Hello everyone,

I have something of a dilemma.

I travel to the US regularly and in recent years have generally flown with Delta. I've accumulated a large number of Skymiles.

I am planning a family vacation this summer and decided to see how far my miles would go. The answer appears to be "not very far". Delta want 200,000 points for a return flight between Europe and North America.

I also have a large number of Amex points and recently received a letter advising of a miles bonus for converting Amex points to BA miles before the end of March. A quick check suggests that BA only want 100,000 miles for the same business class round trip.

Which brings me to my question..... what are the good mileage programs for transatlantic travel? It the Delta scheme as draconian as it seems or am I missing something?

thanks
Austin

Aeroplan is best-liked - 80K *A J, 100K F to Europe.

ANA is a good deal from east coast- 68K J.

edited:

AA has a long off-peak period- Oct. 15 to May 15, to Europe for 40K Y.

US has a short off-peak, usually Jan & Feb only, 60K in J but sometimes matches AA's off-peak Y 40K from Oct. to April.

Flying non-USA metal you often get hit with big fuel surcharges and can't use off-peaks which are only on that airline's own metal. USA airlines' international J (or even F) is not really too great either.

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry8530/5.0.0.601 Profile/MIDP-2.1 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/417)

I have never heard of AA offering an off-peak Business Class award between the U.S. and Europe for 60K roundtrip. The AA Business Class award is 50K each way for MileSAAver awards, and 100K each way for AAnytime awards. There is no seasonality to AA Business Class awards on this route.

Watch out for high fuel surcharges when redeeming on ANA (or on BA).

Welcome to Flyertalk.

In common with other US-based airlines, Delta offers award seats at more than one redemption level. A business class transatlantic trip requires 50,000 , 100,000 or 162,500 miles in each direction. This means a seat may only cost 100,000 miles if Low rates are available in both directions, but it could cost as much as 325,000 miles if you must redeem High in both directions. This allows Delta to balance supply with demand, the same as they do for paid tickets.

In common with many other European airlines, BA offers award seats at only one redemption level. A business class transatlantic trip requires 50,000 miles in each direction (100,000 roundtrip). However, there is also a fuel surcharge, currently $456 roundtrip.

All airlines also collect the UK Air Passenger Duty for departures from UK airports. Currently this is GBP120 ($196) for business class.

Would you rather pay:

200,000 miles plus ~$200
-or-
100,000 miles plus ~$725

Another difference, is that BA (and also AA and VS) offer one-way awards, but on DL you can only (sensibly) redeem for a roundtrip. It is often easier to find availability if you can book each direction separately.

Delta also has a nasty foreign origination surcharge as well, so not only will be find mid/high awards, but you'll also pay $400+ in fees. I'd highly recommend going against Delta for your needs (though you can usually get 100k awards if you fly Air France- especially to IAD or YUL)

I believe the off-peak 60K J is on US, not AA.

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry8530/5.0.0.601 Profile/MIDP-2.1 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/417)

AA also offers a free stopover at the North American "gateway" on its one-way awards. So, for example, for the same number of miles as a Europe-NYC award, you could get a Europe-NYC-California (or Hawaii or Alaska or the Caribbean) award, with a stopover in NYC.

BA permits multiple en-route stopovers on its awards, so you could get LHR-NYC-LAX-OGG (with stopovers at NYC and LAX) for the same number of miles as just LHR-NYC. But you would still be hit with those pesky fuel surcharges.

Be aware that you can transfer from Membership Rewards to several program instantly. This means you can verify award availability, or even begin the booking process, before transferring.

These are the primary instant transfer partners:
Transfer to AC or CO for travel on any Star Alliance carrier
Transfer to BA for travel on any OneWorld carrier
Transfer to DL for travel on any SkyTeam carrier

Bear in mind that British Airways also has a first class cabin, and first class awards have better availability than business. 75,000 miles each way (150,000 roundtrip), plus fuel surcharges, taxes and other fees.

Wow - thanks for the mine of information.

I've just checked the offer from BA - they are offering an additional 30% for transfers from Amex Membership Rewards points before 31st March. I have 400K MR points which would give me enough, with the bonus, for five business class passengers. However, at an incremental cost of $700 per person, I'll do some digging on the Star Alliance and SkyTeam options.

I have 450K Skymiles so even with the MR transfer, I'm well short at 200K miles per return flight.

Some real experts here - very much appreciate the advice.

In looking for transatlantic to Warsaw or Bucharest from western cities like Spokane or Calgary on AA, it always comes up that there is no service with them or their partners, even though they list those US cities as where they fly. I can't even get those cities to fly to Amsterdam. Why can't I get anything to work other than miami?

JudyJFLA

You can use oneworld awards on AA to get J for 80k and F for 100k if you keep the itinerary below 9k miles (i.e. DUB-LHR-JFK-MAD-DUB with BA, IB, and AA).

Also CO has VS as a partner and they allow combinations between *A and VS at regular rates. It was a nice surprise when I was looking to book a friend from SFO to PVG and CO's site routed SFO-LHR-PVG in C for 62.5k miles with a leg in VS J!

I recommend dumping your Amex into Flying Blue (KL/AF) ONLY if you live near AF/KL gateway cities and are flexible with your travel.

PROMO AWARDS
* bi-monthly announcement of 50% off award travel from various US/Canada gateways (YYC, ORD, IAH seem to be perennial repeats) to ANYWHERE in Europe, North Africa or Israel.
- 25K in Y, 50K in J roundtrip with $400-475 in stoopid taxes/fuel surcharges

Good point. DL is the only US carrier with that ripoff charge. They are absolutely the worst option for TATL award travel, when you combine that with the outrageous number of miles they ask for award tickets. European carriers sock you with ripoff YQ charges, but the milage for redemption is more civilized than the scammers at DL. I have read that LOT and SAS are abandoning the YQ charges on award tickets, so they may be carriers to look at in Europe.

As an expat based in Europe who does mostly TATL redemptions (except intra-Europe on BMI), I would say run, don't walk away from DL. DL is a really crappy airline for redemptions, but especially so for those of us based outside North America.

But also be aware that you will pay very high fees on DL or BA that you will not pay on CO. Not certain about AC.