Bay Area to Europe, in Premium Economy or better, for 5, with 350,000 UR points plus
Dec 14, 2018, 9:38 am
#1
Original Poster
Join Date: Dec 2018
Posts: 1
Bay Area to Europe, in Premium Economy or better, for 5, with 350,000 UR points plus
Looking for some advice on the best points + cash spend to acomplish the goal. I need to get 5 people from SMF/SFO/OAK to PRG then from MUC back. Taking the trian in between. Departing March 15th. Returning March 23rd. Should I just suck it up and purchase economy through the portal on BA and upgrade with cash? Economy BA has been around 55K per. Lufthansa offers economy 75K per. Not a great deal but they do have a direct to MUC. Open to all suggestions. No airline preferance. THANKS!
Dec 14, 2018, 1:33 pm
#2
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Apr 2001
Location: MEL CHC
Posts: 21,018
Oddball_one Welcome to FT
Departing on a specific date and returning on a specific date makes anything other than a fully paid tickets hard.
Premium cabin seats: harder again by a magnitude (if not buying with cash)
5 of you on the same deal/PNR: harder again by a magnitude (if not buying with cash)
Have you investigated what 350,000 UR points can do for you? Availability?
Chase FT thread Ultimate Rewards - Airline and Hotel Transfer Partners, Rules, Timeline, etc (2017)
What do you mean by "BA has been around 55K"? 55K of what?
If you think you can buy economy (with UR points/cash?) on BA and upgrade with cash for less than the full retail fare difference time to think again: that's not going to happen. And with 5 people, even less chance.
You may be better looking for flights from California to any where in central Eu and train to PRG and then to MUC.
http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=PRG-MUC...L&DU=mi&SU=kts
For PE/Busness just expect to pay the $$$ to get your party of 5 to Eu & back.
At best you may get is some with UR points/ff miles and the others with hard cash.
Looking for some advice on the best points + cash spend to accomplish the goal. I need to get 5 people from SMF/SFO/OAK to PRG then from MUC back. Taking the train in between. Departing March 15th. Returning March 23rd. Should I just suck it up and purchase economy through the portal on BA and upgrade with cash? Economy BA has been around 55K per. Lufthansa offers economy 75K per. Not a great deal but they do have a direct to MUC. Open to all suggestions. No airline preference. THANKS!
Premium cabin seats: harder again by a magnitude (if not buying with cash)
5 of you on the same deal/PNR: harder again by a magnitude (if not buying with cash)
Have you investigated what 350,000 UR points can do for you? Availability?
Chase FT thread Ultimate Rewards - Airline and Hotel Transfer Partners, Rules, Timeline, etc (2017)
What do you mean by "BA has been around 55K"? 55K of what?
If you think you can buy economy (with UR points/cash?) on BA and upgrade with cash for less than the full retail fare difference time to think again: that's not going to happen. And with 5 people, even less chance.
You may be better looking for flights from California to any where in central Eu and train to PRG and then to MUC.
http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=PRG-MUC...L&DU=mi&SU=kts
For PE/Busness just expect to pay the $$$ to get your party of 5 to Eu & back.
At best you may get is some with UR points/ff miles and the others with hard cash.
Last edited by Mwenenzi; Dec 14, 2018 at 3:14 pm
Dec 16, 2018, 7:58 am
#3
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: home = LAX
Posts: 25,933
Looking for some advice on the best points + cash spend to acomplish the goal. I need to get 5 people from SMF/SFO/OAK to PRG then from MUC back. Taking the trian in between. Departing March 15th. Returning March 23rd. Should I just suck it up and purchase economy through the portal on BA and upgrade with cash? Economy BA has been around 55K per. Lufthansa offers economy 75K per. Not a great deal but they do have a direct to MUC. Open to all suggestions. No airline preferance. THANKS!
Both "saver" award flights and upgrades are "only when available", which is a fraction of the time (both a fraction of the planes, and a fraction of the seats on a plane). If you buy paid fares, it's very unlikely that you'll be able to upgrade all 5 with miles. If you want to use outright awards, then it's very unlikely that you'll find 5 awards (premium economy or above) all on the same plane.
Many people solve the latter problem by breaking the group into a least 2 parts, and not everyone trying to get awards on the same plane. (But even then, it might require flexibility of dates, not very specific dates pre-planned.)
If you do find seats on BA, you're already paying with points + cash, since BA charges huge "YQ" fee (high hundreds of dollars per person) on trans-Atlantic awards.
Dec 19, 2018, 8:35 pm
#4
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@Oddball_one, welcome to Flyertalk.
Please follow the redirect as we send this to the Chase UR forum.
~beckoa, co-moderator Information Desk
Please follow the redirect as we send this to the Chase UR forum.
~beckoa, co-moderator Information Desk