livitup

Hello,
Edit: this got moved here from the UA forum. I’ll be ticketing via UA, and have IA miles/status and MR points. The trip is far enough in the future that I can probably do a SUB on a new credit card if it will help. Thanks!


I’m contemplating an IAD-SIN-SYD-IAD run later this year. I can do IAD-SIN and SYD in paid J, but I’ll have to donSIN-SYD in Y. All the SQ flights look like they’re on un-upgradable equipment, and QF is in Oneworld.

Can I transfer MR to BA and upgrade with Avios? Would I need two reservations to do that? Or is there some other trick?

jsloan

Your travel department will almost certainly insist on separate tickets. I picked a couple of random September dates, and it saves over $15K to ticket IAD-SIN/SYD-IAD on one ticket and SIN-SYD on another.

FWIW, BA appears to have one daily SIN-SYD flight, if that helps.

corporate-wage-slave

If you want to Upgrade using Avios, then you can only do so by one cabin, and on this route it's presumably World Traveller to World Traveller Plus. And you would need to ticket on BA rather than UA. You can pay for upgrades, as an AUP as we call them, and by potentially more than one cabin, that would work on UA ticketing. There is a scheme available for paying AUPs with Avios but it's poor value and I'm not sure SIN is on the right timezone to allow this. If you buy SIN-SYD as a BA ticket standalone and in SGD then you may be offered upgrades via another mechanism, POUGs. There are details of AUPs and POUGs in their respective threads. If you went down BA ticketing, in addition to UuA then you can use Avios to reduce the cost of revenue fares, which has the advantage of being widely available but the disadvantage of being poor value for money, it's unlikely that some credit card scheme would make that worthwhile, it's usually done by people who have too many Avios and can't get rid of them any other way, or who aren't good at maths. In short, if you stick with UA ticketing then it's unlikely Avios will help you.

Bullswood

Not much redemption availability on BA as only single daily SIN/SYD. If you just want a cheap one way J on this sector, it may be worth looking at buying AS Miles at around 2c/mile and then can use 65K+$80 on SQ. SQ has good award availability on this sector as 3+ daily flights inc A380 - can check on AS website.
If you have a sense of adventure, AA sometimes offers J award availability on FJ SIN/NAN/SYD for 40k miles.

Mwenenzi

Is UA ticketing offering SIN-SYD on BA (oneworld)? (a red eye flight). Other airlines will have a day flight (~7:45hr)
What's the objective? Travel in business class and/or earn ff miles?

livitup

Thanks for the help so far. Here’s some more details. Work will pay J for anything > than 14 hours. That gets me IAD-SIN and SYD-IAD. However, work will stick me in Y for the SIN-SYD leg. I have to “fly US airlines” (bet you can guess what industry in in now…) and United will ticket IAD-SIN-SYD-IAD all on United ticket stock with the SIN-SYD on my choice of Singapore or Qantas.

The goal is to sit in J for all three segments. Singapore is part of *A, so I could theoretically use United miles to upgrade SIN-SYD on Singapore, but they specifically exclude their A350, A380 and 777-300ER aircraft flights, which based on a couple dummy bookings are the only equipment that flies the route. Qantas would theoretically let me upgrade but they’re Oneworld, and I don’t have any points with a OW airline.

Since this is a work trip, I can’t get too creative with routings and such. Preference would be to ticket the entire thing with a single US carrier - an exemption is unlikely since there are two nonstops I can buy on United stock (which satisfies the requirements even though they’re operated by foreign carriers).

Again, thanks for the help. Not sure this is the right forum either but I’m pretty sure the United form mods moved it here because I posited on using BA Avios on a Qantas leg.

sammyg901

The only BA upgrade option to go up 2 classes on a non BA ticket stock is going to be a cash "AUP" which isn't guaranteed and will be expensive. You'd otherwise be risking an overnight flight on a BA 787 which does not sound appealing!!

Better to "slum" it on SQ on a day flight IMO

jerry a. laska

As noted above, to upgrade using avios on BA you can only upgrade one class (in your case World Traveler (economy) to World Traveler Plus (premium economy)) and you must be booked on a BA issued ticket (125-). More info here:
Your guide to spending Avios | 2021 edition
The airport upgrades and proactive online upgrades with cash are further explained here (and prices that some have paid are noted in the wikis):
Airport Upgrades (AUP) promotion 2021/22 thread
https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/brit...22-thread.html

Have you considered UA to HNL and HA in their premium class (A330 with lie flats) to SYD?

Mwenenzi

You cannot use BA avios (or QR EI IB avios) to up grade QF flights. Need QF ff points.
The chances of getting an upgrade on QF are low to zero for some one with no QF status.
QF have QF2 LHR-SIN-SYD [red eye] and QF82 (SIN-SYD) [red eye]. Premium seats on QF are selling well for real money. No need for QF to offer as upgrades/awards

Enjoy the SQ flight.

livitup

Thanks for the links. Not sure if you missed the part I'm already in SIN when I need to go to SYD or if you're suggesting SIN-HNL-SYD - if that's even possible.

I think all things considered, "slumming it" in SA Y is going to be my best bet.

jerry a. laska

Ok, I guess I misunderstood. in one of your posts you said:
I took that to me you were in DC and going to SYD by transitting in SIN due to the requirement to fly US and that you hadn't purchased your ticket yet. As an alternative to flying UA to SIN and then coach to SYD, I was suggesting using UA and HA to get you to SYD in a lie flat business class seat (assuming you could use your UA upgrade magic for the domestic flights to HNL).

sammyg901

You could check out the SQ online upgrade offers for a Premium Economy upgrade, though personally I don't find it worth it for the prices they usually want

livitup

Ah, no, sorry. I'm flying IAD-SIN and staying in SIN for a week, then SIN-SYD, staying in SYD for a week, and then flying SYD-IAD to get home.

I've never flown SQ before, and the more I read about their Y, the less I hate the idea of flying in Y. Still, it is almost 8 hours... (and this is where I realize just how much of a first world problem I'm dealing with.)

Perhaps the real win here is to make sure that there's some critical reason I have to be in the office between the two trips, turning this into an IAD-SIN-IAD-SYD-IAD run. Oh, the horrors!

I guess I'm just not used to there not being a way.

Dave Noble

There is always the normal way - buy a ticket in the desired cabin.

Have you looked at Scoot? - the scooplus is basically a premium economy product but may be little more in cost than economy elsewhere operates SIN-SYD-SIN

Fitruss

If you're buying a ticket yourself (and not following the "must be US carrier ticket" rule) then PAL do J on A330s with lie flats SIN-MNL-SYD for about $800. Product looks decent although SIN lounge access and MNL airport in general seem subpar.

What about converting MR to QF points and looking at these to upgrade via QF?