Hawaii - Best airline for service to Hawaii via FF trip with Starpoints transfer

I have a bunch of Starwood Points, and I want to send some relatives on a trip to Hawaii. It looks like USAir, AA, and Delta are my 3 options with the 1:1 conversion. Any suggestions about which would be best for service from PIT to HNL? In particular, I'm considering first/business class, so if there's any thoughts on that I would appreciate it.

I note Continental/United are 2:1 and therefore seem not a good option, but if you have anything to add on that it would be appreciated.

Thanks!

For Hawaii award travel, the award pricing is so high that I like to use awards that give a free segment to/from Hawaii. This works well for bmi miles, but those are not an SPG partner. In your case, I probably use AA and redeem for LHR-IAD/BWI stopover DFW/ORD-HNL for 45K each. A four hour drive to DC would be worth it to me (if I lived in PIT). Business class seats to HNL.

Wouldn't he need to drive to London?

Or take repositioning flight?

Thanks for replies. I guess I'm a little unclear - I don't understand the benefits of that plan. 37.5K-47.5K is the regular one-way business-class on AA, why couldn't I just fly PIT-stopover-HNL for those miles? Are you just recommending business class on American, or is there a plan that I'm missing that saves me something?

As this is about selecting an airline to Hawaii and not about SPG, please follow it in the Hawaii forum.

l'etoile
Starwood moderator

Having had status in both DL and AA's FF programs, I can tell you that getting business class tickets to Hawaii at the low award redemption level on DL is almost like winning the lottery. Availability is much better on AA. Both offer an attractive business product to Hawaii, though, DL on their A330 via ATL, and AA on a 767 via ORD or DFW. You should note that on both airlines, the product involves business class type seats, but cabin service more like domestic F. DL does offer some nice touches, though, such as after-dinner ice cream sundaes. The seats on both are of the "almost flat" sort, but far better than other offerings in the Hawaii market. Check seatguru.com for more info on the seating.

My advice would be to check both airlines availability before transferring your points. You will likely find that AA is a better choice. There is also the sheer numbers factor in AA's favor. They have three flights with the almost-business level (two daily from DFW, one from ORD) while DL has just the one out of ATL. I will say that the FAs and IFE are better on DL, but it's really hard to get awards for reasonable amounts of miles. Hope this helps.

Another nice thing about AA is the off peak award to Hawaii is only 35k miles RT.

One thing to consider - a fare sale to HNL yields better benefits from a SPGFlights redemption vs a transfer, especially on a long distance trip, since the tickets are issued as revenue tickets (eligible for elite upgrades on some carriers) and the miles earned back for the flight reduces the 'cost' of the SPG point used for the redemption.

Compare both options side-by-side before deciding - and if you can't find lower-mileage award tickets on AA, US or another carrier, the SPGFlights program might be your only option.

One item - if you want UA or CO flights, but don't want to redeem SPG at 2:1, move the points as miles to US and redeem your UA or CO flights from that program.

I have a bunch of Starwood Points, and I want to send some relatives on a trip to Hawaii. It looks like USAir, AA, and Delta are my 3 options with the 1:1 conversion. Any suggestions about which would be best for service from PIT to HNL? In particular, I'm considering first/business class, so if there's any thoughts on that I would appreciate it.

I note Continental/United are 2:1 and therefore seem not a good option, but if you have anything to add on that it would be appreciated.

Thanks!

You may already know this, but if you do decide to transfer make sure you do it in blocks of 20k Starpoints to get the 5k bonus...20K SPG = 25,000 miles on US, AA and DL. That effectively makes it 1:1.25.

How long does the transfer take? Unless it's pretty quick, I'd certainly transfer the points to AA. The chances of an award being available might still be there are much better.