Morning -

I am trying to book my dh on business class to Europe via AA - the dates are in Oct (I know a little late in the game).

There is some availablit for him to get there and back but the routing is not great and he is not the best traveler.

Looking for suggestions to "help" out the AA award desk. He is gold so that doesn't get much "juice" these days!

The area I want to get him to is Venice and out of Salzburg area - I have suggested Pisa, Milan, Venice.. any airport I am over looking?

Going home I suggested Salzburg and Munich - again any other airport?

Thanks in advance as always,
Dawn

Where from and dates?

sorry that would have helped!

It is around Oct 18, 2008 - LAX to Venice (or area)

I will be in Florence till Oct 18 and he wants to catch up with dd and I.

Departure around Oct 28 Salzburg (not any later) back to LAX

DD and I fly from Salzburg to London (Gatwich <sp&gt that day.

Except for Milan (where there is 1 available business class seat from JFK on Oct. 23 that I can see) all the airports mentioned are not served by AA directly; there would need to be a change of plane somewhere, most likely London or Brussels (since AA has partners with LHR and BRU hubs.) There appears to be decent availability to LHR from Boston on several days, and from Chicago on a few, so he'd need to get to BOS or ORD (which would be included in the award in first class if needed.)

Coming back, in order to avoid the cross-London yoga, the best bet would be via Madrid, or else get to Vienna, which BA serves from Heathrow.

Venice and Salzburg unfortunately are served by British Airways only from Gatwick airport, which AA doesn't serve any more. So those trips would require a cross-London connection, which is the pits. USA-LHR-Milan would probably be the quickest/easiest trip using AA flights across the pond. Alternatively, Iberia serves Venice from Madrid, and he could use AA's partner Iberia to Madrid from JFK, Miami, Boston or Chicago (or AA from MIA) and connect in Madrid. You need to speak to the Aadvantage people to find out about availability on Iberia or any other partner carrier - you can't book partner awards online.

Thanks Gardyloo - I spoke with them this morning (the AA desk) - and yes, you are spot on with the changing in London - which for the best traveler might be okay - but to know dh is to know he likes to keep it simple.

I was able to get him over to Venice with Iberia but getting him home was proving to be more of an issue.

How is Iberia in general?? It was via Madrid.

I like Iberia business class, although some flights within Europe are on small planes that don't have a business class section. For most of their intra-Europe flights the "business" cabin comprises the first few rows, with ordinary 3 x 3 coach seating, except the middle seat is not sold. Food and service are (in my experience) quite good, about on a par with first class on most domestic US flights.

On their long haul flights, I think their business class seats are great.

Iberia's lounges at Madrid airport are some of the best in Europe IMO.

gardyloo - thank you so much this is great information.

Gardyloo - thanks for the info on Iberia - we will be on several IB - b/c flights in Sep and will have a 3hr layover in Madrid. I have not heard good things about their service.

SD

I have not been able to make dh's miles work - too short of notice I imagine. I have tried Frankfurt, London, Madrid, Milan, Zurich etc..you name it. The issue is that he wants business class. There are actually 40,000 r/t tickets available if anyone is looking

Phone AA and ask about Moscow (DME) - Chicago on the 27th or 29th of October. He could get to DME via London or Budapest from several points in central Europe. From ORD it's no big deal to LAX. Might be a long couple of days, but doable.

Since your husband is bent on trying to fly business, my only suggestion is to do an upgrade, although "gold" is kind of the last tier in the pyramid.

I just returned 2 weeks ago and flew business on AA. The BRU-JFK flight has lots of empty seats and AA was actually advertising upgrades for €500. You might try that route. The BRU-ORD route is almost always full though, from my experience.

Joy it is on my list to call aa and see what it would be to buy economy and upgrade with miles. We upgraded with miles on the way home from Rome and it was lovely

If you buy a discounted coach fare (versus full coach fare), you will pay $300 each way for an upgrade to Europe as well as 25,000 miles each way. You need to put your name on a waiting list as soon as possible, but there is no guarantee that you will get an upgrade. You won't be charged the $300 unless you are actually upgraded. However, if you have to cancel your reservation for some reason, you will lose the $300 once you do receive the upgrade.

We have done this several times from DFW to FRA and were only denied an upgrade once out of the three times we requested it. We didn't find out that we had actually been upgraded until about 10 days or less before our flight.

so, if I understand correctly, you buy your Y ticket, and pay thru the nose for it, and then request the upgrade with miles, paying the surcharge, and are not guaranteed the upgrade on the spot? Is this the same with all airlines, particularly Delta or just AA?

I don't know about Delta.

However, we paid only $700 for our ticket from HOU to FRA and another $300 +25k miles for a one way upgrade in Biz Class. We felt it was well worth it.

We booked our ticket about 5 months in advance and put our name on the waitlist. We did not get an upgrade on our flight out of DFW last Sept. because Biz Class was full but we were able to get the upgrade on our return from FRA. This is the first time we did not get our requested upgrade.

If you are able to do a round trip upgrade in Biz Class, you would pay $600 plus 50k miles. You'd need 90k miles for a free milesaver Biz Class ticket.

Momliz,
On Delta, you have to buy a Y, B or M fare to be able to upgrade with miles. Upgrades are confirmed if upgrade space is available. If not, then yes you'd be waitlisted on a very expensive economy ticket with no guarantee of getting the upgrade.

BTW it's the same with AA. You'd only waitlist if upgrade space was not available to confirm.