I made reservations in June using Delta FF points. Terrible connections!

Over the weekend I looked at Delta and found something much better. They also have this "pay with miles" thing. I cancelled my previous ones, Delta put the miles back in my account, and I used "pay with miles" to get my new reservations. All this resulted in a net cost to me of just under $100 with various charges, refunds, and other savings by making this change. I now have the exact flights that I wanted and that I also had in Sept/Oct of this year.
I am also going to need reservations for the fall of 2009. I am not going to be in any hurry to get them. I don't think it is necessary.
I find the www.sidestep.com site a good one for checking fares. They compare all the sirlines and other sites. You can also set up a "watch" for your particular flights.

Joan

Joan-
I also saw the "pay with miles" thing on my account info, but didn't really know how this worked out. I'm planning on go from Cleveland to London in late feb/ early march and wanted to find the cheapest way. How did it work for you with the pay with miles?

It is basically $100 for each 10,000 miles.

Get your flights online..it will tell you which flights are eligible for "pay with miles"..you click on that and if you have enough miles for the whole thing then you can do that. If you don't have enough to pay with miles for the whole thing, then you pay the difference in cash.

Try it and you will find it is easy..you can back out any time before finalizing it.

They cannot do the "pay with miles" on the phone..only online.

I think "pay with miles" is only good for people who have a DL Amex. (Could be wrong on that)

Remember that you won't get mileage credit on that flight when you pay for your ticket this way.

CarolA is correct on both accounts, though it is a good option for last minute US travel when tix prices can be high and earning miles is less important, i.e. having to travel for funeral. Just my opinion on the latter example bit.

You don't earn miles on a FF ticket or a pay for miles ticket. I swapped one for the other.

I don't know how many offer a pay for miles venue. I am pretty much tied to Delta for my location, so have the Delta Amex card.

I received miles for half of my trip to Italy this past March, which was taken completely on FF miles.

Delta does not do that..you are lucky! All their Ff tickets say "no miles earned on FF tickets"...Different airlines have different policies....some obviously better than others. Delta has been making everything more difficult all the time....

Actually, I don't think it was the airline's policy here, either. But I didn't want to waste their time by pointing out the probable error.

I don't think I would either!!