Have you utilized Holland Air?

Just curious if some of you have used Holland America Air Program? We were looking for business class. And since our cruise flies from US to Rome....then sail back to Ft. Lauderdale. I have found any competitive pricing. We most always use air travel awards, but we're running low on miles.

Yes, several times in recent years including to Rome. HAL had better pricing than I could get elsewhere . Didn't fly business class though so I don't know about that. Have a great trip!

I have been able to obtain Business Class air on USA-Europe routes via HAL Air than anything that I found on my own. I was able to get the precise flights and on the dates I wanted, on the airline of choice, with confirmed seat assignments with no problem.

I have also been successful with doing so with HAL air on South American flights.

I haven't used it, but have inquired about the cost, etc. twice, but found for me the choices I was given, and the pricing weren't what I wanted and so I booked myself.

I just booked LA to Amsterdam round-trip using HAL air. Checked prices on my own and with my travel agent. HAL was considerably cheaper. Good selection of flights and airlines and was able to book the seats I wanted. I wanted to pay for the flights when booked but the web site would not allow that because my cruise was booked thru my travel agent. I called my travel agent who then paid HAL. I then went on the airline's web sites and upgraded my seats to premium economy at an extra cost. My flights are confirmed and paid. During the process I spoke with a HAL rep twice regarding questions and both were very helpful.

I have used my HAL PCC for Alaska flights.

While looking at European cruises, the cheapest Business Class I could find to Rome was $2400 but my HAL PCC quoted me $1400. Instead of booking the flight to be on the Nieuw Statendam first cruise, I switched to later dates from Fort Lauderdale.

North America flights seem to be the same price but HAL international flights have good savings from what I experienced.

Has anyone booked air from Tahiti? Any savings there? I am waiting for the air to open next month and see what the price will be before I commit to the cruise.

Our experience with Flight Ease is that there are great fares to be had on international flights but marginal savings on North American flights. We tend to book about 315 days out from the cruise (Flight Ease will not book until 330 days out). Examples of savings: Last year we did a Sydney-Hawaii and had a NYC-Sydney (First/Business Class) and Hawaii-NYC (first) $2400. We now have a Lima-San Diego booked for March with NYC-Lima (First/Business) and SanDiego-NYC (first) $1300. When I priced flights prior to booking The transpac flights were $5200 and the Lima flights were $2800. We have had no problems with the service although I can not say what problems might arise if the flights needed to be changed. Best of luck and happy cruising.

We have used Flight Ease a couple of times for one-way T-A's (with the cruise being the other way) because of much better prices than I could find on my own. We were able to get our first or second choices of times and routes, unlike the old days of HAL air where you were zig-zagged around with long layovers.

We have used Flight Ease a couple of times for one-way T-A's (with the cruise being the other way) because of much better prices than I could find on my own. We were able to get our first or second choices of times and routes, unlike the old days of HAL air where you were zig-zagged around with long layovers.

Ditto, same experience for us. Got our first choice on a non-stop at the time we wanted both ways.

On one way international flights, HAL's program is unbeatable - particularly given the absurd pricing of most airlines, which charge more for a one way than for a round trip utilizing the same first leg.

Most recent was about $450 per to Rome - rather than the same airline's posted $1,350, while being able to pick airline, flight and seats. For some reason HAL's program seems to offer little or no savings on domestic flights.

OP, a previous CC thread suggested researching fares and schedules on the princess cruise site. The original poster said it was the same company as HAL’s and had the same offerings. Per its suggestion, I found a princess cruise leaving the same port around the same time. Doing a dummy booking, I selected that cruise and saw a tab for flight quotes. I was able to enter my desired departure and return times. I then saw what their flight program called flexible fares. When I contacted my TA to reserve our flights, I was able to get the exact business fares, flights and schedule I had researched on the princess site. Our KLM/AF round trip flights from Houston to Copenhagen for our Baltic cruise next June cost about $2450 pp, as opposed to about $4600 pp on United. A significant savings! Hope this is helpful.

Personally, I think that HAL air program "sucks" when it comes to being user friendly. Lets do a simple comparison to the Princess EZ-Air program (or many other cruise lines) to the HAL air program. I recently booked an amazing Business Class deal on Princess EZ -Air. I logged onto the EZ air site, and in a matter of minutes I was able to compare airlines and prices from 6 different US airports (PHL, MDT, JFK, EWR, IAD, and BWI). It was only after I got to my last option (JFK) that I found an amazing deal (which saved me about $3500!

Now lets compare this to HAL. If I call my cruise agency, I have to give specific instructions to my cruise agent who has to make an inquiry of HAL. or, if I call HAL (because they do not have an online booking site) I would have to spend a lot of time on the phone and might not be able to even think of all the various options. In a sense I have to trust that person (on the other end of the phone) to steer me in the right direction. And those folks are merely telephone center reservation clerks whose job is to get the business done and get on to the next client as quickly as possible. In the case of the Princess cruise, the only reason I even looked at JFK (somewhat inconvenient) was that I did not like any of the other options. But this entire process took me less then 10 min...because my computer screen was displaying all the options (kind of like booking on Orbitz, Expedia, etc).

So we would like to see HAL adopt an online booking engine similar to other cruise lines. They can also maintain their call center (for those that prefer dealing on the phone)....but we are now in the computer world where I even book cruises with a few clicks of the keyboard/mouse.

Hank

If you book through Flight Ease, do you earn the miles to your frequent flyer account?

If you book through Flight Ease, do you earn the miles to your frequent flyer account?

yes, you can add your frequent flyer number to the booking, or I believe my TA actually supplied it at the time we booked our one way Japan flight through Flight Ease.

yes, you can add your frequent flyer number to the booking, or I believe my TA actually supplied it at the time we booked our one way Japan flight through Flight Ease.

Thank you for the info. I have an open jaw to/from Europe to plan, and that's a lot of miles I want to get credit for.

I haven't used HAL Air but have used Princess EZAir a couple of times. Price was the reason as it was considerably cheaper than booking any other way. A few things to be cautious about:

1. Once booked, the ticket may not actually be purchased by the cruise line UNTIL final payment has been made. On some airlines, you cannot book a seat (even though on Princess they allowed you to select a seat, if you log into the airline, you didn't have one and may not be able to select one since the ticket was not paid for). Some have said this varies by airline so may not apply in all instances.

2. MONITOR the flight(s) through the airline site and don't rely on the cruise line portal. I logged into American and found the times had changed but on Princess they still showed the original times. I also had the flights change completely but on the Princess site they still showed the original flights. Also, don't rely on either HAL or the airline to notify of you changes - neither did on any of the flights we booked even though all had cell, email on file with alerts set up.

3. On Princess, you can request they buy the ticket before final payment but it will then be non-refundable. However, you will then have control over the flight(s) through the airline site including seat selection.

4. We had our flights changed by the airline multiple times on our flight to Tahiti to the point we actually had 2 different flights from LAX to DFW (again, still showed the original flights on Princess site). My TA got that straightened out but when she called Princess, they said the original flights we still there. We also had them changed such that the connection was illegal (the 2nd leg left before the first leg arrived!). And another time the flight arrived after the ship sailed!:eek:

5. This may be more for international flights, but the booking number that Princess issued was not the booking number the airlines had. It was a consolidator number. My TA had to call the different airlines (American and Air Tahiti Nui) to get the individual airlines booking numbers so we could check on the flights via the airlines sites.

I would not trust any cruise line to monitor my flights - I always monitor them at least weekly via the airline site and then daily for the 2 weeks prior to departure. This may be excessive to some, but at least I'm on top of any issues that have arisen and there have been several!

Agree with everything poster above has said. I did "choose" my seats, however the seats are not assigned u ntil payment is made for the ticket - which is usually final payment date of the cruise (flex fare). - found this out the hard way as a first timer using Flight Ease.

The restricted fare and the flex fare for my cruise was exactly the same amount, however they can be significantly different. But be aware, if you on flex fare and pay at time of your cruise, your seat request may have been assigned.

As the two previous posters have stated, your fare and seat can change before tickets are purcgased. Our TA clearly stated these conditions to us. Once purchased, your tickets are issued. As the previous poster stated, your flexible, refundable fares now become non-refundable. We chose to purchase our tickets in August 2017 for our June 2018 flights for our Baltic cruise. $2450 pp vs $4600 pp represented too significant a savings to jeopardize by waiting.

Thank you for the info. I have an open jaw to/from Europe to plan, and that's a lot of miles I want to get credit for.

Ruth,

I also have been able to accrue frequent flier miles in the airline's loyalty program.

Ruth,

 

I also have been able to accrue frequent flier miles in the airline's loyalty program.

Thanks for the confirmation.

My outbound flight was available a week ago, so I know what I want heading to Amsterdam, but it will be another three weeks before the flight home from Rome is revealed. I hope I can get them both through an airline I accrue miles with. I know outbound does, but inbound could be an affiliated airline, and I'm not sure how that works.

As the two previous posters have stated, your fare and seat can change before tickets are purcgased. Our TA clearly stated these conditions to us. Once purchased, your tickets are issued. As the previous poster stated, your flexible, refundable fares now become non-refundable. We chose to purchase our tickets in August 2017 for our June 2018 flights for our Baltic cruise. $2450 pp vs $4600 pp represented too significant a savings to jeopardize by waiting.

That makes a lot of sense.

I am using Flight Ease for the first time in decades.

Were you able to purchase the flights and pay for them without paying for the entire cruise? If so, that would make good sense to me.

thanks :)

Thanks for the confirmation.

 

My outbound flight was available a week ago, so I know what I want heading to Amsterdam, but it will be another three weeks before the flight home from Rome is revealed. I hope I can get them both through an airline I accrue miles with. I know outbound does, but inbound could be an affiliated airline, and I'm not sure how that works.

I'd suggest that you make sure that your airline loyalty program's account number is embedded as part of your reservation prior to your flights.

I'd suggest that you make sure that your airline loyalty program's account number is embedded as part of your reservation prior to your flights.

OK. Thanks for the tip. I believe another poster also mentioned it.

I'll check Matrix when the inbound flights are published, make my selections, and have my TA see what she can do.

Does HAL’s Air program allow you to fly into the departure port several days before cruise departure? We want 6 days in Sydney prior to the cruise.