We will be flying from Jacksonville Fl to Sydney in Feb to catch a cruise and return from Singapore to Jax - have 100 thou points in amex plat and 100 thou in Continental - was thinking I would buy tickets and then use points to upgrade - have not a clue which airlines to look at - don't think I can put my amex points in united - even willing to pay alot $$$ for tickets if I can use points to upgrade - thanks

I don't have the answer to your question. I just wanted to say Welcome to Fyertalk. If you don't receive answers here, maybe you can go to the American Express forum, Co, or UA.

It is very difficult to use your Continental miles to upgrade international flights, and CO itself only flies to Cairns anyway (from JAX, via IAH, HNL and GUM).

If you are set on flying to Sydney your best choices are Qantas or Air New Zealand via LAX; UA via LAX or SFO; or HA via any west coast gateway, and then HNL. (You can also take any number of Asian carriers like CX, JL or KE, changing in some Asian city, but it'll take you waaaay out of your way.)

If you had 105,000 CO OnePass points, that would be good for one business-class ticket to SYD on QF (availability is no sure thing, though, and if you're catching a cruise you probably don't have much flexibility on flight dates).

Upgrading is easier on UA but Amex points don't count for anything with them. The only way I think your Amex account balance might help would be if you wanted to try flying Hawaiian Airlines, say, LAX-HNL-SYD. You can buy Amex points at $25 per 1000, topping up your current balance until you had enough for two business class tickets, and simultaneously transferring the lot into Hawaiian's FF program. If you've already got 100,000 Amex points, another 100,000 points would be $2500 -- not unreasonable for two premium seats down to Oz. You would still have to get from JAX to LAX on your own dime though.

Your best bet, if you are willing to spend a little money to travel in business class, might be to hang into your miles and points and book through a west-coast consolidator offering cheap premium-cabin fares, which often come up on second-tier Asian carriers like Korean Air or Thai.

Good luck...

Thank you taking the time to answer my questions - appreciate it!

Amother option to check out, since you have an AmEx platinum card, is the two-for-one deal they offer for business class travel if you use their travel agency. Might get the cost within reason, especially considering that it would give you complete control over travel dates and a wide choice of airlines with convenient routings. It also might enable the person whose name is on the paid ticket to earn first-tier elite status with the airline you fly based on that trip alone, as well as picking up enough miles for at least a future domestic US round trip.

While you can't transfer Amex points to United, you can transfer into some of the other Star Alliance carriers-- namely ANA, Air Canada, and US Airways.