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Old Jun 6, 2025 | 11:29 am
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xliioper
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Originally Posted by ATOBTTR
Google Flights can be of assistance there. You can leave the destination blank, narrow down to SkyTeam and then see how the global destinations populate. Destinations like JNB, DEL, BOM, BLR, SIN, etc. that have a connection through Europe and are booked through AF/KL/VS/etc. will earn a significant a pretty good amount of MQDs based on the distance flown. xliioper provides an example for MCO-JNB where one could earn close to 4K MQDs for $2700 in actual spend.
The MCO-JNB PE example above actually earns about 5K MQDs for $2700 (4K MQDs was for MCO-DXB PE for around $2200 roundtrip). So not quite 2 to 1 earnings in both cases. Yes, Google Flights in "Explore" mode where you don't specify a destination and it brings up a map is useful. Knowing typically cheaper destinations helps. In addition to destinations above, CPT can sometimes be pretty cheap too.

While SIN is cheap in coach, the problem with cheap coach fares is that they don't earn many MQDs. The main problem here is that KE does not have PE fares yet (no PE cabins) and booking DL PE fares will just earn $1 MQD per $1 spent. China Airlines does, but PE fares on them only earn 20% miles as MQDs vs. 25% on tier 1 partners. SIN, BKK, and CGK PE fares on CI look to be reasonable at times.

Last edited by xliioper; Jun 6, 2025 at 11:47 am
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