Travel
Dear Community,

Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.

If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.

Thank you.

Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.

Delta Skymiles- Difficult to book a ticket with Skymiles?

I almost have 25k miles racked up and am thinking of using it next year when DH and I go on vacation. 

I've never booked a ticket using Skymiles- are they difficult to do? Are there a lot of blackout dates? Restrictions? 

Re: Delta Skymiles- Difficult to book a ticket with Skymiles?

  • They aren't difficult at all but depending on where you are going amd when the chances of finding a flight for 25000 miles is probably slim 
    Warning No formatter is installed for the format bbhtml
  • imagefrlcb:
    They aren't difficult at all but depending on where you are going amd when the chances of finding a flight for 25000 miles is probably slim 

    Aren't all domestic/continental US flights 25k miles? 

  • They aren't called "Sky Pesos" for nothing. I've routinely heard that Delta is the worst airline for mileage redemption. You should be able to use them, but you might have to be patient with routing, dates, etc.  It should be much easier for a domestic flight than international. This is one of the reasons I've never been loyal to Delta. AA and United miles are much more valuable. 

  • imageclevebride2006:

    imagefrlcb:
    They aren't difficult at all but depending on where you are going amd when the chances of finding a flight for 25000 miles is probably slim 

    Aren't all domestic/continental US flights 25k miles? 

    Ha, no. It depends on the day/time/city. Some are 25, some are 32,500 and some are either 60 or 70. It varies also based on what time of day you travel and if you are going nonstop or with layovers. It is possible to get tickets for 25k but not always.

    Warning No formatter is installed for the format bbhtml
  • I've booked tickets with Delta using skymiles on 3 separate occasions and never had a problem booking at the lowest mileage rate. The key is to book as soon as tickets become available. I use AA now and do find their program better but Delta is still fine (it is just non longer convenient for me since I have moved).
    Baby Birthday Ticker Ticker
  • Like PP said, the trick is to book your tickets VERY early - if you can plan 11 months out (airlines release their schedules 330 days out) you shouldn't have much difficulty.  If you are trying to book 4-5 months out, you'll likely have a difficult time using them (depending on when and where you are traveling).

     Delta will tier their tickets so that you can ALWAYS get a rewards ticket on a flight - it just will cost you significantly more miles than what you expect (i.e. a 25,000 mile ticket will be 50,000 but with no blackout dates). 

  • imageclevebride2006:

    imagefrlcb:
    They aren't difficult at all but depending on where you are going amd when the chances of finding a flight for 25000 miles is probably slim 

    Aren't all domestic/continental US flights 25k miles? 

    Nope.  I used 40k miles to get home for a family emergency, it would have cost me a little over $600 if I paid in cash.  It was definitely worth it for me. 

  • DH and I both get Delta Skymiles and have used them for flights. They've never been difficult for us to use but it usually takes a lot more than 25k to get a flight. But we've never had issues with blackout dates or anything. In fact, we used Skymiles to fly home for Christmas this year the day before Christmas Eve and returned the day after Christmas (direct flight from ATL to MSP). But I think it was like 50k miles or something like that. Definitely more than 25k.

     

    TTC #1 since June 2008 *SAIFW*

    TI, IUIs, IVF = c/ps and BFNs

  • imageKimberlyS530:

    Like PP said, the trick is to book your tickets VERY early - if you can plan 11 months out (airlines release their schedules 330 days out) you shouldn't have much difficulty.  If you are trying to book 4-5 months out, you'll likely have a difficult time using them (depending on when and where you are traveling).

     Delta will tier their tickets so that you can ALWAYS get a rewards ticket on a flight - it just will cost you significantly more miles than what you expect (i.e. a 25,000 mile ticket will be 50,000 but with no blackout dates). 

    This. The great thing about Delta is that they'll sell you the last seat on a plane for miles. Sure it will cost you a lot of miles, but it would have cost you a lot of dollars as well so I don't see what the issue is.
  • I've used Skymiles several times and haven't had any problems.  I booked a ticket to LA in mid-December for 25K miles and a ticket to Hawaii a couple years ago for 50K miles, no issues. 

  • I have rarely been able to book tix at the lowest redemption rate.  I'm even looking into Hawaii now, looking 330 days out and still can't get the lowest rate.  You can definitely get a ticket, but you will likely have to use a lot more miles than you expect.
  • I'm a gold medallion member and still have problems getting tickets for the least number of miles.  This is why I'm not an advocate of travel cards unless you are also earning mileage through travel.  

    That being said I've learned two things.  As others have said - book as early as you can.  We book out between 9 and 11 months.  Also, if you are close to multiple airports try booking from different destinations.  Last year we went Orange County through Minneapolis to Amsterdam.  We couldn't get on the Los Angeles through Minneapolis to Amsterdam.  It was the LAX leg that was "full".  The rest of the flights were the same.

  • I use them a lot. I've never had any problems redeeming them. It probably all depends on where you're flying from/where you're going, but it's straight forward.
Sign In or Register to comment.
Choose Another Board
Search Boards