AMEX Membership Rewards Can Now Be Used on Expedia

Offers contained within this article maybe expired.

American Express and Expedia have linked up offering Expedia users a new way to use their Membership Rewards. You can link now an eligible Membership Rewards earning American Express card to your Expedia account and use your Membership Rewards at check out. While it’s great to see Amex expanding its partnerships, this is not a terrific redemption and you should probably not ever do this.

Why using Amex Membership Rewards on Expedia is not worth it

When you use your Amex Membership Rewards to book travel on Expedia, you’ll only be able to redeem them at a rate of .7 cent per point. Compare that to cards like the Chase Sapphire Reserve that allow you to cover airline and hotel expenses at a rate of 1.5 cents per point or even the Chase Sapphire Preferred and Citi ThankYou® Premier Card which allow you to redeem points for airline and hotels at a rate of 1.25 cents per point. Heck, you can even redeem American Express Membership Rewards for flights at 1 cent per point and hotels at .75 cent per point.

So this redemption rate for Expedia is not very good at all. In fact, you could probably redeem Membership Rewards for hotel gift cards at a higher rate than that and then just use the gift card for your booking so you’ll still earn hotel points and receive elite status benefits.

How does it work?

The way the system will work is that you’ll first have to link your eligible American Express card to your Expedia account. Million Mile Secrets has a good walk-through of how to link your card. Once you check out using points, your eligible American Express Card will be charged for the entire booking and a statement credit for the Membership Rewards points you used at checkout will appear on your Eligible Card account in 2–4 business days.

Expedia allows you to use partial payment with points so you don’t have to use points to cover the entire cost. However, these bookings must be made on pre-paid rates and cannot be used on flight+hotel packages and other expenses like rental cars, cruises, etc.

Final word

There’s nothing good about the redemption rate of this new opportunity for Expedia bookings. Assuming you’re not transferring your Membership Rewards to travel partners (which is where most of the value lies), you’re better off booking your flights and hotels through the Amex Travel Portal or redeeming gift cards for the hotel you want to stay at.

In limited cases, it could make sense to use some points to cover an Expedia purchase if you just really  didn’t want to use cash but I wouldn’t make it a habit. And while Expedia can be useful, if you’re wanting to utilize an OTA and want to get massive returns, check out BonWi.com which blows away other OTAs with its high cash back rate.

Earn up to 45K Marriott Points Per Year with New Social Media Promo

Marriott is offering a new promotion where you can earn up to 45,000 Marriott points by connecting your social media accounts. The promotion is called #RewardsPoints. Utilizing social media for promotions is nothing new for Marriott as they’ve offered several promotions in the past for linking up your social media accounts.

Right now you can earn 250 points by connecting your Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook accounts via Chirpify and earn an additional 125 points by following them on Instagram and Twitter.

Each month, Marriott will release a hand full of different campaigns where you can earn additional points by engaging in some form through your social medial platforms. I’m guessing that the campaigns will be around a few hundred points each but I have no idea what they will require. It could be requests to follow, retweet, comment, hashtag, share, etc.

All of these things could be a PIA depending on how you value your time and how savvy you are with social media. Personally, I don’t mind taking a few seconds to retweet, follow, or comment something so I think this promotion would be worth it, but I do have come concerns over the access being granted to a third party.

A lot of people feel weird or reluctant about linking up their social media accounts to third parties. If you attempt to link your Instagram and Twitter accounts, you’ll get the following messages:

I don’t like the fact that I’m giving permission to a third party to comment on photos, follow accounts, update my profile and post tweets. Admittedly, I don’t know anything about Chirpify and I wouldn’t doubt that they are legitimate but I’ll have to do a little bit of research into them before I agree to allowing them to have so much access to my account.

I’ve linked up my social media accounts with third parties before but I don’t recall seeing requests for so much access. I mean, why do they need permission to post on my behalf? Is that how this works? I just let a bot start spitting out tweets and comments from my account? Doesn’t sound too appealing even though I love Marriott and love free points.

If these things don’t bother you in the slightest, however, you might as well sign-up for some free Marriott points, as 45,000 Marriott points is a lot of points and could get you a free night even at a category 9 hotel.

Maximize Hotel Redemptions with Two Citi Cards

The Citi Prestige® Card’s most valuable perk in my opinion is the 4th night free benefit. With this benefit you can get a consecutive 4th night hotel stay for free when you book through the Citi Prestige Concierge. With the new changes to the Prestige, you can utilize this perk with cash or points. Being able to use points on this benefit opens up some great possibilities for extra value and here’s why.

Update: Some offers are no longer available — click here for the latest deals!

Maximizing point value with the 4th night free

When you use ThankYou Points for the 4th night free benefit, the points redeem at one cent per point. So for example, if you were booking 4 nights for $400, you’d get $100 off so your total would be $300. At 1 cent per point, that would require 30,000 ThankYou Points. Pretty simple.

However, as shown by the The Frequent Miler, if you have the Citi ThankYou® Premier Card, that redemption rate bumps up to 1.25 cents per point when your points are pooled, which is the standard redemption rate for travel expenses with the Premier Card. So using the same example, if you were booking 4 nights for $400, you’d get $100 off so your total would be $300. At 1.25 cents per point, that would require 24,000 ThankYou Points.

This is a great deal compared to even the Chase Sapphire Reserve. If you had used the Reserve to book that $400 stay with Ultimate Rewards, you’d need 26,666 Ultimate Rewards. So if you have the Prestige and Premier combo, it’s definitely worth considering using your the Citi Prestige Concierge if you had planned on covering hotel stays with points.

1.67 cents per point?

An issue that’s been debated about this redemption is how to determine the point value. If you’re using 24,000 points for a $400 stay, that’s 1.67 cents per point. However, if you calculate the value based on the $300 rate after applying the 4th night free benefit, that’s 1.25 cents per point.

Some would argue that because the 4th night free benefit applies to both cash and points bookings, you would never pay $400 for that stay as a Prestige holder. Thus, the cash rate should be determined based on the $300 rate. This makes sense and will give you the “truer” cents per point value of your savings.

However, I still like to think of it as a 1.67 cents per point redemption. This is primarily because I now travel wayyy more than I would normally travel because I’m covering almost all of my expenses with points. Therefore, I’m not “saving” any money the majority of the time I’m using points. I’m just experiencing new things for free or nearly free. So focusing on cents per point based on the “true” cash value of a Citi Prestige cardholder doesn’t serve the best purpose for me. Instead, I simply want to use the fewest amount of miles or points for a given redemption.

I’ll illustrate why I prefer looking at this as a 1.67 cents per point redemption  by using that same $400 hotel rate example.

Let’s assume I’m looking to go on a 4-night stay and that this is yet another trip that I’m only taking because I have the points to cover it. In other words, I’m not truly “saving” any money by using points on this trip because I would not have traveled but-for having the points.

So I look at my redemption possibilities.

  • I could spend 53,333 Membership Rewards at .75 cent per point (no thanks)
  • I could spend 26,666 Ultimate Rewards at 1.5 cents per point (much more reasonable)
  • I could spend 24,000 ThankYou Points at 1.67 cents per point (the best deal)

If I had factored in the cash price after applying the 4th night free benefit, I’d be looking at redeeming for 1.25 cents per point with ThankYou Points and that would make it look like less of a bargain than using Ultimate Rewards. But we know that ThankYou Points would be the more optimal redemption currency in this situation since it requires fewer points.

Ultimately, I don’t think it really matters how you slice it — the practical significance of initially determining what type of currency you want to depart with is much more important. In my case, departing with cash isn’t really an option because I’ve reached a point where I’m only traveling because it’s virtually free. At that point, it’s all about using the cheapest redemption methods to cover those costs and by focusing on the 1.67 redemption value, I’m able to better compare my options between award programs.

Save or Earn Amex Membership Rewards on Cell Phone and TV Bills

American Express has sent out different targeted Amex Offers that can save you up to $30 cash back on your phone and cable bills or simply earn you up to 3,000 additional Membership Rewards. The offers come in different forms, so you never know what you might have and it’s possible that you might not have anything at all. All offers expire 11/15/17.

Be sure to check all of your Amex cards, even those that don’t earn Membership Rewards, such as SPG credit cards As it sometimes happens, I received four different offers on four different cards (personal Platinum, Gold Card, SPG Card, and Hilton Surpass).

Earn extra Membership Rewards

Cable and satellite bills

The first offer is for 1,000 Membership Rewards after you spend $100 on your cable or satellite bill.

  • Offer valid on bill payments for US cable and satellite television services made directly with the provider.
  • Payments must be made directly with the provider online, via mobile app or by phone.
  • Excludes payments for satellite radio services and subscriptions with streaming television providers.
  • Limit 1 enrolled Card per American Express Card online account and limit of 3,000 additional Membership Rewards points per Card
  • These additional points are in addition to any points you would normally receive for purchases on your Card under the terms of the Membership Rewards program.

Cell phone bills

The next offer is for 1,000 Membership Rewards after you spend $100 on your cell phone bill online.

The terms state that the offer is only good for select providers.

  • Offer valid on cellular phone bill payments made directly with T Mobile, Sprint, AT&T Wireless, US Cellular and Verizon. Excludes all additional brands not listed.
  • Payments must be made directly with the provider online, via mobile app or by phone
  • Payments for hardware and non cellular services are excluded, if not bundled and charged with monthly service bill.
  • Limit 1 enrolled Card per American Express Card online account and limit of 3,000 additional Membership Rewards points per Card.
  • These additional points are in addition to any points you would normally receive for purchases

Cash back offers

The alternative offers actually give you a cash discount on your purchases instead of Membership Rewards but limit you to $30 total.

Cable or satellite bill

  • Get 10% back on your cable or satellite bill (up to $30 total)

  • The same terms apply as above but you get cash back versus Membership Rewards.

Cell phone bills

  • Get 10% back on your phone bill (up to $30 total)

  • Same terms apply as above.

Which offers are the best?

If you’re like me you and got all four offers then you might have to choose which offers are going to give you the best value. I might try to see if there’s a way to partial pay via phone. That way I could spend $100 for the 1,000 Membership Rewards and then go for the 10% back for the remaining bill. It might not be worth the hassle but I’m also just interested to see if it would work.

If I had to just choose one, I’d go for the 1,000 Membership Rewards because I’ll get around 2 cents per point of value with those points making my value received close to $20 back with each payment. I usually pay these bills with my Chase Ink Plus to earn 5X on these purchases but since the 1,000 Membership Rewards are in addition to what I’ll earn on the purchase, I’ll get more points with this promotion.

H/T: The Frequent Miler

Earn up to 10,000 AA Miles Per Night with This New Promo

American Airlines is offering a new promotion where you can book hotels on their new AAdvantage hotel portal and earn up to 10,000 AA miles per night. American advertises that you can earn up to 10,000 AA miles, but I didn’t find any properties offering 10,000 miles, so I think those be might hard to find.

The new website is powered by Booking.com and the search engine appears to be pretty robust. Simply put in your location and nights and you’ll see the listing populate with different hotel properties. Look for the AAdvantage logo at the bottom of each selection to see how many miles you can earn.  Some will be in the thousands but others will be in the hundreds. 

If you search for multiple nights, the amount of miles you see listed is the total amount that you will earn for all of your nights combined.

If you value American miles at around 1.5 cents per point and can earn 5,000 miles for a night, that’s $75 worth of value received each night. And if you can max out the offer at 10,000 miles, that’s $150! While that’s a nice return, the properties offering 10,000 per night are probably very expensive, so I doubt a “mattress run” for miles will make a lot of sense here.

Be sure to include your AAdvantage number in your booking to ensure that you get the points sent to your account. Also, keep in mind that this is likely the equivalent of booking through Booking.com (an OTA) so it’s likely that you’ll lose out on elite status perks and benefits when making your booking.

Delta Sneaks Another Devaluation

I’ve got several issues with Delta SkyMiles but my biggest ones have to do with their devaluations which usually come with no notice and their ridiculous dynamic pricing.

In the fall of 2016, Delta increased business class awards to several destinations, including Asia, Australia/New Zealand, Africa, and South America. Delta also devalued awards to Tel Aviv and to Europe in 2016, increasing the latter by 15,000 roundtrip (without any notice). Then, in the spring of 2017, Delta increased the price of business class tickets on partners, such as Virgin Atlantic, increasing the prices to places like Europe by 30,000 miles round trip.

Delta’s award program SkyMiles has no published award chart and practices “dynamic pricing.” This means that the prices for their awards fluctuate, presumably based on demand. Many of the redemption rates for their dynamic pricing can be ridiculously high, sometimes triple the cost of their competition.

The lack of an award chart makes it easier for Delta to do whatever it wants, especially when they provide no formal notice.

Now Delta is being Delta again and has increased the redemption price for some non-stop saver awards (R fare). Some non-stop domestic first class flights are now pricing at 30,000 miles versus the standard 25,000 miles they priced at before.

However, as shown by VFTW, when you originate a flight from certain airports and fly to your destination via a hub the price goes down. For example, LAX -> ATL might be 30,000 miles but OAK -> LAX -> ATL will still price at 25,000.

This is odd to me for the reason that Delta does not allow you to connect saver awards to form a single itinerary. Often if you wanted to connect saver awards the price will go up. But here, we’re seeing the price actually go down.

It’s hard for me to think of anything good to say about Delta SkyMiles. Their recent devaluation on partner awards to Europe and Australia with no notice threw a huge wrench in my plans earlier this year. I feel that if other programs like American and United pulled these same tactics the outrage would be substantial, but we’ve almost been conditioned to accept this from Delta.

Delta is obviously free to do as they please, but I struggle to see how they’ve maintained a loyal following given their practices. Devaluations are a part of the game, but the frequency in which Delta imposes them along with the lack of notice really is awful.

If you ever have plans to use Delta SkyMiles try to redeem them as quickly as possible and don’t ever think that you’re “safe” because of recent devaluations. You never know when Delta will strike.

H/T: VFTW

 

35% Bonus Transfer Rate from Hotels to Aeroplan

Aeroplan is offering a new promotion where you’ll receive a 35% bonus when you transfer hotel points to its program through August 21, 2017. Even though transferring hotel points to airlines is often not a very good deal, these bonuses often make them reasonable in certain situations and I think this is one of those deals you should at least think about.

Aeroplan is a spin-off loyalty program of Air Canada and has been independently owned and operated by Aimia for almost a decade. However, this soon won’t be the case any longer as Air Canada will be “taking back” its loyalty program in 2020, though Aeroplan will still be around.

Aeroplan is one of my favorite award programs. They are a 1:1 transfer program of American Express Membership Rewards and offer some competitive redemption rates for Star Alliance partners. In particular, their rate for business class travel from North America to Europe can be as low as 55,000 one way. And you can avoid surcharges by flying on any one of these partners: 

  • Air China
  • Brussels
  • EgyptAir
  • Ethiopian
  • EVA Air
  • Scandinavian
  • Singapore
  • Swiss
  • Turkish
  • United

I recently flew on SAS to Tromsø, Norway to see the northern lights by using Aeroplan miles and I only paid about $12 in total fees.

SAS business class.

The transfer bonus

There are several different hotel partners participating in the promotion: 
They key thing to be aware of is that the transfer rates differ for these different hotel programs. I’ve bolded the first two rates from SPG and Marriott because they are the deals that I would consider. But here are all of the hotel transfer partners and their respective transfer ratios.

  • SPG Members can convert their Starpoints to Aeroplan Miles at a rate of 1 for 1
  • Marriott Rewards members can convert points to Aeroplan Miles (10,000 points for 2,000 miles).
  • Wyndham Rewards: Wyndham Rewards members can convert their Points to Aeroplan Miles at a rate of 5 points to 1 mile (starting at 6,000 points for 1,200 Miles)
  • Best Western Rewards members can convert their Points to Aeroplan Miles at a rate of 5 points to 1 mile
  • Choice Privileges members can convert their Points to Aeroplan Miles at a rate of 5 points to 1 mile.
  • Coast Rewards Members can convert their Coast Rewards points to Aeroplan Miles at a rate of 1 point to 1 mile. Conversions are allowed in 1,000 point increments
  • Club Carlson members can choose auto-conversion (every 10,000 points will automatically convert into 1,000 Aeroplan Miles) or convert as needed (in increments of 2,000; 50,000 or 100,000 points)
  • Members earn both Aeroplan Miles and Hilton points for the same stay or can convert points to miles in increments of 10,000 points for 1,000 miles.
  • Le Club Accorhotels members can convert their Le Club Accorhotels points into Aeroplan Miles at a rate of up to 2 points to 1 mile (in increments of of 4,000 Le Club Accorhotels points= 2,000 Aeroplan Miles)
  • Golden Circle members can convert their Golden Circle Award Points into Aeroplan Miles at a rate of 1 point to 1 mile. The minimum amount of Golden Circle Award Points to convert into miles is 2,500 points (with the subsequent of 500 point increments

SPG

SPG points are usually great for these types of promotions for a couple of reasons. They offer a 1:1 transfer ratio to airlines on top of a 25% built-in transfer bonus when you transfer points in increments of 20,000. So for example if you transfer 20,000 points to an airline you’ll receive 25,000 airline miles.

And what makes this even better is that this 25% bonus stacks on top of the bonus promotion. So 20,000 SPG points would earn you 5,000 points from the 25% bonus and also earn you 8,750 since the 35% bonus is stacked on top of the 25% bonus. So that would be a total of 33,750 miles.

If you value SPG points at 2.5 cents per point and Aeroplan miles at 1.5 cents per point, you’re going from $500 to $506 worth of value with the conversion of 20,000 SPG points to 33,750, so there’s an overall increase in value.

Marriott Hotel + Air Packages

JW Marriott Houston Galleria
JW Marriott Houston Galleria.

Marriott Hotel + Air Packages can be good deals without any type of promo being offered. They allow you to use Marriott points to redeem for a set amount of miles plus hotel stays at Marriott properties. The amount of miles and the category of Marriott property you’ll receive a free night for depend on how many Marriott points you’re redeeming.

The only real drawback to these is that you must book your free hotel nights consecutively. So whether you get a 5 night package or a 7 night package, you must book them all consecutively, which means you need to find availability for an entire week. Even if you don’t end up staying all 5 or 7 nights, though, the deal can still be worth it.

The most common Hotel + Air Package talked about is usually the 7 free nights at a category 1-5 + 120,000 miles. To redeem for this, you would need 270,000 Marriott points. If you utilize this bonus, you would end up with a 162,000 Aeroplan miles.

At .8 cents per point for Marriott points and 1.5 cents per miles, that’s an exchange of $2,160 of Marriott points for $2,430 of Aeroplan miles PLUS the 7 free nights at a Marriott property up to a category 5. With Marriott Gold Status, it’s possible to stay at a Marriott category 5 and receive up to $320 per night in value. So it’s possible to get over $4,500 worth of value from converting 270,000 Marriott points with this promotion.

I’m not crazy about transferring hotel points from many of the other programs because you lose so much value.

For example, 10,000 Hilton Honors points would be worth $40 at .4 cents per point and they would convert into 1,350 Aeroplan miles. At a valuation of 1.5 cents per point, that $40 becomes $20 worth of value. As shown above, the SPG and Marriott conversions actually brings you more value so for many of these hotel programs, I don’t think it’s worth it to lose value when transferring to Aeroplan.

However, since Aeroplan is also a member of American Express Membership Rewards, these programs may be a great way to top-off your Aeroplan miles so that you have enough for a given redemption.

Final word

Overall, this promo is pretty decent since there’s no tiered approach that you often see requiring you to transfer a lot of points to maximize value. I’d probably only go for it with SPG or maybe Marriott points but I’d also have to have some type of redemption plans for Aeroplan in mind. I would not make this transfer just for the sake of accumulating Aeroplan miles.

H/T: OMAAT

Amex Offering 40% Transfer Bonus to Avios

Offers contained within this article maybe expired.

American Express just announced that British Airways Avios and Iberia Avios would once again be 1:1 transfer partners. This was great because it allowed Amex to catch up to Chase Ultimate Rewards a bit since British Airways is a 1:1 transfer partners of Chase. Now the deal is even sweeter because Amex is offering a 40% bonus transfer rate to Avios. 

The offer 

  • Special Offer: Get 40% more Avios when you transfer Membership Rewards points through 9/17/17.

You have all the way until mid-September to take advantage of the offer so there’s plenty of time to earn a couple of sign-up bonuses and then transfer them over to British Airways or Iberia.

These promotions come about once a year and while some promo bonuses have been higher, 40% is still solid.

For your convenience, I’ve included some of the best uses of Avios below.

Just remember to play around with the math to figure out the new transfer requirements. Some of these requirements become quite lucrative. For example, 50,000 Membership Rewards to Iberia becomes 70,000 Avios, which is enough for a roundtrip business class ticket from cities, such as Chicago, New York, and Boston. 50,000 roundtrip in J is a an exceptional deal!

How to figure out your exact mileage requirements?

To figure out your exact mileage requirement for this promotion simply enter the standard total milage requirement and divide it by 1.4. So using the example above it would normally require 68,000 Avios for a roundtrip to Madrid from Chicago. 68,000/1.4 = 48,571.

What can I use Avios for?

Avios are excellent for short-haul flights around the US/Mexico/Caribbean, flights from the West Coast to Hawaii, certain routes to Europe, and other intra-continent flights around the world in places like South America and Australia.

Here are some specific examples of great value that you can get from Avios.

1) Flights to Europe

A. Flights with Aer Lingus 

A long-loved sweet spot was using Avios to fly Boston to Dublin on Aer Lingus but that sweetspot was bumped from Zone 4 to Zone 5 on the British Airways chart so that the mileage requirements increased. Even with the new requirements, it’s still a good deal, especially if you can book the trip during off-peak times.

The roundtrip redemptions from Boston to Dublin now look like this:

  • Economy
    • Off-peak: 26,000 Avios
    • Peak: 40,000 Avios
  • Business:
    • Off-peak: 100,000 Avios
    • Peak: 120,000 Avios

Also, as a result of the new chart with Aer Lingus, more sweet spots opened up from different cities. You can now fly from NYC/Chicago/Hartford/DC/Toronto to Dublin for the following rates:

  • Economy
    • Off-peak : 26,000
    • Peak: 40,000
  • Business:
    • Off-peak: 100,000
    • Peak: 120,000

Fees can be around $170 total for a roundtrip so they aren’t that bad, considering how cheap these redemption rates.

B. Flights with Iberia 

If you want to fly in business class to Europe from certain cities like New York and Chicago, then you probably want to consider transferring your Membership Rewards directly to Iberia Avios. It is possible to transfer your Avios from British Airways to Iberia, but there are technical steps involved with that so I would just transfer your points directly to Iberia if you were planning on flying with them.

The great sweet spots with Iberia are for trips between 3,001 to 4,000 miles. 

This is a tremendous sweet spot for using Iberia Avios to book business class, especially if your trip falls within the off-peak calendar. 68,000 Avios for a roundtrip in business class to Europe beats some of the best redemption rates like Korean Air, Asiana, and ANA and the fees are reasonable so don’t overlook this option!  The 100,000 (round trip) redemption rate from British Airways and Aer Lingus during off-peak times isn’t bad either, so long as you can avoid or minimize fees.

Here’s a comparison of the rates with British Airways/Aer Lingus.

  • British Airways/Aer Lingus
    • Off-peak: 50,000
    • Peak: 60,000
  • Iberia
    • Off-peak: 34,000
    • Peak: 50,000

These rates are good with Iberia for the following routes:

  • Boston to Madrid
  • New York to Madrid
  • Chicago to Madrid

Chicago technically is more than 4,000 miles but Iberia lumps it in with the other routes and I’m 100% okay with that.

2) North America to Hawaii

When flying from the West Coast to Hawaii, Avios offers one of the best redemptions. For this particular redemption, you’ll be flying with American Airlines or Alaska Airlines, which gives you access to a number of departing locations all along the West Coast and Alaska.

A. Avios economy redemptions

  • 25,000 Avios – West Coast to Hawaii

B. Avios business class redemptions

Getting from the West Coast to Hawaii in business class with Avios is still somewhat of a sweet spot compared to other major airlines, although you can do better by going with airlines like Korean Air, ANA, Singapore, etc.

  • 75,000 Avios – West Coast to Hawaii

Note: if you used Iberia Avios for this redemption you could get it as low as 62,500 Avios roundtrip (but you can’t book one ways on American with Iberia).

3) North America to South America

Avios can offer you some of the best redemption rates for getting to South America. You’ll usually be flying on LAN, TAM, or American Airlines.

A. Avios economy redemptions

Take a look at economy rates for getting to two popular South American destinations, Lima and Santiago Chile from Texas and New York. The distances between these destinations stays in Zones 5 and 6 for Avios so the rates are pretty reasonable but the sweet spot is getting to destinations in the southern part of South America, such as Santiago.

  • 40,000  Avios -DFW/JFK to LIM
  • 50,000  Avios – DFW/JFK to SCL

B. Avios business class redemptions

For the most part, the business class redemptions to South American from North America are not great and a lot of them are very terrible but I’ve included them for your reference and the sake of completeness. Here’s a look at some of the redemptions and how they stack up against the competition.

  • 75,000 Avios – MIA to LIM
  • 120,000  Avios -DFW to LIM
  • 150,000  Avios – DFW to SCL

4) North America to Mexico or the Caribbean

Using Avios to get to Mexico and various Caribbean destinations can be a great way to redeem. As you can tell from a couple of the examples I’ve posted, the deals can be great even if you are flying from the Northeast or Midwest.

A. Avios economy redemptions

Getting to Mexico

  • 15,000 Avios – DFW to CUN (Cancun)
  • 20,000 Avios – JFK/ORD to CUN

Avios business class redemptions

When flying from hubs in the southern part of the country, the redemptions for business class are an absolute steal to Mexico and the Caribbean, assuming you can find direct shots. Even when you’re departing from northern states, the redemption rates are still very competitive.

Getting to Mexico

  • 30,000 Avios – DFW to CUN (Cancun)
  • 60,000 Avios – JFK/ORD to CUN

5) Short haul economy flights in North America

The recent devaluation to short-haul flight redemptions with Avios was a pretty big hit to the program but there’s still some pretty good redemptions to be had. The devaluation basically did away with the first zone and made it so that the cheapest short-haul flight in economy would require 7,500 Avios, and business and first class were changed to Zone 2’s requirements as well.

Even with that devaluation, it’s still a good deal to use Avios for flights 2,000 miles and under in the U.S. because you can save 5,000 to 10,000 miles.

Getting around the United States

  • 15,000 Avios for routes up to 1,150 miles (e.g., MIA – JFK)
  • 20,000 Avios 1,151 miles to 2,000 miles (e.g., SFO – IAH)
  • 25,000 Avios 2,001 miles to 3,000 miles (e.g., LAX – JFK)

6) Intra-continental flights

Avios can also be used effeciently to book intra-continental flights. I’ve recently used Avios to book some pretty otherwise expensive flights between Lima and Santiago. The particular flight I booked costed $2,000 for a one-way business class ticket. I used 20,000 Avios for a 10 cent per point redemption, a great value that you usually find on higher-end first class suites.

These kind of redemptions can be had in other continents, too. I’d always do some research on One World partners in Africa, Australia, and Asia in order to seek out valuable Avios redemptions.

Avios Now a 1:1 Transfer Partner of Amex Membership Rewards

Offers contained within this article maybe expired.

Back in the fall of 2015, American Express lowered the transfer ratio of Membership Rewards to British Airways and Iberia from 1:1 to 10:8. This move hurt American Express Membership Rewards because Chase Ultimate Rewards remained a 1:1 transfer partner with British Airways. Now, American Express has re-introduced British Airways and Iberia as a 1:1 transfer partner once again. This is great news, especially since British Airways offers promotional transfer rates about every year.

Avios refresher

Avios is a rewards program that partners with different airlines, such as British Airways, Iberia Plus, and Aer Lingus. The programs for the airlines are separate but related, meaning that they have their own routing rules, award charts, and calendars but also allow you to transfer points between them.

Each of these airlines has their own distance-based award chart which can be seen below.

British Airways

Aer Lingus

Iberia

What can I use Avios for?

Avios are excellent for short-haul flights around the US/Mexico/Caribbean, flights from the West Coast to Hawaii, certain routes to Europe, and other intra-continent flights around the world in places like South America and Australia.

Here are some specific examples of great value that you can get from Avios.

1) Flights to Europe

A. Flights with Aer Lingus 

A long-loved sweet spot was using Avios to fly Boston to Dublin on Aer Lingus but that sweetspot was bumped from Zone 4 to Zone 5 on the British Airways chart so that the mileage requirements increased. Even with the new requirements, it’s still a good deal, especially if you can book the trip during off-peak times.

The roundtrip redemptions from Boston to Dublin now look like this:

  • Economy
    • Off-peak: 26,000 Avios
    • Peak: 40,000 Avios
  • Business:
    • Off-peak: 100,000 Avios
    • Peak: 120,000 Avios

Also, as a result of the new chart with Aer Lingus, more sweet spots opened up from different cities. You can now fly from NYC/Chicago/Hartford/DC/Toronto to Dublin for the following rates:

  • Economy
    • Off-peak : 26,000
    • Peak: 40,000
  • Business:
    • Off-peak: 100,000
    • Peak: 120,000

Fees can be around $170 total for a roundtrip so they aren’t that bad, considering how cheap these redemption rates.

B. Flights with Iberia 

If you want to fly in business class to Europe from certain cities like New York and Chicago, then you probably want to consider transferring your Membership Rewards directly to Iberia Avios. It is possible to transfer your Avios from British Airways to Iberia, but there are technical steps involved with that so I would just transfer your points directly to Iberia if you were planning on flying with them.

The great sweet spots with Iberia are for trips between 3,001 to 4,000 miles. 

This is a tremendous sweet spot for using Iberia Avios to book business class, especially if your trip falls within the off-peak calendar. 68,000 Avios for a roundtrip in business class to Europe beats some of the best redemption rates like Korean Air, Asiana, and ANA and the fees are reasonable so don’t overlook this option!  The 100,000 (round trip) redemption rate from British Airways and Aer Lingus during off-peak times isn’t bad either, so long as you can avoid or minimize fees.

Here’s a comparison of the rates with British Airways/Aer Lingus.

  • British Airways/Aer Lingus
    • Off-peak: 50,000
    • Peak: 60,000
  • Iberia
    • Off-peak: 34,000
    • Peak: 50,000

These rates are good with Iberia for the following routes:

  • Boston to Madrid
  • New York to Madrid
  • Chicago to Madrid

Chicago technically is more than 4,000 miles but Iberia lumps it in with the other routes and I’m 100% okay with that.

2) North America to Hawaii

When flying from the West Coast to Hawaii, Avios offers one of the best redemptions. For this particular redemption, you’ll be flying with American Airlines or Alaska Airlines, which gives you access to a number of departing locations all along the West Coast and Alaska.

A. Avios economy redemptions

  • 25,000 Avios – West Coast to Hawaii

B. Avios business class redemptions

Getting from the West Coast to Hawaii in business class with Avios is still somewhat of a sweet spot compared to other major airlines, although you can do better by going with airlines like Korean Air, ANA, Singapore, etc.

  • 75,000 Avios – West Coast to Hawaii

Note: if you used Iberia Avios for this redemption you could get it as low as 62,500 Avios roundtrip (but you can’t book one ways on American with Iberia).

3) North America to South America

Avios can offer you some of the best redemption rates for getting to South America. You’ll usually be flying on LAN, TAM, or American Airlines.

A. Avios economy redemptions

Take a look at economy rates for getting to two popular South American destinations, Lima and Santiago Chile from Texas and New York. The distances between these destinations stays in Zones 5 and 6 for Avios so the rates are pretty reasonable but the sweet spot is getting to destinations in the southern part of South America, such as Santiago.

  • 40,000  Avios -DFW/JFK to LIM
  • 50,000  Avios – DFW/JFK to SCL

B. Avios business class redemptions

For the most part, the business class redemptions to South American from North America are not great and a lot of them are very terrible but I’ve included them for your reference and the sake of completeness. Here’s a look at some of the redemptions and how they stack up against the competition.

  • 75,000 Avios – MIA to LIM
  • 120,000  Avios -DFW to LIM
  • 150,000  Avios – DFW to SCL

4) North America to Mexico or the Caribbean

Using Avios to get to Mexico and various Caribbean destinations can be a great way to redeem. As you can tell from a couple of the examples I’ve posted, the deals can be great even if you are flying from the Northeast or Midwest.

A. Avios economy redemptions

Getting to Mexico

  • 15,000 Avios – DFW to CUN (Cancun)
  • 20,000 Avios – JFK/ORD to CUN

Avios business class redemptions

When flying from hubs in the southern part of the country, the redemptions for business class are an absolute steal to Mexico and the Caribbean, assuming you can find direct shots. Even when you’re departing from northern states, the redemption rates are still very competitive.

Getting to Mexico

  • 30,000 Avios – DFW to CUN (Cancun)
  • 60,000 Avios – JFK/ORD to CUN

5) Short haul economy flights in North America

The recent devaluation to short-haul flight redemptions with Avios was a pretty big hit to the program but there’s still some pretty good redemptions to be had. The devaluation basically did away with the first zone and made it so that the cheapest short-haul flight in economy would require 7,500 Avios, and business and first class were changed to Zone 2’s requirements as well.

Even with that devaluation, it’s still a good deal to use Avios for flights 2,000 miles and under in the U.S. because you can save 5,000 to 10,000 miles.

Getting around the United States

  • 15,000 Avios for routes up to 1,150 miles (e.g., MIA – JFK)
  • 20,000 Avios 1,151 miles to 2,000 miles (e.g., SFO – IAH)
  • 25,000 Avios 2,001 miles to 3,000 miles (e.g., LAX – JFK)

6) Intra-continental flights

Avios can also be used effeciently to book intra-continental flights. I’ve recently used Avios to book some pretty otherwise expensive flights between Lima and Santiago. The particular flight I booked costed $2,000 for a one-way business class ticket. I used 20,000 Avios for a 10 cent per point redemption, a great value that you usually find on higher-end first class suites.

These kind of redemptions can be had in other continents, too. I’d always do some research on One World partners in Africa, Australia, and Asia in order to seek out valuable Avios redemptions.

Final word

I consider Avios to be a valuable currency because there are many ways to earn them and there are several sweet spots that you can take advantage of if you know how to look for them. Now that Membership Rewards is once again a 1:1 transfer partner with British Airways and Iberia, Avios is now an even stronger program in my eyes.

Citi Offering Transfer Bonus to Hilton Honors

Citi is offering  a promotional bonus transfer rate to its lone hotel partner Hilton Honors. The promotional rate transfer Citi ThankYou points at a 1:2 ratio. So 10 ThankYou points equals 20 Hilton Honors points. The standard ratio is 1 ThankYou point to 1.5 Hilton Honors points. This offer is only good up until September 20, 2017. 

This deal comes at an interesting time after Citi discontinued its co-branded Hilton cards after losing out on a bidding war to American Express. I’m wondering how that dissolved relationship will affect Hilton as a transfer partner of Citi and if this promotion has anything to do with Citi maybe having a surplus of Honors points on the shelves.

Is this a good deal?

This really is not that great of a promotion.

Hilton Honors points are worth about .4 cents per point on average. If you assume a point value of 1.7 cents for ThankYou points then you’re losing almost a full cent in value by transferring your ThankYou points to Hilton since you’d end up with .8 cents worth of value. Even if you value ThankYou points at 1.25 cents per point, you’re still losing value when you transfer them to Hilton (in most cased, at least).

This deal is also not worth it in many cases because you can use the Citi ThankYou TravelCenter (Citi’s travel portal) to book hotels at a rate of 1.25 cents per point if you have a card like the Citi Premier. In many cases, it will make more sense to redeem ThankYou points for a hotel stay this way than transferring your points out to Hilton.

An easy to see if the deal is worth it is to look up the cost of the hotel through the ThankYou TravelCenter and see how many ThankYou points would be required. Then shop through Hilton.com and see the total points required. If the cost in Honors points is over 2X more than the ThankYou TravelCenter, then you should probably book through the ThankYou TravelCenter.

Keep in mind that by booking through the ThankYou TravelCenter you likely lose the chance to receive elite benefits and credit earned, while booking with Honors points through Hilton will still allow you to receive your free breakfasts, upgrades, etc., so that should be factored in.

If you just needed to top off your Hilton balance for an upcoming redemption this could still present decent value for you even if the exchange rate is a bit uneven. I’ve had times when I’ve just needed a couple of thousands points of a given reward currency and it made sense to take a small loss in value to allow me to make a redemption. Also, if you were going to be able to take advantage of a free fifth night that could also make more sense to transfer to Hilton.

Lessons from this promo

I think this promotion underscore two important lessons:

Transferring points to hotels like Hilton are rarely a good use of points. The only hotel programs that consistently offer good value in my experience are Hyatt and perhaps Marriott at times, which are both transfer partners of Chase Ultimate Rewards. While you might stumble across decent value here and there, transferring points to Hilton from either Citi or American Express is rarely a good use of points.

It’s always important to consider booking through a reward program’s travel portal before going through with a booking. This is especially true if you have a card like the Chase Sapphire Reserve. I’ve often seen domestic United flights requiring something like 18,000 Ultimate Rewards to book while transferring points would require 25,000. So always weigh your alternative options.

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