ANA First Class Coming To Seattle, Singapore, And Frankfurt

Damn
I'm booked on ANA first class from Paris to Narita in May
What are my other first class options for the same route?

Hoping there'll be plentiful award space on NRT-SIN in F. I currently have UA F booked for that route connecting from NH F starting in JFK. Would be sweet to do the whole way in NH F.

@jack if you want to stay with ANA, fly to FRA and connect on LH to CDG.

This is exciting for someone like me who's based in Singapore! Ben, would you know if they are already releasing award space for NH F to SIN?

Ack!

I booked the SEA - NRT route in August specifically to fly on the 787!

So, question: I used United miles to book this flight. Without that airplane, I'd rather not fly that route. So do you think this enough of a change to warrant United waiving award change fees?

Bummer!

@ Jack -- Air France also flies the route and offers first class, though I wouldn't count on them rebooking you on Air France, unfortunately.

@ Vin -- The schedule change hasn't yet been loaded, so no first class inventory has been loaded yet.

@ Mike -- Keep in mind ANA actually has a better business class product on the 777 than the 787, so it seems like a "win" to me. In theory they wouldn't waive the change fee since the flight is staying the same, but if you get a nice agent and explain the situation, maybe they'd consider waiving the fee.

FWIW, UA also has "first class" on SIN-NRT, so you could previously price JFK-NRT-SIN in F using LMs...hopefully it'll become easier to get once NH starts releasing award space for NRT-SIN

Does the 777-300ER offer fully flat in business class?

Thanks Ben for your quick response! Normally how long does it take for them to publish it? Eyeing to clear out my Lifemiles for a nice round birthday trip to Japan on NH F!

Excited about IAH-NRT route even though my trip is in April and we are on a nonstop UA J. Oh well, still better than spending such a long flight in Y 🙂

Looks like ANA is trying to compete with SQ's suites class in Asia. Other than for ANA's Rimowa First Class amenity kit, on flights less than 9 hours there's little reason to fly First - I'd choose their new business class if their new business staggered seat is provided (like on their 787-8) to conserve miles spent.

Lucky: did you rent a storage room to keep all your Rimowa kits (and other must keep swag)? Also as a German Rimowa collector, why don't you travel with one of their carry-ons?

"ANA First Class Coming To Seattle"

Well that's good for the wealthy or the points-rich, but I hope they also include economy class for regular folks like moi 🙂

Hey Lucky,

In your experience what's ANA's advance saver first class award availability like for 2 tickets? Do they make that premium space available for United miles? I assume you'd rank ANA first class below Cathay, Singapore, and Emirates -- how do you compare it to Korean F on the 380 (from LAX) or 772 (from SEA)?

Thanks,
Todd

@ Todd -- I believe Lucky had written about ANA F availability previously but, basically, they almost never make 2 seats available in the beginning (especially, on the new F product). If there's any availability, it'd be at most 1 F per day. I actually needed two F seats ORD-NRT last year and ended up booking them on back-to-back days and waiting... About 2 weeks out ANA started releasing some more space. Just checked the details: 2nd seat became available on Sept. 15 for Sept. 27 flight.

P.S. The above is a long version of saying that you should have a backup plan in case ANA doesn't feel very generous! 🙂 Maybe SQ Suites for LAX-NRT? Booking 2 seats on that is possible in advance.

P.P.S. Thanks to the arson at FAA facility in Chicago, we actually never made it on that flight so that was a huge bummer *sigh*

Does SEA really need a 777? I would say it would be better if they kept SEA with the 787, doesn't seem like that big a market.

FYI, the only new F route that has been announced is NRT-SIN (and only one frequency at that). No word on whether other destinations served with the 77W will receive F service or F seats with J service.

Also, there are still unconverted 777-300ERs that have slanted lie-flat seats in business. They are likely candidates for a relatively low-yield route like SEA.

@ Ivan Y -- As Ivan Y notes, they often make one seat available, but two seats is really tough.

I'd say ANA is on par with Cathay, Singapore, and Emirates.

@ Bill -- Believe it or not I HATE the Rimowa luggage. Love the collectible kits, but that's where my love of Rimowa ends. I prefer more flexible carry-ons, which allow me to maximize what I travel with better.

@ Vin -- I would expect within a few days.

@ Mantini -- Most do. ANA does still have some which haven't been reconfigured and feature the older product.

I wanted to try and fly with them to Tokyo via London, yet they're nearly £11k in F per person. That makes Singapore look like a bargain.

Keep in mind ANA swapped out the Seattle 787 for 9 across seating in economy a while back. I got caught with that change and that is a tight seating arrangement. I imagine the 777 seating is better. Also the 787 I flew on had a nasty high pitched whine the whole time.

Lucky, that was even faster this time : Award Availability is now fully loaded on ANA and LM website (but not yet on United...)
But I was able to book 1 F for FRA - HND by calling UA (had to insist a bit as first answer was "zero" award availability across the board for every class of travel)
1 F seat was available (EVERY day) for the whole summer period for that route.... but's that not a surprise...

At this moment it looks like the new SEA and FRA flights have opened up for award travel.

FRA-HND - there is 1 seat on literally every day during summer but nothing in reverse.

SEA-NRT-SEA is open everyday in both directions, but again only one seat.

It does look like the schedule change is only for the summer though - those SEA/FRA flights seem to revert back to 787s in the Fall.

Exciting news, especially as someone that does TYO-SIN regularly. When ANA's website says "first class service" for the NRT-SIN route, does that mean that the flight includes the full first class service (pajamas, Rimowa, caviar, etc.) or a scaled-down version?

@ Adam -- No way to know for sure since ANA hasn't offered a first class product on the route for as long as I can remember. If I had to guess I'd say the route will have full first class service, though.

Damn. Looks like the ones for SIN have not loaded yet...

i knew those LifeMiles would become useful someday again...

Thanks for the update. Seems odd to take F off Paris and send it to Frankfurt instead...

Used Lifemiles in December for J class NRT-SEA to try the 787.......well....they loaded 2 F seats on my day in July (showed one earlier, but 2 now). Just went through the cancel process with Avianca (what a pain) and re-booked in F class....going over in Suites on SQ from LA (380), return to SEA in F on 77W....not a bad summer trip!

@ jack w -- Awesome, can't beat that!

I am not an expert on ANA but I think some 777-300ER still feature old F and old J. I talked to FA and they said they will have to reconfigure.... but years pass by and still not. So CDG, IAD, 2nd ORD flights are still in old F.. Since SEA and SIN planes come out of CDG, maybe it is old configured airplane?

At the time in 2013 when 787 was grounded and a bit after that NRT-SEA was flown by 777-300ER with old F and old J. I was on one. Not sure if they sell F or just have J with top status sit there.

One thing to add. Currently, ANA use the international version of 777-300ER with new F to fly HND-GMP, the plane spend the night in GMP. On a busy flight the will let J pax with high status sit in F. I am not if this flight will end or not

Any idea when the new schedules will be loaded? NH801/802 still show as operated by 787, not 77W, so no F yet...

@ qasr -- Was wondering the same thing. All the other routes already show the new equipment, while that one doesn't. Hopefully they update it soon.

It's funny. IAH-NRT is showing as 77W, but no F buckets exist. SEA-NRT is still a 787 with J & Y buckets, as is NRT-SIN... Possible this won't actually happen?

@ Qasr -- Do you mean they haven't opened up F for regular fares on IAH-NRT? Because I just did a search on ANA site for F award space on random dates in June and can see space for multiple dates (e.g. 6/16 IAH-NRT and 6/19 NRT-IAH). It does say "Subj. to Approv." so perhaps they aren't selling revenue tickets.

@ qasr -- As Ivan Y notes, not sure what dates you're checking. See the same thing for NRT-SIN, but I do see the inventory for IAH-NRT and SEA-NRT.

@Lucky @Ivan Y I was checking in mid-late December.

I did just check August and see that IAH-NRT has F space. SEA/SIN-NRT are still both 787's with J/Y only.

One strange thing I noticed on EF is some days on SIN-NRT have max availability of 4, while others it is 9 (what I would expect.) Happens to be even different on one flight but not the other on the same day. Very strange.

@ qasr -- Ah, yes, I think only the summer schedule has been updated so far.

SIN-NRT is now open! And what's amazing is I got two seats for me and my partner!

Cheers, Ben!

Seems like 2 seats available in F on NH 801/802 NRT-SIN through EOS. Grab them while you can!

@ qasr -- Yep, finally. Awesome!

I've seen two seats on the NRT-SIN route as well. I *hope* that one stays that way. I find intra-asia rewards tend to be more generous than anything connecting to North America. BTW, I'm using the Aeroplan search engine, and the NRT-SIN route shows the plane as a 788. Assume that's an error?

As an aside, still seeing pretty reliable one-year out inventory in F on the 777 routes out of the US to NRT. A JFK-NRT-SIN in ANA F sounds pretty amazing.

@ grandgourmand -- Yep, Aeroplan's site tends to be a bit slow on updating when there's a schedule change, but you have nothing to worry about.

i have been able to book F award SIN-NRT-SEA for june. Looking forward to expereincing ANA first class! (other than 6am departure ex SIN!)

@ dan -- Awesome award!

Ben, how would you know if the aircraft in SEA has the new square first class?

@ Wayne -- Take a look at the seatmap. If business class shows four seats per row, it's the new product. If it shows seven seats per row, it's the old product.

Bumping this one as it seems ANA is removing their 77W with First class from their NRT-SIN-NRT route... replacing it with 787... This is very bad news as Im travelling this segment in November, and will have to transfer to C instead of F going to SIN...