Topic Wiki

Please follow the following rules when posting in this thread. Failure to do so may result in you request being ignored or deleted.

(If you are looking to purchase a paid ticket, please post here)

FAQs:

Q: How can I use my credit card points to book a USA-TLV ticket?
A: Please read Dan's very helpful and informative guides found here and here

Great tool to see the mileage cost for a route http://www.awardhacker.com

Q: Do I have to pay a lot of money when using miles for a ticket?

A: Sometimes. For more information read this

Q: How do I find award availability?
A: For Star Alliance (United, AirCanada, Lufthansa, Swiss, and others) see this guide

For OneWorld (AmericanAirlines, BritishAirways, Iberia, Malev, and more) You can use BA's award search engine (you need to have a free BA account to access the engine). In addition, you can use Qantas' engine (free account needed as well), which will (to an extent) search Elal. As of this posting, the Elal business flights that show up are coach, and vice verse.

For Delta and AirFrance, use their respective sites. While not perfect, they are quite manageable for the casual searcher.

And of course, many of us here will take time out to help someone who is trying to learn.

Q: All this searching is making me crazy. Is there an easier way?
A: Yes, but it might cost you. Check out AwardNexus.com, KVStool.com, and expertflyer.com.

Q: I see AirCanada availability, but when I call AirCanada they say I can't use my United miles with them. Aren't they partners?
A: You can only use miles with the airline that issued them. Through that airline (in our case United) they can issue a ticket on a partner (ie AirCanada). Trying to call AirCanada with United miles, is like trying to use shekels in Mexico.

Q: I can't find availability on my dates. What should I do?
A: You should try to be as flexible as possible. Can you add a stop or 2? Can you be more flexible with your dates? The airports?
If all else fails, keep trying. Availability is constantly opening up.

Q: Can someone please help me find a ticket?
A: No! Find it yourself.  ;D ;D Just kidding. Please copy the following lines, delete the non bolded parts, and fill it out in your post.

One way/Round-trip:
Non-stop/Maximum stops/Any:
From: All airports from which you can depart
To: All airports which you can arrive at. For multiple destinations, just keep adding this line
Departure dates: All possible dates that you can depart on. Please be as specific as possible.
Return airports:If different from 'To' line. Delete this line for One-way tickets
Return dates: Delete this line for One-way tickets
Class: First/Business/Coach/Any
Seats: Total number of people traveling over the age of 2
Alliance/Airline: What airline or alliance are you looking to fly with

IF you have any airline status or credit cards (Ie, United CC or status) that gives extended seat availability, please add that. Would be helpful to find you correct availability.

An additional note about using miles for direct flights from NYC-TLV

NYC-TLV is only served by 3 carriers non-stop, United, Delta, and El Al. Saver availability on Delta is non-existent. Saver availability on United is rare but sometimes available close-in. It is almost never available on or near holidays or holiday weekends, or around yomim tovim. Any award space that opens will be snatched up immediately so you have to constantly be checking if you hope to snag it if/when it opens. El AL awards are more readily available but prohibitively expensive using Matmid points (El Al's frequent flyer program) but may be able to be booked using Quantas points (transfers from Citi & Amex) at a much more reasonable rate.

This leaves the following options if no saver availability:

The Chase travel portal will let you use Ultimate Rewards, or a combination or UR and cash to book flights. If you have a Sapphire Reserve or a Sapphire Preferred, the redemption rate will be 1.5 cents per point or 1.25 cents per point respectively, instead of the regular 1 cent per point without them. (A, Ink cash or Ink Preferred will also give you the 1.25 cpp redemption rate.)

The Amex travel portal will let you redeem points at 1 cent per point towards the cost of air travel. If you have a grandfathered Business Platinum card, you will get 50% of the points you redeem back around a month after you book the ticket. If you have a non-grandfathered card, you will get 35% of your points back. (This is only available when redeeming points for tickets on your selected American carrier in economy class or on any airline in business or first class.)

The Citi travel portal also lets you redeem points at 1 cent per point towards travel and seems to have better pricing on El Al in business class.

Alternatively, you can sell your points (not here on DDF) and use the cash to buy regular tickets. This is usually the best option for people without either a Chase Sapphire Reserve or grandfathered Business Platinum who are flying economy.

Those are your only options for nonstop travel. For options with a stopover and more information in general, see https://www.dansdeals.com/points-travel/milespoints/the-ultimate-israel-mileage-award-chart/

This keeps on getting asked over and over. Besides Dan's comprehensive list of how to get to, or from, TLV here is a short list of options for travel to or from NYC in Y:
Lowest point per RT is FB 50K (less with promo, but YQ of ~$500 unless you can find unicorn DL availability), AA 80k (AA metal for transatlantic), AC 80k (LX or LO for low YQ) and UA 85k. Half that for OW.

Please add any other information to this wiki that you feel might be useful.



Author Topic: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)  (Read 1838736 times)

Offline @mike

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8500 on: February 06, 2018, 04:08:15 PM »
Non-stop/Maximum stops/Any: Any
From: NYC, BOS, PHL, PIT, CLE, YYZ, ORD
To: TLV
Departure dates: July or August( flexible)
Return dates: Two Weeks later -July or August
Class: Coach
Seats: 4
Alliance/Airline: Any( other than Turkish)

I have some points available( 60k Alaska, 50k CR, 60k Jetblue) and will work on accumulating more on the best way to get to TLV.

Offline NF2018

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8501 on: February 06, 2018, 04:12:53 PM »
Round trip
Non-stop
From: NYC Area (maybe even Newark if its much cheaper)
To: Tlv
Departure dates: Late June and Early July
Return airports: NYC
Return dates: Late July (but before July 28)
Class: Any
Seats: 3
Alliance/Airline: Delta* (Not Turkish)
*I have 130k Delta Skypesos and 100k UR points Saphire Reserve

Offline Moshe26

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8502 on: February 07, 2018, 10:45:33 AM »
Hi. any DDFs out there can help me out? i know in united.com i can book for around 150K round trip but im trying to find out if there are better option/ searches i can do. looking for:
Round trip
stop / Non-stop (not too long of a stop unless in Madrid)
From: Tlv
To: NYC
Departure dates: anytime between Mar 4-6 (7th would be a stretch)
Return airports: NYC
Return dates: April 8-9
Class: Business
Seats: 1

Offline Abelefko1

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8503 on: February 07, 2018, 11:25:45 AM »
Round trip
Non-stop
From: NYC Area (maybe even Newark if its much cheaper)
To: Tlv
Departure dates: Late June and Early July
Return airports: NYC
Return dates: Late July (but before July 28)
Class: Any
Seats: 3
Alliance/Airline: Delta* (Not Turkish)
*I have 130k Delta Skypesos and 100k UR points Saphire Reserve
By Nyc area you mean boro Park or Flatbush 🤣🤣

Offline mmgfarb

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8504 on: February 07, 2018, 01:15:16 PM »
Hi. any DDFs out there can help me out? i know in united.com i can book for around 150K round trip but im trying to find out if there are better option/ searches i can do. looking for:
Round trip
stop / Non-stop (not too long of a stop unless in Madrid)
From: Tlv
To: NYC
Departure dates: anytime between Mar 4-6 (7th would be a stretch)
Return airports: NYC
Return dates: April 8-9
Class: Business
Seats: 1
What airlines have availability? Are you only looking at *A?
"JS [is] a fetid cesspool of unvarnished linguistic manure, with lots of useless drivel and post-padding." -Moishebatchy

Offline NF2018

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8505 on: February 07, 2018, 03:45:50 PM »
By Nyc area you mean boro Park or Flatbush 🤣🤣
No.

Offline Moshe26

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8506 on: February 07, 2018, 05:00:06 PM »
What airlines have availability? Are you only looking at *A?
on the way to NYC I see availability on LH and LX and some others with normal stop over. but on the way back I don't see any availability with a stop less than 10 hours.
ive also checked OW on JAL but the only real option was AF and the stop is too long. and also on OW wasn't able to find any availability for the flight back on Apr 9-10

Offline davidrotts63

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8507 on: February 12, 2018, 09:07:35 PM »
Round-trip
Non-stop
From: NYC, PHL
To: TLV
Departure date: March 25
Return dates: April 12
Class: Business
Seats: 1
Alliance/Airline: Any
(Quit) pulling out the flowers, and watering the weeds. -Peter Lynch

Offline helpyouamdme

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8508 on: February 13, 2018, 08:10:51 AM »
NYC-MIA/FLL Feb 15

Offline letav_aved

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8509 on: February 13, 2018, 11:52:48 PM »
looking for first class tickets (2) from las vegas to EWR- March 26- April 18

Offline yud aleph

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8510 on: February 18, 2018, 06:40:26 PM »
round-trip
Non-stop/Maximum stops/Any:- 1 STOP
From: All airports from which you can depart- NYC
To: All airports which you can arrive at. TLV
Departure dates: All possible dates that you can depart on. FLEXIBLE WEEK AFTER TISHA BAV JULY 22 2018
Return dates: Delete this line for One-way tickets - 4 WEEKS AFTER DEPARTURE
Class: First/Business/Coach/Any- LEAST EXPENSIVE
Seats: Total number of people traveling over the age of 2 -4
Alliance/Airline: What airline or alliance are you looking to fly with I HAVE 250K BA MILES

Offline nishtposhut

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8511 on: February 19, 2018, 10:04:57 AM »
I'm looking to stop in Zurich on way to Israel for a few days on a one way. Is my best option to book two different award flights, or is there a way to combine for less miles? I plan on using UR points.
Thanks!

Offline yelped

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8512 on: February 19, 2018, 10:22:49 AM »
Use Singapore KrisFlyer miles.

Offline nishtposhut

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8513 on: February 19, 2018, 10:38:41 AM »
Thanks, less miles, but there's only Swissair on my date, =a lot of fees through KrisFlyer.  Any way around that?
Thanks!

Offline high end hobo

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8514 on: February 19, 2018, 12:15:31 PM »
Thanks, less miles, but there's only Swissair on my date, =a lot of fees through KrisFlyer.  Any way around that?
Thanks!
use AC, no YQ, free stop

Offline nishtposhut

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8515 on: February 19, 2018, 06:18:29 PM »
Thanks!! I guess that has to be done by phone...

Offline Alex519

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8516 on: February 20, 2018, 07:14:40 AM »
Hi everyone! It is my first time on the site and I am looking for a way to find cheap flights to Israel and Spain.
I am looking to go in the Month of July

Any suggestions would be helpful.


Alex

Offline hvaces42

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8517 on: February 20, 2018, 07:17:47 AM »
Hi everyone! It is my first time on the site and I am looking for a way to find cheap flights to Israel and Spain.
I am looking to go in the Month of July

Any suggestions would be helpful.


Alex
Welcome to DDF. It would be helpful if you followed the format in the wiki. This thread is for award flights. "Cheap" flight requeats usually belong in the Paid flight thread. Also, we dont need your exact address. It shows up under location.
Fair warning - Any PMs sent in response to forum posts are fair game for ridicule in public.

Offline high end hobo

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8518 on: February 20, 2018, 09:37:33 AM »
Thanks!! I guess that has to be done by phone...
no it shows online on AC site

Offline yman

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Re: Need help finding a ticket? Post here! Award ticket edition (Master thread)
« Reply #8519 on: February 20, 2018, 03:25:27 PM »
Round-trip: Roundtrip for month of Nissan
Non-stop/Maximum stops/Any: non-stop or 1 stopover
From: TLV
To: DEN
Departure dates: MAR 18, MAR 19, MAR 20
Return airports: Open to the possibility of traveling to NYC (incl EWR) or DEN at a later date
Return dates: April 11th or April 12th
Class: Any-cheapest
Seats: 2 adults
Alliance/Airline: No preference; I have Chase UR points, I also have FREQ Flyer accounts with almost everyone

Shkoyach in Advance for your help, my wife rathers I spend time learning than to research tickets :) BIG ZECHUS
« Last Edit: February 20, 2018, 03:47:44 PM by jmldude »