FLYING TO EUROPE WITH MILES

I would start calling now and if no seats are available call every few days. I know with United that you can go to their website and book flights using your miles, I have done that in the past.

It is difficult to land a miles tix for the summer espec 2. However call mileage plus and discuss it with them. They have always been very helpful to me for such questions. You might also be open to other airports nearby as Manchester or Glasgow. Previously for my summer ff tix for Europe I started in late Jan or early Feb.

Because London and Dublin are so close, you might want to try to get a round trip to London with a stop over in Dublin. Or vice-versa. That might be easier.

We booked "free" flights into Dublin and out of Edinburgh for March 2009. Seats typically open up on airlines 330 days in advance and we were able to secure itineraries that we wanted. The airline also said that as they get closer to the actual time of flight, oftentimes additional seats are opened up for "free" travel, but they usually hold off as they would prefer to sell the seats for some revenue. My recommendation would be to keep calling in as you never know when those seats will be released for mileage. Also, be forewarned that you're still responsible for the taxes, etc. Our "free" tickets were still almost $200/person, but can't complain versus paying for full fares!

You need to be well versed in routings etc. in order to use your miles though it is definitely doable. I am always booking 4 tickets at a time through UA and generally can snag the tickets I want.

In fact, I have 4 tickets for next summer, flying DEN to Split, Croatia and coming back out from Chisinev, Moldova into Denver. You need to be extremely flexible and willing to connect in different cities.

In fact, I just changed my routing on the outbound last Friday from Denver-Calgary-Frankfurt-Split to do DEN-Boston-FRA. So the tickets are there.

Email me if you need tips or routing suggestions. And do remember, it normally is better to fly the Star Alliance partners so don't limit yourself to just UA.

Arnold, do you know who the Star Alliance Partners are for UA? Is it Lufthansa?

The Star alliance partners (European ones) include the following:
Lufthansa,
Austrian,
Swiss,
BMI (British Midland),
Scandanavian,
Croatian,
TAP (Portuguese carrier),
LOT (Polish),
Turkish

and lots of smaller partners - In fact I have flown on Air Dolomiti (partner of LH) and am scheduled to fly on Tyrolean (Austrian partner or subsidiary).

In fact, since UA tickets allow for a stopover (only one unfortunately - also note, you cannot have both a stopover and an open jaw), you do not need to fly an open jaw given where you want to go. You can get a ticket to Dublin and just use London as a stopover on either the outbound or return journey.

The only way I get seats on the AA flights I want is by reserving 330 days in advance. I always get non stop flights leaving when I choose and seats where I want them on the plane.
From my experience you can learn that requesting seats as early as possible increases your chances. An agent told me that on some flights there are only 3 or 4 seats reserved for frequent flyers.
I always reserve with an agent and not on the webpage so I can ask about other flights on other days than I choose. Being flexible will help.

I just booked two mileage tickets (open jaw) into London and returning from Paris for May '09 (7 months in advance) on AA and had no problem finding availability. Maybe they open more seats to award tickets than other carriers?

Start now to book two free seats on United and aim for August.............or September............it will take you several hours/days to put this together on their website.........I did it but it took lots of time to keep requesting options................I recommend going in and out of London.......

Just responding to Beth comments. If you limit yourself to just UA, you may have a very tough time getting seats. There are lots of other Star alliance carriers that your UA miles will get you a seat on. You can't check this availability on UA's website. You either need to access a tool such as ANA's website to check availability or call UA.

Sharon -
Have you tried to book it online? I booked my (single) ticket from Columbus to Dublin and back home from Amsterdam. I only had to pay tax - around $65. It was more expensive to fly from Dublin to Amsterdam! I bought my ticket about 3 months out. Just be flexible - I had to change my travel days because the flight times (i.e. overnight, arriving fairly early in the morning; leaving fairly late) didn't match.

Good luck!!

Thank you for all your advice. We do now have reservations, using our two mileage tickets. They are with United. I started trying to get reservations for June (nothing available), then went to July (nothing available), and did manage to get on an August 4 flight - into Heathrow, out of Dublin. So, I'm surprised and happy. We had much better luck this year than last. Now just have to manage to wait until August!

Be sure to ask United about their travel partners. They couldn't book us tickets in April or May, but we got them through Air Canada (which I understand isn't a fabulous airline, but it will get us to London for free).

Glad you were able to make this happen...............gives us hope for finding a few deals in the future!!!