Questions and Answers

So I’m a bit surprised that this hasn’t been brought up on here or elsewhere. So after I read that Delta “enhanced” (spoiler, it still has issues) their website to also include China Airlines as being an available booking partner, I was expecting to be able to construct an itinerary with them for a family trip to Hong Kong/Singapore. But nothing was showing up when I entered destinations or start points that I knew China Airlines flew to in the US, so I tried searching on Air France’s website, and lo and behold, itin after itin showing availability, with China Airlines as the connecting airline.

BUT… on Delta’s website, I tried looking for availability if I used Taipei as my start point or end point and searching China Airlines availability one segment at a time, and lo and behold, most flights had availability. So I tried using the multi-city tool to construct an itin using China Airlines as the only carrier, and it was a no-go. I didn’t try calling Delta, but wanted to see if anyone else was coming up with this issue or if there should be a post on it.

And if we want to also pile on the Delta website issues, I did manage to book my family on China Eastern with their Delta miles to Singapore. But for one of the bookings, even though I selected business class on the website, the ticket issued for the PVG-SIN portion ended up getting booked into economy, but thankfully a call to Delta resolved the issue quickly. So Delta website. Broken, but just not as broken as before.

And also, speaking of China Eastern, reading this right now… [URL]https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trip-reports/1816683-china-eastern-77w-first-class-shanghai-chicago.html[/URL]

[USER=1776]@Euro[/USER] I’m not defending Delta for sure, but I was looking at China Airlines routes today and found many. In addition when I flew CI A350 last month I used Delta to search and found a number of awards as well. I don’t have an answer for you other than there is a glitch I found using their site. If you use flexible dates and select from the calendar sometimes it switches the toggle from Delta/Partners to Delta only and you won’t see partner space.

Another thing to keep in mind is Delta has a funny way of routing. If your itinerary had more than 3 segments it won’t price. So if you were searching segments the question is how many? And to your point mult-city I’ve never had any success with it. At least you got your situation resolved.

I was hoping to do something akin to SFO/LAX-TPE-HKG/SIN (or in reverse) itinerary for the family, so I was searching for 2 segments on China Airlines metal only.

But plug in SFO/LAX as the start or end destination and HKG/SIN as the opposite, and Delta’s website doesn’t piece together the itin if TPE is used as a transfer point. I was able to get Delta’s system to price out an SIN-HKG via TPE routing on China Airlines, so… blocking for US destinations only when using Taipei as a transfer point instead of a start point or final destination? And the calendar for me is… untrustworthy. Both the 7 day and 5 week versions. There were huge price discrepancies on multiple days.

And well, family is of the “simple itins only” (got them to relent only by saying almost all itins to SIN require 2 stops out of hometown airport) and “no inconvenient times” and “simple credit card layout” type. Wasn’t easy to get something booked for them when half the flights to Asia depart late evening out of California. Just hope China Eastern business class is acceptable to them.

I think the best way to use Delta’s search is segment by segment and then calling Delta to piece it together. More time consuming, but youll end up with what you’re looking for.

Delta’s award search isn’t good with multi stop itineraries