Greece has been on my list for a long time. There is so much to see and do there. From the countless ancient ruins, wondrous ancient history, stunning islands and the beautiful countryside. Having been to France in March 2019, I didn’t think I’d be back in Europe this soon again, not to mention this year. However, if there is a will there's a way. Or rather in my case, if there are points or miles, there is a way! I started checking what was available and what points and miles I had available. I knew I didn’t want to fly coach for 9 plus hours being 6’1’, so the minimum class acceptable to me was premium economy. I started looking on Alaska Air for award space but they are devious and if you are not careful, they will stick you in a mixed cabin award. I also dreamt of flying Emirates First Class and was trying to figure out how I could get those last 37K I needed in Alaska Miles for the absurd 180K miles award redemption per person.
I gave up on my dream after a few days of number crunching because it would cost me $1200 USD to buy those last few miles. I went back to researching and reading articles online about how to max out award redemptions for different airline alliances. I came across an article on Star Alliance and Aeroplan redemptions. I started thinking how I could make it work (if I found an award on Aeroplan), since I had no miles there.
Business Class on Turkish Airlines
Well it so happened that I found an award ticket, not for Premium Economy but a Business Class one way ticket on Turkish Airlines. This flight was on their 777-300er from JFK to IST and IST to ATH. The cost for the flight was only 57,500 Aeroplan miles and $15 Canadian Dollars!
I had a small stash of Amex points and could transfer those instantly but what would my girlfriend use? She didn’t have enough Amex points to transfer. She did however have 120k Bonvoy points (formerly SPG), which would transfer at a 3-1 ratio. In other words, 60k equals 20k miles. For every 60k transferred you get a 5k bonus in miles, so 120k Bonvoy points came out to 50k Aeroplan miles. Then she just needed to transfer 7500 Amex points to get the total 57,500 Aeroplan miles needed. I went ahead and transferred my Amex points to the plan and then we had to wait as those valuable but dreaded Bonvoy points took forever to transfer. According to tests done by TPG they could take 4 days to over a week and Bonvoy's site said it could take even longer! Normally I’d have called the airline or in this case Areoplan to hold the award seats for 1-3 days until the miles cleared but Aeroplan typically doesn’t do this, so I had to hurry up and wait. Finally after three and a half days of stress the points cleared and when I checked the award seats were still there and we booked them! Yes! No coach for us! At 57,500 miles and $15 Canadian Dollars, which equates to $11.41 USD, this is a no brainer. If you can find a One-Way Fixed Mileage Flight Reward, go for it!
I think the award chart prices have gone up a bit since I found this in 2019. Something of note, when trying to create a Turkish Air account to associate the record locator and pick my seats, I could never successfully create an account. I still was able to select our seats by looking up the flight via the number and doing so that way, without ever logging in.
We flew Turkish Airlines and loved it. Check out my Business Class video review below.
So the key points I'm trying to get across here: 1.) You should have a diverse miles and points portfolio. For example, don’t have only AA or United points. Amex, Bonvoy, and Capital one points let you transfer those points to tons of airlines.
2.) Be patient! Award searching is a lot of work. Also your points might not transfer immediately. If your airline plan allows you to hold the award seats, call them first to hold it, then start your points transfer! There is nothing worse than transferring your hard earned points but when they finally show up the award is no longer available.
3.) Plan your trip around your award flights. For most people this isn’t going to work. When I find a great award and I know it’s a great redemption (like my Turkish Airways Business Class award for 57,500 miles on Aeroplan), I snag it! Then I fill in the rest of the flights as I find them or buy cheap coach seats for connecting flights to position myself to where my return flight homes is leaving from.
4.) Search multiple airline alliances. For Oneworld, I use British airways. For Star Alliance, I use Areoplan and United. For Flying Blue I use Delta, KLM/Airfrance and sometimes Virgin Atlantic for good Delta award redemptions.
5.) You could sign up for an Expertflyer subscription and set up alerts to take some of the work out of the award search for you. If you have limited time or knowledge on where or how to search this might help you. Good luck in your award searches!
Having dinner in Santorini as the sun sets. Thank you Aeroplan!
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