We are hoping to book Skysaver seats for next summer. I know that Delta charges a $25 fee for seats booked by phone, but will a representative be better at finding available seats than I will be able to do online? Should I call at midnight on the first day seats are available?

The agent may be able to find seats on partner airlines that you can't find online.

Check online first. If you get what you want, you are finished.

But, a bigger problem has just appeared in my in-box;

Northwest - soon to be delta - is going to start charging for free flights. I have no doubt that delta fliers are getting the same notices.

Airline executives are the dumbest group of people in any idustry.

"free seats" are truly seats that would otherwise fly empty. While the number of passengers on a plane affects revenue, it doen't affect fuel cost.

There is also the minor problem of the airline points industry.

"Use our credit card and you can get a free flight you pay for"

huh?

To my knowledge, Delta, Continental, Northwest, Air France, Alaska, Hawaiian and maybe KLM are the only carriers that can be booked online. For any of the others, you'll need to call. There's also the issue of the Delta website being glitchy. You can call at midnight on the first day but there's no guarantee award inventory will be loaded at that time. However, it doesn't hurt to start checking as early as possible.

Thanks for your replies. Delta has partner airlines online now, but I wondered whether it's as complete as what the representatives have. This morning I was checking and found 4 seats online while a rep was telling me by phone that there were only 2 seats available. I wondered whether if I had tried to reserve those 4 seats, I would have found they really weren't available.

It doesn't seem fair that what are billed as free tickets now come with big taxes and a fuel surcharge, not to mention a potential booking fee.

Contplat-just to let you know that the number of passengers on a flight determine how much fuel is put on so fuel definitely is affected by "extra passengers".
I have worked numerous flights that had to be held for more fuel when we received passengers from other airlines.

*confirmed by my retired airline pilot husband

Huh? Award seats are those that will go out empty? Er... Sorry, but not on the airline I fly. Most of the flights I was on recently were packed full, and I was using an award. They definitely could have sold my seat as revenue if I hadn't claimed the award.

"To my knowledge, Delta, Continental, Northwest, Air France, Alaska, Hawaiian and maybe KLM are the only carriers that can be booked online."

Booking FF flights online? American and Midwest do it.

Keith

I looked at ff seats on line with AA, but found out that, instead of sitting at Dallas Fort Worth for 5 hours between flights, I could call AA and get a seat on Mexicana with only a 1 1/2 hour wait, as they are a partner airline. So I did pay for that service, but it was worth it to me. Just book on line if Delta has what you want.

Keith,
Those are the carriers that can be booked on delta.com using Skymiles.

Ahh. Thanks Patty.

Keith

Keith,
You can only book online AA metal; if your award involves an OW partner airline, you have to speak to an agent (See Pat's note).

"...but will a representative be better at finding available seats than I will be able to do online?"

Probably, especially if you are redeeming Skymiles from two different accounts and want to travel together as my wife and I wanted to do earlier this year.

We talked with a Skymiles representative on the phone and told her we wanted the same itinerary and wanted to sit next to each other. She did all the work and just placed a 24-hour hold on the tickets. The next day, I went back to the computer and booked the tickets (on hold) myself. No charge!

Orlando, how do you access the "on hold" tickets to purchase them yourself?

The held itinerary will show up in under Itineraries. You can click on Redeem Now or something like that to ticket. However, Delta's current policy is no award holds by phone. Telephone reservations are supposed to be ticketed immediately.

Patty's information ("Delta's current policy is no award holds by phone. Telephone reservations are supposed to be ticketed immediately.&quot is news to me. It must be a fairly recent development. Too bad.