidelines. There are currently no codeshare agreements with SkyTeam Associates.

SkyTeam Associate Sponsor FFP Program
Air Europa (Spain) Air France Flying Blue
Copa Airlines (Panama) Continental OnePass
Kenya Airways (Kenya) KLM Flying Blue

i just called and used skymiles for an award ticket to NBO using kenya air part of the way. it does work!!!

Yipeee, me tooo!

Many of you know my saga trying to get my family to Africa this Christmas on Skymiles. I was able to book the whole trip from the US except for one segment. I couldn't get any award seats back from NBO to anywhere in Europe on any airline, so I ultimately paid for three business class seats one way from NBO to CDG on Kenya Airways.

Well today my dream came true. After I saw this post was updated I called Delta and just like that they put me on the same Kenya Airways flight NBO-CDG for free. OK, it cost another 15,000 miles per ticket, but given the actual dollar cost per ticket ($2,375), I saved $7,125. (OK again, I did have to pay $75 per ticket re-ticketing fee, but I think you get the picture.)

But let's not stop there. It gets better. My return is actually from Kigali, so I asked the agent to include that segment (KGL-NBO) as well, and she did for no additional miles. That's another $370x3=$1,100.

Total savings=$8,225, for 45,000 miles.

I still have to get Kenya Airways to refund all this money on my purchased tickets (and clear up my double bookings), but the fares are all refundable so I should make out OK.

Kenya Airways has destinations everywhere in Africa, so everyone with Skymiles come on down and get yourself some. Thanks thit cho for the news!!

Great news!

sevendown,
Can you refresh my memory if they'd originally given you a 15,000 mile discount per ticket because there was no availability on the NBO-Europe segment (I seem to have a vague recollection of that)? So your complete itinerary is now costing 120,000 miles each or are you saying that they required an additional 15,000 for a total of 135,000 per ticket? If the latter is the case, do you know what triggered the additional 15,000?

I'm currently holding reservations for next February on KL flights to NBO. I prefer to go in June but at the time that I booked (last month), there was no availability on the KL flights for June. I should've just waited another month but I have no impulse control whatsoever With the additional KQ, I'm going to try to change my dates now. It sounds like DL was able to confirm your KQ flights right away so they have "live" access to KQ award inventory, is that correct?

I'm also toying with the idea of adding a few days in the Seychelles. I currently have a stopover in Amsterdam but the Seychelles sounds better to me Plus I feel I need to take full advantage of the addition of KQ with some more exotic stopover. I thought of DXB as well but fear I'd melt in their summer

Did you get your refund from KQ yet?

Wish me luck!

OK, I did it! I made a new set of reservations for LAX-CDG-AMS-NBO(stopover)-NBO-SEZ(destination)/SEZ-NBO-CDG-LAX. It's still for the late January/February time frame (I quickly realized getting the transatlantic segments in June would be difficult), but I can live with that. Agent confirmed it's still 120,000 miles for the new itinerary. I've yet to cancel and redeposit the old award as I want to make sure I can shift our safari dates. We're spending most of our time in Tsavo so hopefully availability won't be a problem. I also made award reservations at the Hilton Northolme for 4 nights using 125,000 HHonors points. Now I have to find out what there is to do there. Hope the weather's nice in February. I know almost nothing about the Seychelles!

KQ award availability seems to be very good, at least at the moment. I had no problems getting my first choice dates for the segments I needed (AMS-NBO-SEZ/SEZ-NBO-CDG) even though it was a complete shot in the dark as I know of no online tool to check KQ award availability myself. I basically looked up transatlantic availability on AF, hoped I could get the KQ flights, called DL and voila!

For anyone looking to redeem DL miles on KQ, I was told that only partner award agents are able to book KQ (could change later). Regular international award agents can't do it, so you have to ask to be transferred to the partner award desk (I know of no way to get there through the automated phone prompts anymore, you used to be able to do this). I wasted a few minutes with an intl agent before she realized KQ was the only Skyteam carrier serving SEZ and transferred me, but once I got to partner awards, this was one of the easiest award reservations I've ever made!

Just received an email from my tour op confirming the new dates are OK, yippee!

Are you guys calling KQ directly for your seat assignments?

Patty -

So the Northolme is now a Hilton property! Know the hotel was refurbished a few years after we had stayed... believe within the past 5/yrs. Whether further work since Hilton in charge can't say. The hotel is located on a bluff, own beach, own dive center and spa. Small, but rooms on different levels. The lower down, a bit damp... but then the island is damp. There is a/c, so shouldn't be an issue.

Great idea is to rent one of those cute convertible red cars (or are they yellow) and ride around the island. Can cover the entire island in 1/day... it can be fun. It's easy, with lots of remote "anse" (cove-like) beaches at which to stop. But do watch if wishing to swim as there are no lifeguards... they're remote. Victoria, the capitol is interesting for shopping... can bus between hotel thru the mountains.

Are you only going to stay on Mahe Island? Do tours to Praslin or La Digue? Easier to do tours if staying on Praslin, i.e., to La Digue. Mahe/Praslin flight time is 15/min, but by boat much much longer.

Wish I could include a return trip to SEZ, but this time stay on North Island, ha! ha! I'm dreaming, again!

Patty, that's a great use of frequent flyer miles. Based on my experience with several carriers, I find Delta among the easiest with which to work, which is one of the reasons I try to fly on SkyTeam carrier. I booked this week my trip for next August (into Baku, Azerbaijan and back from Yerevan, Armenia), and it took about 3 minutes on the phone with Delta (and only 50,000 miles -- Delta considers the Caucasus region, technically in Asia, to fall within Europe for frequent flyer purposes).

Thanks, Michael! Excellent that their definition of Europe extends that far.

Thanks, Sandi! Yes, unfortunately only 4 nights on Mahe. I'm sure it'll leave us wanting more, but that's all the time we could spare and I already had to cut the Kenya portion down by 1 night. I'm just excited to be going! Here's what I could find about renos and when Hilton took over http://www.helicopterseychelles.com/northolme.html

Thanks for the advice on what to do. So is Praslin the easiest island to day trip to from Mahe or is it fairly easy to get to La Digue too? If we only do one day trip, which should we do?

Patty -- I was traveling yesterday and just saw your post. As you have already found out, my round trip to Africa is 120,000. They had given the 15,000 discount when I could not get the NBO-Europe portion, but now that I have that on KQ, it went up from 105,000 to 120,000.

Yes, I was so surprised at how easy it was to book the KQ flights with miles. In fact, I just didn't believe it at first, and made the agent check and double check everything. The agent did in fact have live access to the KQ inventory, so it went smoothly (unlike every time I tried to check KL inventory -- 5-10 minutes on hold). I also had my TA call Kenya Air in Houston, and they checked and found my reservation booked through Delta.

No, I haven't received my refund for my KQ paper tickets, but I was told that could take a month or so.

On getting the seat assignments, I am not sure how to do that. I don't know if I call Kenya Air in Houston and they can do it. Hopefully I don't have to call Nairobi. Anyway, Kenya Air doesnt open up its seating charts until 90 days out, and I have another couple of weeks to then.

Glad you got the KQ tickets. I have

Patty -- I got my seating assignments on Kenya Airways over the weekend -- approximately 88 days or so before my flight. (I had tried 92 days out and they couldn't do it.) Just call the Kenya Airways number here in the US (866-536-9224), give them the flight number, date and names of passengers, and it's a breeze.

It was reassuring that they found my reservation made through Delta on Skymiles.

Now if I can just get my refund for the tickets I returned. It's been over a month, and my travel agent is being told by Kenya Airways that their credit card refund machine is broken, and it will be another 6-8 weeks. Yea, right.

How much fun!!

Thanks, sevendown! Did they tell you how many rows of 2-1-2(?) are on the 763? I just changed our outbound date again last week to fly one day earlier so we could go LAX-CDG-NBO instead of LAX-CDG-AMS-NBO so will be on the 763 both directions. From what I understand, the seats aren't as nice as the 772 but I was able to reduce our overall travel time by 8 hours.

Just an update to my earlier post, on my last two calls intl agents were able to look up KQ availability for me. I didn't need to speak with partner awards.

No, they didn't tell me how many rows total, but they did confirm the configuration in business class is 2-1-2.

Looking at ExpertFlyer, it shows there are 10 rows in business class, but that may be high. One thing I did learn from ExpertFlyer, is that it appears only Rows 2, 3 and 4 are available for pre-assignment. Row 1 and Rows 5-10 show blocked out on ExpertFlyer. (I chose row 2.)

The 763 J class has 5 rows. Best rows are 2-4 as row 1 is near the galley/toilet and row 5 is near the rear toilet and Y class galley.

Thanks, guys!

roadwarriorafrica,
Do you know the seating arrangement on the 737 to/from SEZ? Is it 4 rows of 2-2?

CORRUPTED KENYA AIRWAYS
Posted: Thu October 18, 2007 03:49 PM UTC
WARNING: Stay away from Kenya Airways... They overbook their flights, and DO NOT REFUND you for any compansation whatsoever.. We booked our flight over 9 months ago with them, and upon check in, they advised us that the overbooked and we were bumped. We lost over 7000$ USD because of their irresponsible behaviour and they refuse to compensate any of it. We were stuck in the Nairobi terminal with no food, water or any telephone to call our agent for over 9 hours!!! YOu are better off flying with a reputable provider that will not ruin your holiday and will actually comply with it's reservation policies. The staff were unhelpful, rude, lying and overall, the don't deserve to be the "Pride of Africa" more the " Shame of Africa". We were two out of several people who got bumped from this flight. All of us who didn't get refunded or a simple sorry. STAY AWAY from this airline from hell!

Hi kqsucks,
It would help if you gave more details about your experience. From where to where were you flying? Once they informed you that you were involuntarily denied boarding, did they offer to rebook you on other flights? If so, when was the next available flight? Was it on KQ or another carrier? How exactly did you lose $7000?