Originally Posted by
drorbach
I'm a newbie when it comes to booking flights with points/miles. I have close to 200k aeroplan miles (Air Canada) and I looked into booking a flight from DCA-TLV for May-June with Air Canada, I noticed that it would cost me 102k miles plus $702 USD in surcharges. That's insane!!! Am I looking at this the wrong way or is it feasible to transfer aeroplan miles to any other Star Alliance carrier (Such as United)? The United Airline flights are much more convenient for me but I only have 160k United Miles and I'm looking to book two tickets so I don't a have enough to book a United flight. Any suggestions? Can one book a United Flight with Aeroplan Miles or am I stuck with those Aeroplan miles? Thank you in advance for your suggestions/help
To clarify what others have said, you can book an award flight with any Star Alliance carrier (including United) using Aeroplan miles. Given your origin/destination (US to Israel), a Fixed Mileage redemption (AP's equivalent to United's saver awards) should cost you 160k miles total (80k*2) regardless of the carrier, compared to 170k miles if you used MileagePlus. However the carrier(s) used would affect the surcharges -- if you can cross the Atlantic on United, Turkish or Swiss your surcharges will be much lower than if you cross on Air Canada metal. If you get a United/Swiss combo your surcharges should be closer to $150 per ticket.
You mentioned 102k miles per ticket with Aeroplan -- you were probably offered a Market Fare redemption, which is AP's equivalent to United's Standard Award (albeit with dynamic pricing and usually a poor value) and can only be flown on Air Canada metal. Unless your travel dates are very strict I don't think it's a good idea to check Market Fare awards at this point.
The toughest part will be finding availability, but that will be hard whether with Aeroplan or with MileagePlus. I suggest you try to find availability for Transatlantic flights first, from IAD, EWR, JFK, BOS, etc., to any big Euro hub that could then get you to TLV (ZRH, FRA, IST, etc). Then separately find availability from DCA/BWI/IAD to/from the North American hub, and from the Euro hub to TLV. United releases availability on domestic or Can/US flights regularly, including close to departure date, so while you may be stuck with some weird routing such as DCA-ORD-EWR-... if you book 6-9 months out, you could be able to change for DCA-EWR-... 1-2 months before you leave (AP would then charge a $90 change fee per ticket).