It was a short 45-minute hop across the Irish Sea in an ATR72. Redemption cost was 8k per ticket, 16k miles total, plus $51.90 per traveler in taxes / fees. When I bought my second, walk-up ticket 90 minutes before departure the price, to my surprise, was £58.84 all in, charged to me as $73.66. This benchmark (no idea if the price paid was anomalous, but the flight was only half filled) values the redeemed miles at a very poor .003 cpm. So I don't think I'd do that redemption again anyway (and confess to not cross-checking the cash price of the tickets back when I pulled the redemption trigger, but I obviously assumed it was more).

But it's the principle of the thing, I think -- how many AS partner awards out there right now, at all price points, are invisibly, secretly broken? -- versus the small amount of cash at stake. Not that I don't still want my money back. 😃