Singapore to Sydney

[dwkjrk]

We are planning a Princess cruise next December from Singapore to Sydney and need some help on flight reservations. We are planning on using United mileage to pay or upgrade to business. Has anyone done this as they say it is two different zones? Any tips would be appreciated.

Thanks.

[kitty9]

When I had to fly to Sydney, and then took the cruise that ended in Dubai, they didn't tell me anything about zones. I just asked how many miles I needed to upgrade each flight segment, and they took the miles from my account.

[greatam]

Hopefully, I can clear up some of the confusion about zones, miles, etc.

 

I posted part of this answer on the Asia forum when you asked the other question.

 

It is my understanding that if you fly United all the way (or a United code share), you will only have to look at the award chart for REGIONS. And since South East Asia and Australia are in the same UNITED region, you will spend 150,000 miles for Business RT. However, if you want to use the Star Alliance partners, which includes Singapore Air and Air New Zealand, you will be required to purchase in ZONES which are different than United regions. SouthEast Asia and Australia are in two different zones. 90,000 miles one way, Business class for each zone, so the total ticket would be 180,000 miles.

 

You also MAY have the problem of a "legal open jaw". Best I can tell, the distance between Singapore and Sydney is less than the distance from Chicago to either Singapore or Sydney via air. The way around that is to book the flights as two one way tickets, using your miles on a Star Alliance partner. Won't cost you any more miles, but will make your trips legal.

 

This is the link to the United awards and the Star Alliance awards are a page over. http://www.united.com/page/article/0,6722,1143,00.html

 

Are you a Premier status member of Mileage Plus? If you are, you can book most any fare, and upgrade that. However, if you are like a lot of people, and have accumulated a lot of miles on a credit card or from some means other than flying and do not have premier status, you must buy certain fares, H and M, to upgrade. And these are NOT the cheapest of the economy fares. All in all, if you have 360,000 miles, I would use them to book Singapore Air from NY or LAX, and either Air New Zealand to LAX or Singapore Air to LAX via Singapore from Sydney. Star Alliance will route you on United for the US domestic portions of your trip. If you need further help, you may email me at greatam@earthlink.net. Put CC in the subject line. I play this miles game to the fullest and am pretty well versed in how to get the most from your miles.

[Ollie_WA]

We lived in Singapore for 2 years and every summer we would fly home for a couple of months. Hubby's company paid for economy tickets and we would upgrade to business for 40k each ticket. The gal that I would work with in Singapore with United airlines was so fantastic. She would actually let me fly from Singapore to the west coast, stay a month then fly to the East Coast, and stay another month, then back to Singapore....she upgraded all of our flights to Business Class, and we only used 40k miles each:eek: . Unfortunatly when we left Singapore she was no longer with United!:confused: