In preparation for this year's Umbraco
Codegarden 2009 in Copenhagen I decided to try and obtain an
award-travel itinerary from Seattle to Copenhagen. For last
year's Codegarden I purchased an itinerary on SAS in coach for
nearly $2,000 (USD). Although SAS offers a very convenient
direct Seattle to Copenhagen flight, the level of comfort was low
and the cost high - I arrived tired, stinky and found working
(which we were there to do) very difficult.
Having heard the extreme pessimism surrounding the ability to
actually locate and book one of these itineraries without being
forced to use the higher point requirement (200,000), I was not
very optimistic. I collect most of my award points in Continental's OnePass program and also have an
American Express card which earns points that
are transferrable to the OnePass program. All in I had 96,000
points available in the OnePass program. Note: these
points do seem to add up fast as I had previously booked an award
itinerary in December 2007 for Seattle to Copenhagen.
Continental provides an online booking engine
for award travel and allows you to book on partner airlines as
well. My first attempts were fruitless, but a bit of
perseverance paid off and I was able to locate an itinerary from
Vancouver, BC, Canada (about 30 minutes from my home, hooray!) to
Amsterdam in Business class on Northwest for 100,000 points. Good
enough, the dates fit perfectly and, while Northwest Business class
isn't Virgin's Upper class, not having to sit in
coach for a 10+ hour flight is a huge benefit. I booked it
entirely online (including the purchase of the additional 4,000
points I needed) and received immediate confirmation. Kudos
Continental!
All that was left was to book from Amsterdam to
Copenhagen. As it turned out I had just enough points in my
SAS
EuroBonus account to book a very convenient itinerary, not in
Business class but since the flight is only 80-minutes long it's
not of much concern. SAS also provides an online booking
engine and I was able to locate, book, and confirm this itinerary
in less than 15-minutes. Kudos SAS!
Granted this itinerary is not quite as direct as Seattle to
Copenhagen nonstop, however the extra couple of hours in travel
time will be made up for by the more comfortable seating…at
least I hope so. In addition, the total cost covering taxes
and fees was less than $230 (USD), just a fraction of what I
could've otherwise spent. As far as the level of booking
difficulty and time-required - while it certainly took longer than
sending a request to a travel agent and receiving a complete
itinerary in return, it did not require more than one-hour of
effort in total, I consider that a fair trade-off.