Virgin Atlantic Flying Club - Flight to Cancun - using miles and flexible cheap fares?

Hi guys,

I'm looking at getting a flight to Cancun in mid-October. I've only gained 10,000 miles (would have had more from a Hawaiian airlines connection but Virgin said my discounted ticket did not qualify :mad:), and was wondering what I could do with this on this flight.

Now due to the circumstances I'm not sure when it is I'll be returning, or I might want to rearrange the flight to another location (rather than back to the UK). I'm guessing I probably need a flexible ticket, but these are like three times the price!

I see they have a 50% sale on reward seats, apparently thats 23,000 miles+ £350odd in 'taxes'. Or, I could upgrade to premium economy for 12,500 miles. Spending my miles plus money seems like a waste of time. Then its all this different fares within a class - its all very confusing!

What would you savvy travellers recommend? Thanks

Upgrading from economy to premium economy is unlikely to be cost effective as you can only upgrade from the higher fare buckets (Y,B,R,L) all of which are very expensive. Although this may be ok if you're booking a flexible ticket as you will probably be booked into one these buckets. By the way, the 10,000 miles is only a one-way upgrade.

Unfortunately when you upgrade you will pay more "real" tax (the Government APD) as well as some other "charges" which is a higher fuel surcharge.

Now, although I would usually say the 50% off reward seats is not worth bothering with (due to the high taxes/charges), in your situation it would have the massive benefit of being flexible. You can change the travel date for just £25 on reward tickets.

Therefore this may be a good option for you. There is a caveat though, which is you would need there to be reward availability when you change the date, so it's not what I would call fully flexible.

Thanks for the advice LondonMiles, very informative.

The reward seat suggestion sounds like a good idea, and £25 is resonable to change the date/route. I appreciate about the reward availability but it's better than booking the cheapest economy tickets and not being able to change it at all (I'm guessing thats the case?) The only issue there is it costs 23,750 miles and I only have 10,000 miles. The reward sale ends in 14 days, and I don't really know of any way to get an extra 13,750 miles in that time :( I could buy the miles (£225), but add that to the £337 and the total fare is £562. Do you think that still is worth doing for a flexible ticket (but still in economy)?

Edit: Having seen your post here (http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/virgin-atlantic-flying-club/1372759-reward-flight-sale-50-off-economy-flights.html), I might check out their prices/conditions as well. Suppose just because I have virgin miles doesn't mean I have to do something with them straight away. Did a trip with the competitor last January and didn't join the club - hmm could have claimed miles then, ah well.

No problem - happy to help.

Manufacturing your fairly flexible ticket for £562 is, in my opinion, worth it if you need the flexibility that it gives. In my other post, I was fairly against redeeming for Virgin economy rewards but that's because I never really need flexible tickets - my travel tends to be based on fixed dates.

Regarding booking the cheapest economy ticket and not being able to change. Slightly surprisingly, you usually are able to change although it tends to be at quite a high cost. The best way to find out what the cost is, is to do a dummy booking and check the fare rules - it will normally mention what the change fee is. You also have to pay for any difference in fare (ie if the price has gone up you will have to pay the change fee + the increase). I imagine it would be in the region of £200 though for the change fee. The cheapest tickets are normally always non-refundable so you can very rarely cancel them and get your money back.

Personally, I would save up the Virgin miles for an Upper Class reward. There are lots of opportunities to build up your balance through Tesco, Virgin credit cards, hotel stays, Amex Membership Rewards, shopping on the Virgin Atlantic portal, flights on partner airlines.

In the past, I took a lot of flights that only earned miles at 50% and I regret that now as if I picked an airline that earned 100% I could have built up balances a lot quicker.

As an extra point, Premium economy on Virgin earns at least 125% miles and 2 out of the 3 standard fare buckets are upgradeable to Upper Class using miles, so even if you don't want to save up the large amount of miles needed for an Upper Class redemption, then this could be an option.

Thanks again for the information.

Working it out, the lowest price on economy is £618 (change fee £100) and this gives class X. A fully flexible ticket is stupid at £1854 (Y). Going through their 'offer', it would cost £562 for the semi-flexible ticket and £25 to change.

So its £587 vs £718 (total cost). I'm not sure that cashing in my miles, not actually earning any miles on the flight, and being restricted to reward seat availability is worth the saving of £131...

You mentioned using a competitor who gave you 100% of miles earned. Now I thought I knew who this was, but they don't offer 100% miles on the cheap economy tickets. Not sure on the etiquette of the forums, so I'm not sure if you can name it here, if so could send me a PM to confirm? Thanks.

I agree it is not worth cashing in your miles to save £131.

It's BA where you earn 100% on discounted economy. To get to Cancun though you probably have to connect in Miami. They have a miles calculator on their website but sometimes if you put in the direct route it shows zero miles so you have to put in LHR to MIA and then MIA to CUN.

It's BA where you earn 100% on discounted economy. To get to Cancun though you probably have to connect in Miami.

BA serves Cancun direct 3x weekly with a 3 Class 777.

(S12 Timetable valid to 27 Oct)

BA2203 Tu 11:15-15:35 / BA2202 17:45-09:00 +1
BA2203 Th 10:45-15:05 / BA2202 16:35-07:50 +1
BA2203 Sa 09:45-14:05 / BA2202 15:35-08:50 +1

Daily connections via MIA from LHR as you said are also available.

Thanks again for the information.

Working it out, the lowest price on economy is £618 (change fee £100) and this gives class X. A fully flexible ticket is stupid at £1854 (Y). Going through their 'offer', it would cost £562 for the semi-flexible ticket and £25 to change.

So its £587 vs £718 (total cost). I'm not sure that cashing in my miles, not actually earning any miles on the flight, and being restricted to reward seat availability is worth the saving of £131...

You answered it yourself and the answer isn't £131, the benefit to you is £1,267 by booking via a redemption to get some flexibility (noting availability as an issue).

One tip, never take someone else's viewpoint on fare prices and value, only you can determine that ;). So if you think this is worth it for the flexibility you seem to want, it's down to you.

I'd agree that a saving of £131 with no flexibility might seem poor value however ...

Definitely flying direct, flying via Miami would be a pain.

I wouldn't be saving that much though slinky. I would be paying £618 for a normal economy fare, and then paying an extra £100 to change my ticket to another date/destination, and earning miles as well. So in my eyes it makes more sense just to buy a normal ticket and pay the change fee if needed.

Thought it was BA LondonMiles, but read the mileage thing wrong so got confused...It seems like I got stung previously flying to Vegas with VA. Booked through somewhere like opodo or something and probably paid the same as if going direct through Virgin. However since it was discounted (apparently) only got half the miles. Both VA and BA offer 100% miles if you book through their website, which is usually the same as elsewhere anyway...

Just need to decide between VA and BA now, but that's another story.

De
Thought it was BA LondonMiles, but read the mileage thing wrong so got confused...It seems like I got stung previously flying to Vegas with VA. Booked through somewhere like opodo or something and probably paid the same as if going direct through Virgin. However since it was discounted (apparently) only got half the miles. Both VA and BA offer 100% miles if you book through their website, which is usually the same as elsewhere anyway...

Just need to decide between VA and BA now, but that's another story.

Unfortunately Virgin only give 50% miles on 'discount economy' tickets even when booked through their website. Unless you search for a flexible ticket, you will most likely be in a discount economy fare bucket. You can see the earnings table here (http://www.virgin-atlantic.com/en/gb/frequentflyer/earnmiles/earn_miles_table.jsp).

This contrasts with BA who give 100% miles on all paid economy tickets booked through their website.