I know what you mean, but she did say "I guess I can just pretend that I can use them on Delta".......

Remember: Every time the PA Dings, a FlyerTalker gets some Things, just trying to expedite......I'm looking at you Clarence

I've never sold a mile in my life, but if I could truly and safely sell my HA miles for a penny a mile I would. Where would one do this?

My wife and I were each saving up for the Virgin 70,000 mile worldwide coach award (and, sadly, was within a month of redeeming for that award when they pulled it). The only way I could get close to replicating that value would be to sell at a penny a mile (and then buy a mileage earning ticket on another carrier where I have elite status).

My other realistic alternative would be to redeem into HHonors. I'm thinking of doing that promptly because, if they pull that redemption, my options would be extremely limited. I personally don't value 140,000 HHonors points at $700. More like $500 (admittedly low, but I'd have other options for hotel redemptions).

If it were practical to redeem on DL, I'd do that, but it's been confirmed here that such redemptions are essentially imposslble (no surprise, given how horrific Skypeso redemptions are for DL metal).

BTW, has there any interest in HA miles on Flyertalk's coupon connection?

A little bit, because they are transferable. But they move slowly. Other than Hilton, they have very little utility left given how easy it is to use BA Avios from the west coast to HI. I like them. If you can find saver award to and from the mainland, it is an excellent product.

That's what I'd suspect. I also suspect it's a bit of a hassle to do the trade (like I guess I book somebody's rez and then they book something for me).

If I had to, I could use the miles to actually go to Hawaii, but I already have other (probably better) options to do that. So unless there's a legal and safe way to turn these into cash at a penny a mile, I think I'll do the HHonors transfer.

Quite a shame. I was looking forward to the Virgin Atlantic flights (something different for me, and good value).

I think the best cashout option is JetBlue. You get .8 cents on B6 per 1 HA mile. Otherwise, it's .5 cents for gift cards. If you don't fly B6, it doesn't do much for you.

I COULD fly B6, but for .8 cents, I think I'm personally better off with HHonors ponts.

To my complete amazement, when I called the Hawaiianmiles service center to complain about the no-notice elimination of the "old" VS redemption chart, they asked me where I wanted to go. I said USA-South Africa in coach. The agent hit a few keystrokes and told me it was 70,000 miles roundtrip. I said, "That's interesting -- let me make a reservation."

And I did. And the process was dreadful. Call after call to get the seats "confirmed" -- even though they showed as "available." And more calls to get the reservation pushed through ticketing. But I got them. Hawaiian's complete incompetence -- allowing the old chart to be booked after they replaced it -- worked to my advantage.

My recommendation: if you've got the HA miles and want to fly Virgin Atlantic, book fast. And keep calling until you get an actual ticket number.

That is INCREDIBLE!!! I've not much experience with either HA or VS. How did you see if there was availability on VS?

I had never previously redeemed miles in the HA program, and I've never flown Virgin. When I initially called HA, it was to complain and then "settle" for an HHonors redemption. When the agent told me it was only 70K for the Virgin tickets, I asked them to check available flights for me. It seems like they're able to tell which flights have award seats, and then "request" them.

I did have considerable trouble actually geting my seats confirmed from the "request" -- the HA agents seem generally incompetent in using the right procedure -- and at one point I called Virgin to see what seats would actually be available. Unlike some other airlines, I found the Virgin agents to be very helpful in guiding me to availability (I basically wanted to confirm that what the HA agents were saying was the availability was the REAL availability -- I had little faith in the HA agents doing anything correctly). I think the HA award seats on Virgin are pulled from the same bucket as Virgin's own award seats. So if there's an online way to check that, it would be very useful. Perhaps some folks more familiar with the Virgin program could help in this regard.

Is there no way to check VS award seat availability online as it pertains to HA redemptions?

If there's a way to check Virgin's own award inventory, I think there is!

I'm confused. So do I just make a search for award tickets on Virgin's site?

I believe this is the case because when I called Virgin to confirm HA's award availability -- HA's agents are so bad I didn't trust them -- the award inventory was the same.