babiemindy

Dear savvy FTers,

Looking for some advice please... I currently have 0 Alaska Miles, I want to get 100k for one way from JNB to JFK in September on Emirates EK. What is the best strategy? I am open to apply for credit card(s) or transfer points from other programs.

The current offer for credit card is 25,000 miles, is this a good place to start?
I also have SPG: 60k points IHG: 80k

Before the trip I am also going to Europe and Southern Asia, I can also earn miles with AS partners.

Thanks in advance, have a great day!

ANC

well the credit card is the quickest way to get started. They used to have bonus miles for signing up to mileage plan and then to the emailings. Dont think they do that anymore. With the credit card you get the 25K and then pay every single bill that you can on the card and everything you buy that you can on the card, and of course pay off the tab in full monthly. If you are buying things online check mileageplanshopping.com to see if its a web store that you can earn more AS miles from. If you have a mortgage see if you can pay that with a credit card, the vast majority you cant do this although there was a coin buying scheme going around but Im not sure if thats still happening either. Well if you are going to Europe and Asia you should at least hit MVP which you would then earn a 50% bonus on flight miles traveled as an MVP as well. I wouldnt do any points.com transfers. You lose way to many in the conversions. With getting the card and paying all the bills on it and spending coupled with what you earn for the Asia and Europe trips you should be pretty close and theres always the option to buying 30K miles if you are close

kwl747

I'm not saying this is what I would do but..

Starpoints transfer to AS at a 1:1 ratio plus an extra 5k for every 20k transferred.

Transfer your 60k starpoints to AS, that's 75k AS miles. Apply for the credit card with the 25k bonus, and boom you are at 100k.

Also, looks like if you apply for the credit card, BOA is offering a bonus of 15k miles with $10k in spend in first 6 months. So if you went this route, you'd get 40k for getting the AS card + another 10k for base spend. Now you only need to transfer 40k starpoints.

http://boardingarea.com/onemileatati...minimum-spend/

ANC

ahhh I didnt know that ^

That article for the card promo that you posted though says "up to 40,000 "for elite mileage plan members"

jsguyrus

TODAY (1/31) is the last day to join the Alaska Airlines Boardroom for a 7,500 mile promotion.

http://www.alaskaair.com/content/gif...nrollment.aspx

CDKing

Thats the easy part. The tough part wil be finding EK award space especially in F. When i looked from South Africa in September there wasn't much space at all

WrightHI

If all else fails, you could do some flying.

Joking aside, a couple of credit card signups and a little bit of flying add up pretty fast, especially if you can get a status match and qualify for elite bonuses.

beaver

And if you need, don't forget about:
https://www.mileageplanshopping.com

Most of the companies are $1 to 1 mile, but there are a few promotions going on.

Waitlisted

Great advice. Also if you apply for the credit card on an actual AS flight and turn it into an FA you get extra miles (not sure how many though, it seems to vary from 1,000 - 5,000).

SingaporeDon

But CX via HKG may have better availability, and they usually tend to open up more seats closer to the flight date.

CDKing

Thats the best strategy avoid EK all together

babiemindy

I heard EK F is supposed to be really nice.

@CDKing
Looks like the availability opens up for F to JNB 2-3 weeks before travel. I can wait until then to book a one way flight with cash if I can't get the award ticket.

@kwl747 @ANC Thanks for all the advice!
Looks like I will be signing up for the credit card, and then transfer some points from SPG.

@SingaporeDon any idea what the routing would be like on CX for NYC-JNB? If I go that route, I'd probably use my AA miles.

Flying on AS is not really an option for me, they only go to SEA from the NY area - I might take one trip to visit the NW but that won't get me many miles.

Thanks everyone for all the tips so far, you're awesome!!!

CDKing

It is really nice

At one point space was available on almost every flight but was tightened up.

Its JFK-HKG-JNB. Its about 27 hours in F although its not too much longer air time than EK but its 30K less AS miles spent

hamburglar

You may also buy miles now at 40% off

https://buy.points.com/PointsPartner...LandingBuyBody

LwoodY2K

AS allows US-HKG-JNB on a single CX award (for 70k in F). I'm 98% sure that AA doesn't, which means it would be like double the miles.