AMAZING FARES That Won’t Last from $178 Roundtrip to Abu Dhabi; India, Asia and Africa Deals Too!

by Gary Leff

The Flight Deal is an awesome resource. Head over to their post on this for all the details.

I’ve just confirmed as of this writing that the deal is still working. You won’t find it using the ITA Matrix, but search Kayak or Google Flights, purchase on sites like Priceline. (Orbitz may show a higher fare initially, but if you’ve found the lower fare on Google Flights it should show a price drop when you click through to the itinerary.) Booking through US Online Travel Agencies should give you 24 hours to cancel.

Etihad has some holiday specials for you folks in New York / Dallas / Chicago / Washington D.C. / Los Angeles / San Francisco to the Middle East, India and Africa. We did some primarily checks for the following:

  • Johannesburg [JNB] – Under $700 from San Francisco
  • Mumbai [BOM] – Under $600 from San Francisco
  • Abu Dhahi [AUH] – $187 – $465 for all the listed cities.
  • Seychelles [SEZ] $588 from JFK [2/11 – 18]

    We did a bunch of dates in February and availability was easy to find. …

    Update 12/25/2014 @ 1:00AM Eastern – Availability so far: Late January – May, September – November. Stick to Monday – Thursday departures for best price.

    Update 12/25/2015 @ 2:05AM Eastern – Availability to cities like Hong Kong, Manila etc per the comments starting around $270 from New York. Availability for Hong Kong seems to be available in the Fall. We did not find anything in the Spring.

    • While Etihad is an American AAdvantage partner, flights between the US and Abu Dhabi won’t earn miles from this (although flights beyond Abu Dhabi will) and Etihad flying never earns elite qualifying miles.

    Many cities available weekdays between January and May and between September and November.

    About Gary Leff

    Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel - a topic he has covered since 2002. Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »

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    2. @Unclesam – you may be able to upgrade using Etihad’s miles (all Etihad tickets are eligible to be upgraded with miles unless the fare rules specify otherwise, and I haven’t looked up the fare rules) and Citi Thank You Points transfer to Etihad. But absolutely no on AA miles. Etihad is aggressive with auctioning premium cabin seats for cash as travel approaches, though. Odds on you’d fly coach.

    3. Before anyone books these economy seats for a long-haul flight you should read the reviews of Etihad economy seats on Skytrax–they get uniformly bad reviews for very narrow seats and very little legroom making for an uncomfortable ride.
      Buyer beware!

    4. One thing to be aware of is that the “trip span” reads “29 days” on the example in the screenshot. So, though a person may be able to book the $178 fare, they may end up paying a hefty sum in change fees should they only want to travel for a week or two instead of 29 days.

    5. Shame it’s so hot there for much of the year when these fares are valid for. Hard to sightsee in 100 degrees.

    6. Grabbed a family vacation to AUH in February.

      @Gary: Any suggestions on where to credit the miles?

    7. @LarryInNYC: You could credit to ANA [Amex Membership Rewards transfer partner] and earn 50% flown miles. I don’t believe the lowest fares earn miles in Korean Air Skypass. If you earn miles in Etihad guest [50% flown miles] you could redeem for merchandise…

    8. Thanks Gary,

      Booked 2 tickets ORD AUH in Feb for 5 days for 207.80 each. Already ticketed.

      Merry Christmas!

    10. assuming this is honored:

      I booked a rt to Kuala Lumpur and on the way back it goes KUL-AUH-CDG-JFK. The last leg is on AA. If I am a no-show at CDG for the last leg, what are the odds Etihad will recalculate the fare at the new prices as an open jaw as JFK-KUL-CDG and make me pay extras?

    12. @ Gary Leff
      You are right, I guess I’m afraid that the last throwaway segment on a pricing error ticket will be treated differently than on a “regular”, normal price ticket. I was afraid they’d attempt to charge my credit card / bill me for the fare difference

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