1.6 million BIS¹ miles & you still need to stay on your game if you want any chance at a gratis upgrade.

There are usually two flights a day SEA🛫AMS on #Delta, & fewer people layover there than SLC, which also has 2 flights a day. So I favor SEA when I'm on West coast USA headed to Europe…
But, due to logistics, I'm traveling on a *SATURDAY*. SEA only has on AMS flight on weekends.

I'm 2 of 0 — I surely won't be assimilated up front, as 2 of 0 isn't a valid Borg designation.

¹ BIS is an old school #FrequentFlyer term for “Butt in Seat” miles. Since so many airlines now give “bonus” miles for things other than travel, keeping track of how many miles you've been in the air is different than “how many miles in your account”.

Many airlines have fortunately switched to distinguishing them as “points” but #Delta stuck with “SkyMiles” to refer to “points” & “miles” to refer to BIS. Still confusing.

Anyway, I have more time waiting in airports to post, obv.

@bkuhn Honestly, I've gotten upgrades for JFK🛫AMS flights before, mostly in the winter where load is super low. But generally getting automatic economy to delta comfort/economy comfort upgrades on booking is nice enough in most cases.

You might have more luck with PDX🛫AMS, since it's once daily (I think?) and not a very heavily loaded route.

@neal

Funny you mention JFK🛫AMS! I spent 2 hours on the phone with Delta Global Ticketing yesterday because I found a *cheaper* coach routing through JFK, & the long haul KLM metal had Z available for GUC. We were so close to upgrading me all the way through, & KLM partner desk refused to release the Z to Delta.
Delta+KLM=biggest frenemies ever!

As for PDX🛫AMS, does not run weekends & is KLM metal & gambling on a Z opening is a weaker play than Delta metal with a GUC.

@bkuhn I wish I had GUCs... I don't have status for those. This year is the first year I'll have RUCs.

@neal

If your point of origin is west coast USA, though, that JFK layover adds a lot of wall clock time to the entire trip when you factor into how long the transcontinental is.

Obvious proof that the earth is round. I always say people who think the earth is flat should be forced to always fly due south/north to the equator, and then due south/north to their destination.

@neal 😲 … how did you get upgraded on a transatlantic without a GUC?

Do you mean with miles? If so, yes that works great from November 10th to March 1st, but hopeless in northern spring/summer.

Or, was this pre-pandemic? In the good ol' days where loyalty mattered, FAs would upgrade me to D1 just because they had an empty seat and recognized my name on the manifest. 😔

@neal best pro-tip I have on RUCs: wait to apply them until either:

(a) FC is down to 3-5 seats, or

(b) you see a lot of relatively cheap SkyMiles/cash upgrades being offered. (Which count as revenue seats and beat you)

@bkuhn It is still the policy of KLM to do such upgrades at their discretion. I have gotten it once or twice when they needed to bring in standby families and wanted to free up my slot and there were free premium economy or world business seats.

Lufthansa did it a couple of times for me pre-pandemic too.

(I think it helps if you directly book with them, I haven't gotten it ever through partner bookings.)

@bkuhn The usability of RUCs is kind of weak for me, because it's somewhat rare for me to *not* get upgraded on my flights since I almost always fly out of LGA for domestic instead of JFK. But those are some good tips indeed!

At least this is going to be useful for JFK-SEA and JFK-LAX flights that I have later this year. And maybe even the trip for FOSSY. 😉

@bkuhn Yeah, I'm familiar with that pain as I once had to do BOI-SEA-JFK-AMS-VIE in 2023. That trip *hurt*.

@neal Oh, yeah, being booked with KLM directly changes a lot. They treat code shares as “people in the way of real customers”.

I should maybe consider this for future given the slow but clear decline of value in being a million miler/Diamond with Delta.

I mean, it's my own fault for thinking loyalty meant anything in capitalism.

@bkuhn You can still associate your Delta SkyMiles status with a direct KLM booking. So you get the one-two punch of being a "direct customer" while being "a loyal customer". It also reinforces your Delta status better too, since west coast to Europe MQD generation is significantly better with partner bookings than Delta bookings.

https://www.delta.com/us/en/skymiles/how-to-earn-miles/airline-partners

https://awardwallet.com/airlines/delta-skymiles/medallion-qualification-dollar/

@neal

Ok , I have you beat: FOSDEM and LinuxConf Australia were back to back.

Did AMS🛫PDX, 6hr layover at my apartment to do laundry, then PDX🛫LAX 🛫SYD🛫MEL.

All in coach.

@neal yeah, I have a vague memory of trying to do this a few years ago & splitting the itinerary was just too much and added costs.

AFAICT, KLM discounts the inter-Europe flights to Delta via AMS. So, if AMS isn't final destination it's cheaper to book a full roundtrip in Europe with Delta via code share.

Anyway, there are good tips and every frequent flyer had something to learn in the new era of *non*-loyalty.

I'm considering status match to Star Alliance as well!🫢

@bkuhn My most recent booking showed that it costs *exactly the same* now unless you're booking in premium cabins. Then flights on Delta's own metal will be more expensive than KLM's metal. But the pricing will be the same on both Delta's site and KLM's site. It's just a question of how you want it to count toward SkyMiles.

For me at JFK, it almost never makes sense to book with KLM if I'm booking higher than economy class. But economy bookings *can* make sense.

@bkuhn As for Star Alliance, I'm only considering it if I can line up enough qualifying flights for United to do it. And that's hard for me since I *really* don't want to go to Newark for anything. And United partner earnings are really tricky compared to Delta's.

@neal @bkuhn I'm Diamond on Delta, and KLM has always been a PITA for trans-Atlantic flights. I don't have much good to say about them in Europe either. See you in Amsterdam.

@sjvn are you going to UndoneCS or something else?
Or did you mean generally that we're all laying over in AMS all the time?

@neal

@bkuhn @sjvn These days, I have three choices now for trans-Atlantic: Air France, KLM, and SAS.

If you want to reasonably affordable premium cabins, SAS is a good choice. Their premium economy winds up being similar in cost to AFKLM economy class. And their business class is similarly priced to premium economy on Delta and Air France.

So insofar as "good deals" go, premium on SAS is a pretty appealing choice. It's on my list to try this year.

@bkuhn @neal I'm there for Kubecon.

Little did I know #LinuxFoundation & its wealthy cronies were the reason my gratis upgrade didn't clear. #LF's got an event starting tomorrow in Amsterdam. My seat mate told me.

It's funny — as I head to #UndoneCS to talk about how LF funds research that distracts us from real #FOSS &#copyleft — I sit in the cheap seats while the capitalist sleep in flat bed seats up front.

It's quite the metaphor.

@bkuhn Humph, that sucks. This is why I do some ahead of time research of surrounding days for booking. I have been screwed a few times, and just adding a couple of days drastically improves my quality of life for travel and gets me out of competing with bookend travelers like what is common for LF events.

Admittedly, I have that flexibility from my choices of JFK and BOS as international airports I can easily fly out from.

@bkuhn @sjvn I will say after having compared all three US airline programs and a few European ones... Delta's is still the best from my point of view. Delta gives you qualifying status for award flights, the earning potential with partner flights is unrestricted (even if it's goofy), and earning status doesn't require jumping many hoops.

The next best program is AFKLM's Flying Blue. They even have an "easy" path to lifetime status, and have soft falloff for status.

@neal @bkuhn Delta's my first choice. I just got into Amsterdam, and a single Global Upgrade Certificate took me from Comfort+ (Automatic since I'm Diamond) to Premium, then to Delta One.

@sjvn my D1 didn't clear. What was your long haul route?

As I said upthread, I realize SLC, which is usually wrong option, was the right one today as only SLC has 2 Saturday flights.

While I love that UnDoneCS
(in Luxembourg) is counter program to the LinuxFoundation stuff (real irony there which I'll talk about in my talk), my SEA🛫AMS meant tech bros from the usual Seattle-adjacent suspects bought out D1 with revenue. Including 2 w/ 36hr notice at $8k/seat!

@neal

I indeed didn't get the gratis upgrade. & — wow! — is it obvious I had only 2 hours of unrestful “sitting-up & cramped” sleep in the last 27 hours.

Since I got to hotel, I:
* mistook another hotel guest for my food delivery person merely b/c they was carrying a large plastic bag.
* opened & closed my first aid kit 3x in as many minutes thinking it was my medication kit.
* got legit *confused* (for 15 seconds!) why a NEMA 5-15 wouldn't fit in a CEE 7/3 outlet.
🤦
#Travel #UndoneCS