Hellooo, Newman...
Originally Posted by
jnewman
Hellooo, Jerry.
Thanks, guy! Good to know 80K is not a good redemption value. To a novice, redeeming miles and $200 fees sounds like a great deal for business class to BKK. I'm not sure I can do much better with what I have now and I definitely want to take this trip. I'm going for 2 months.
Oh, I wouldn't say 80K is not a good redemption value. Yes, if you can get CX J for 55K instead, that's much better. But between the devaluations that are going on in many programs (meaning it keeps costing more miles for a given ticket) and the increasing difficulty in bagging some award tix (such as CX J and F), 80K for a trip in the relatively near future isn't bad at all.
Originally Posted by
krazykanuck
The reason redeeming through Ultimate Rewards is so high is because you're using points to offset cash fares at a fixed amount, not using actual airline miles.
This is a crucial point regarding UR (and I believe Amex Membership Rewards points as well). Yes, you can use them to in effect "buy" tickets directly through UR, which is how you can end up paying the ridiculously high 330K you were quoted. But the far better value is to convert those points into a UR or MR partner airline's miles. These can in turn be used for award tix on that airline or a partner. Of course, you have to make sure there is award availability for a given trip.
To make a long, complicated story short, if by some chance there is award availability via SQ J or F for travel to BKK in February, you could convert your UR and/or MR points into SQ miles for the best travel experience available. It typically takes at least day or two for the conversions to take place, though, so you'd run a risk of the availability ending by the time you went to book the award tix. However, if you have some flexibility as to travel dates and you're seeing lots of SQ availability on multiple dates, your risk is substantially lowered.
One other thing to be aware of re SQ is that if you book SQ award tix online you get a 15 percent discount on the miles required.