I had some great help planning an itinerary for a a ~35-40 day trip in SE Asia this summer over in the BT forum, and I was hoping to come here for some advice on using points and/or miles to experience first class on a leg of my trip.

I'm going to be leaving from LAX on August 3, and flying into HND for a week long stopover before going into BKK. I was planning on traveling around and potentially using an open jaw from SYD to visit a friend or SIN where some other friends live. Both options are only about $950-1050, but it seems like it would be about 100k United miles for economy if I book round trip. From everything I've learned from lurking up here, that just doesn't seem worth it.

However, a one way first class award from SYD in September around the 8th shows up for around 80k, and having never experienced first class, I started thinking that this would be a cool experience. Ideally, I would also love a stopover in another place that's not SE Asia or HNL, even if it's only for a few days but that doesn't seem possible.

Right now I have around:
Chase UR 45k, 12k AMEX MR, 20k AA, and just hit the spend for the 30k United MP (also have about 3k MP). I also am willing to apply for new rewards cards and will gather about 5-10k UR points from normal spending in the next two months or so.

From what I can tell, BA would cost too many miles, although a stop in London would be great, as would Singapore Airlines. I recently learned that I might have been able to use Alaska miles to travel CP, but im not sure on how worth it it would be to take out two additional cards for the miles if i can just use my current stash to fly United first class. I guess having never experienced first class flying but having talked to friends, some have made me think that it may not be worth using the miles for United from SEA. I'm hoping that that's untrue or someone has some advice on best using my points/miles for the best experience I could receive. Thanks.

I'd say you will have better premium cabin experience on Air NZ or Qantas from SYD to the US. You'd also have great service on Cathay or Singapore but using AA miles for Cathay will require 2 awards as Australia->US awards cannot connect in Asia. Not familiar with Singapore and UAs mileage requirements or award availability.


The harder part is finding award availability. Very tough on Qantas using AA miles.

Just quickly popping in to say that NZ does not have a F product, but I agree with the rest

Oops Shows how little I know about non-OneWorld airlines. Sorry about that. Will edit post.

It's a good 'business-first' product, a bit like VS, but it's been a long time since I flew NZ.

Thanks for the input so far and sorry for the delay in responding; I've been on vacation intermittently checking messages. I don't know if I can do Cathay because I don't think I can get enough AA miles for the first class trip from the west coast right now, but Singapore is a chase UR transfer partners and a member on the star alliance correct? From what I've learned, perhaps I could use my United miles and transfer my MR/UR points to use on Singapore.

Since I'm looking for the best experience, maybe instead of booking F out of Syd on UA, I Could book F either from TYO --> SIN/BKK, OR from SIN/BKK --> SYD during my trip, and just fly economy for the LAX --> TYO and SYD --> LAX as a round trip ticket.

Do you all think the duration of the trips on one of those legs would be worth spending what looks to be about 80k vs spending the 80k on UA from SYD --> LAX? I'm still learning about plane configs and who flys where so it's hard for me to judge.

Getting SQ First using United miles is extremely difficult.

If you can find availability (and it's a big IF), the part I've bolded is your best bet. (Finding F or probably even J availability on UA SYD-LAX is extremely hard, especially if you are not doing it 330 days in advance, and in any event it seems you don't have enough miles, plus the SQ F experience is much, much better even though it would be a shorter flight.) If you book online, you get a 15% discount on your SQ miles, so you'd seem to have enough for NRT-SIN on SQ's best plane, the A380, which has an enclosed suite for its F seat. It's 60K miles, less the 15% point discount, so your 57K total UR/MR would seem to do it. Here is the award chart: https://www.singaporeair.com/pdf/pps...wardCharts.pdf

What you'd do is this:

1. Establish a Krisflyer account.
2. Once you do that, you can search online at Singapore Air to find award availability.
3. If you find availability, transfer you UR and MR points to SQ and hope the availability remains for the one to three days it will take for your points to be converted into KF miles.

I just did a quick check and found availability on Aug. 8. Didn't check too many other dates.

Now, for the same miles you should also be able to continue from SIN on to BKK in J, but that's a more complicated strategy since it involves a phone/skype call and trying to find an SQ customer service rep who knows the rules properly. Feel free to private message me if you want more of an explanation.

Hope it all works out!

Thanks so much for this mate. I have my Krisflyer account already and am looking into it now. I really appreciate you taking the time out to write that out.

I was able to find a UA F out of SYD around Sept. 8th or so for I believe 80k miles, but I feel like the A380/Shorter duration experience in the cabin would outweigh spending the extra Miles for the UA Flight (which I think is a 777? I forgot). Unless someone feels differently I'm going to try the approach above and will report back

You're welcome!

Having done the UA F and SQ A380 suites F, I'd go with the latter. The SQ is the best of several international F's I've ever flown, and far superior to UA in both the hard and soft products. Based on what I've flown and read, I'd even rate it the top international F but for the new EY F options on its A380.

UA F is certainly nothing to sneeze at, especially for someone who has never done international F before, but in addition to being generally inferior to SQ F the quality of the FA service varies a lot and can be downright mediocre.

Of course, you'd save more money on your revenue flights for this trip if you cross the Pacific on an award ticket. But from your posts I assume it's not a controlling consideration.

If you do go SQ F, two additional pieces of advice:

1. Try to bag the daytime NRT-SIN A380 flight, as you'll get to enjoy the experience more.
2. If you do end up securing an award ticket that goes on to BKK, I believe that by virtue of arriving on SQ F (even though you'd go on to BKK in J) you can gain access in transit to the SQ Private Room Lounge in SIN, which is wonderful.

Again, hope it all works out.

I think I was able to work out something even better thanks to your advice that will fit into my travel schedule with some friends I'll be meeting up with perfectly.

Instead of doing NRT - SIN on the A380 and connecting to BKK, I'm going to fly with my friend on UA from LAX --> TYO --> BKK. I'm going to use your advice and go from SIN --> SYD on the A380 since thats 63,750 miles before the 15% discount, and I'm pretty sure I can hit that within the next two weeks or so. This way, I can hopefully experience this lounge, and I can also travel the first leg of the trip with my friends. And, if nothing else, I still have this plan as a backup to decide within the next few days if I can't secure that.

Again man, I really can't say how much I appreciate it. This trip is shaping up to be great thanks to the help I've gotten from people like you.

Very glad to help, but...

I believe SIN-SYD is 63,750 AFTER the discount. Hope I'm wrong, but I see the SQ award chart as listing that route at 75K (before discount).

The other thing I'd be wary about is whether seat availability for the date(s) you can fly might vanish over the next couple of weeks or however much time it takes for you to do the requisite spending, for the points to post, and for you to transfer them from UR or MR to your SQ account. That's of course a judgement call based on your risk tolerance and how many dates are still available for the approximate time you'll want to fly.

Ah, well was hoping I'd get to save some extra miles. Fortunately it looks like I ended up spending enough to get me to 65k UR/MR combined once my statement clears, so I think I should be good. All of the availability for that week and the prior week was set at 63,750 for the A380, so hopefully I should be able to grab something once these miles clear.