cmstraf

Has anyone made the flight from San Francisco to Bangkok flying Economy Plus? We had hoped to use miles to fly business but may not have enough. Plan B of paying 1 business class ticket and flying one free got kind of squashed over the weekend when I saw a paid business class seat is around $6000 (I had hoped for 3500-4000, have never paid to fly business before).

We had an excellent experience flying Economy Plus to Paris in May, getting exit row seats in Economy Plus where there was just the two of us, but I see the plane to Bangkok is a 747.

I really miss the days when it was still possible to use miles to upgrade to business. Now is almost impossible unless you have High FF Status, which we don't

Thanks.

simpsonc510

Are you thinking of United Airlines ecenomy+ product or another airline? United no longer flies into Bangkok. You can fly to anyone of a number of stops in Asia and then continue to Bangkok on another carrier. I just returned from Bangkok via Tokyo Narita to Chicsgo. It was United and ANA combination.

rhkkmk

pick the seats in economy way in the back---rows 63-65--they are 2 seaters and have extra room wall to seat..

what about buying the extra miles you need??

we fly coach frpm boston to bkk every year... not all that bad... we take sleeping pills over the pacific..

Craig

I think the extra 5 inches of pitch (distance between seats) would make the long (11+ hours) flight to Narita more bearable. We always go for economy plus on long domestic flights and feel it is worth the extra $$. We always fly business class to Asia though. I think ANA has a premium economy class but I don't know if you can upgrade from economy. It would probably be worth a call to United as the flight to Bangkok is another 7 hours.

Craig

rhk's suggestion to buy miles is a good one...

cmstraf

Thanks. Yes, United to Tokyo, then ANA to Bangkok. We always pay the extra $$ for economy plus to fly from SF to Italy (husband is Italian) and find it worth it.

Buying miles is a great idea. I will look into it. I also realize to get free tickets on saver award I will have to do it a year and a day in advance, whereas I do not know if it will be possible to have definite dates in place for Bhutan 2015 by November. Oh well, a step at a time.

Just found out yesterday that the flight to Bangkok is so long (same length as LA-Papeete). Good to learn but sad to know. My hope had been 3-4. Not so much geography.

FromDC

If you need extra miles on United, you can get one of the Chase credit cards with a 50K mile bonus - - cheaper than buying miles - - but they won't be credited to your account right away.

Craig

The advance purchase time is 330 days (11 months), not a year and a day and although your chances will be best at that time, awards are often available for a while. If you don't have the Mileage Plus Explorer card from Chase, do look into it. We pretty much rack up all of our miles with our cards. There are various promotions - not all give you 50,000 miles...

cmstraf

Thanks, Craig and DC. We have an Explorer on our personal Visa, but a regular Visa on my United business card. Thanks also for telling me about the 330 days. I'm hoping we might get a super saver award rather than a regular one.

I'm going to upgrade my business card to Explorer right now.

cmstraf

Did it, but because it was an upgrade not a new membership, they gave me only 10,000 miles instead of 50,000. Still--not bad for the $35 increase in fee. Now we have 2 explorer cards.