Etihad Ate My A380!

Since I live in hotels full time

Then why the sudden slowdown in trip reports?

Ben, thanks for posting this. I also am on a couple A380s from LHR - AUH and then AUH to Syd.

Luckily my AUH - Syd is still showing an A380, however my LHR - AUH is now a 777..... obviously i meticulously booked these routes. Do we have any recourse here?

edit- in June, like the 10th or something

Yah my June 8th LHR-AUH is now a 77W, and my June 9th AUH-SYD is still an A380.

Now I'm quite worried lol, do you think they will change the A380 Ben or is this mostly likely now set in stone for the most part?

That's a bummer!

Are other airlines (i.e. non middle east airlines) more accurate on their "first flights" dates? What I mean is do they usually respect the dates first announced?

5/31 week Sunday Tuesday Thursday Saturday still A380 AUH-SYD..

I had SYD-AUH-BOM to try both Etihad A380 F and Etihad 787 F but the AUH-BOM leg got downgraded to 777. :/ ... so I know the feeling. 😉
Luckily you can change the dates with no fees!

@Joey can we really change the date? Im on an AA award... looks like the day before they have the A380 on my LHR-AUH route.

Thoughts? any requirements for the change?

How do you get on these inaugural flights? just contacts?

So what you do? Cancel your flight? Was it an award or revenue?

I'll have to agree with John - it's been a while since we last read your trip report Ben 🙂

Lance- That is because trip reports dont generate $ like credit card referrals do.

I think this is less a symptom of the ME carriers than it is a result of trying to fly close to the scheduled introduction of a new aircraft type. Nothing wrong with that, of course, but you know you are going to take a risk when you do that.

I'm booked in November and still showing an A380. Question - when I booked through AA, I specifically requested the Residence.. but he said First class and didn't know anything about the Residence. Is there specific booking code you need? Or should I be all set?

@Westin -- if there is award availability the day before, you can change for no charge (since the routing stays the same). If there aren't award seats open the day before for the A380 flight, you might be out of luck. it's an AA ticket and they can't open up Etihad space.

@Nick the "Residence" is the special cabin with the separate bedroom and is not available using AA miles. The regular first class seat is known as the "apartment". I would not expect an AA agent to know the marketing name that a partner airline uses for its product. If you are in first class on an Etihad A380, you are in an "apartment".

@Ryan

Not a new aircraft type, just getting more A380's and opening a new route to SYD with it.

@Nick
The Residence is not first, but a different class of it own and no saver level tickets available.

It's possible to book by miles, but I think was something like 2.5 million miles in Eithad own program; not sure if AA even has booking access.

Thanks for that info, guys. The Apartment looks pretty darn nice so I'll "settle" for it with my AA miles from Sydney to AUH 🙂

Got myself booked on the 'soon to be' Second A380 out LHR and wonderfully enough it has been downgraded to an A340-600. Hopefully a very long chat with EY staff might get me a change....

@Lucky
Gave me a bit of a scare there lucky. Thought EY started pulling back AUH-JFK 380s.. Thanks for that btw, booked for the end of Jan, with sufficient "delay time" in case of any late deliveries.

@ Phillip -- Smart to leave a bit of a buffer. Enjoy the trip!

@Harry let me know if you have any luck. I'm trying their social media customer service and seeing if they can grant an exception and get me on a flight a day earlier

@ Nick -- As stated above, if you're booked in the "O" first class that's the First Apartment. You can't redeem American miles for The Residence.

@ Eli -- Was an award. Guess I'll have to cancel.

@ AD -- Nope, not contacts. I just try to book myself on inaugural flights (either using cash or miles) as soon as they're announced.

@lucky any tips on seeing if Etihad will move me?

Also will you be in Sydney? Staying at the PH and would love to meet up if you were there as well

@ Westin -- You can indeed change dates for free, assuming there's the same type of award availability.

@ Marc -- For the most part they usually do, in my experience. That being said, in this case Etihad is still keeping their "inaugural" A380 date between Abu Dhabi and Sydney, but instead are just thinning out the schedule after that.

@lucky no dice I don't think. It's an AA award and while there is Etihad award availability, there is no partner award availability the day before.... Is it worth asking if they would open some up or make an exception?

@ Westin -- I wouldn't count on it being set in stone yet, but I'd say your odds of keeping the A380 are pretty good.

@ Westin -- Your only decent shot is using the technique explained in this post:
https://onemileatatime.com/how-to-be-your-own-liaison/

@lucky perfect. Thanks for the help as always. Appreciate it!

@Lucky

I guess not a bad idea would be those want newer products to OZ would to book via BNE since that is virtually guaranteed a "newer" product and not depend on the A380 SYD lottery which seems to be going on this summer. Do you think as we get to the Fall/Winter schedule that things will get more consistent?

Lucky, Shouldn't you be writing trip reports instead of planning new flights? 😉

Inaugural flights are always a bit iffy in my experience. It is not at all unusual for dates to change, sometimes quite significantly.

@ Daniel -- You're talking about the 787? I'm not sure that product is actually better than what's offered on the 777/A340. While it's newer, the cabin isn't as wide, so I don't think it's as spacious.

@Westin - I called up Etihad's customer center, and whilst they understood my 'aviation enthusiast' needs, I'll have to pay a $100 rebooking charge. I was gonna upgrade from Y to J using miles; so I am just happy I caught the mistake before it was too late.

@Harry was it an AA award?

Hi,
I had booked the 2nd a380 out of AUH to LHR for a May 4 flight 2 months ago, but to my dismay, I only found out they switched to a 77W a week before. There was no announcement from Etihad. According to the EY source, the airbus for flight EY 19 was used for training purposes and positioned Al Ain May 4-16. I tried to explain to Etihad and American Airlines and asked to be placed on the 1st flight from AUH, however, AA advantage customer service stated I can only switch if there was still a guest booking on that earlier flight. Unfortunately, there was no open seats for guest booking and I was forced to fly the 77W after all the effort to position my flight from MNL to AUH (American Airlines Manila required in person booking when originating from MNL).

Although first class service and hard product on 77W was exceptional, it was hard to justify booking positioning flights to AUH, then LHR back to home in NYC when I my original expectations were to be on the A380 first class apartments. I guess I would have to wait until I get enough AA points again to go on the A380 route from the NYC to AUH in December.

@Westin - Just a plain old boring revenue ticket.