Should I buy points or flights?
 

Well I have to go to Geneva in a few weeks. Should I pay $1100 for the San Diego-Geneva economy fare or should I somehow buy points and use those?

Help.

[This message has been edited by emaij (edited 07-11-2002).]

It will cost you more to buy miles from the Airlines. Even after you purchased those 50,000 miles - the minimum required to fly you in economy - it is very hard to find award seats to Europe. Summer is a high season and award seats are hard to find.

AndrewM

It's painful to pay $1100+ for an economy seat that should be half that. I don't really see any alternative though.

Try buying two separate tickets - say SAN-JFK and JFK-Geneva - to see if you can cut costs.

Mike

Let's back up here a second. Could you share with us what miles you do have in which aircounts and then we'll look at the value of "topping off" as well as some special international awards lurking around right now.

I'm doing as you suggest but it doesn't seem to be saving me anything. Thanks for the idea though.

Suuure.
Delta: 55,000
AC: 25,000
Starwood: 40,000
Northwest: 30,000

That kind of thing.

(deleted when I realised that my suggestion was no better than the $1100)

[This message has been edited by christep (edited 07-11-2002).]

1. Convert the 40,000 starwood points to Delta Skymiles + 55,000 you currently have with Delta will translate into one un restricted ticket in economy.

2. 40,000 Starwood will translate into 100,000 Qantas miles. Free award ticket on BA to Europe. or

3. 40,000 starwood + 30,000 NWA = Free restricted Business class on NWA\KLM.

The problem is you don't have enough time to complete the transaction.

Maybe I am missing something here, but you can get a SkySaver award on Delta from the US to Europe for 50,000 miles. It looks to me that, since you have 55,000 miles on Delta, you wouldn't need to buy a ticket or buy miles.

Why don't you transfer 20'000 *wood points to Qantas netting 50'000 Qantas points, enough to book 1 award ticket on BA?

Let's just hope they have seats available.

AndrewM, you beat me http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Damian's idea is interesting... unless AndrewM's accounting is more accurate. I don't actually want to use the Delta points for this.

[This message has been edited by emaij (edited 07-12-2002).]

#2 above 100,000 miles Qantas award ticket on BA is for Business class from the east coast.

You need 80,000 miles for economy from SAN.

http://www.qantas.com.au/fflyer/dyn/...ables#qf_ba_aa

AndrewM

I don't have time to research your cities and dates right now, but in half a dozen similar situations over the past few months the best deal for paid tickets has been (by several hundred dollars) a flight to London followed by a partner ticket onward. With AA or BA you ask for a Visit Europe Pass ticket. *A has a similar program. You have to get these in North America in conjunction with a trans-Atlantic flight on an alliance member.

The usual online booking places don't have these fares. You have to call the airline and ask about them.

The reason this works is that competition to the UK keeps those fares low, and the intra-European fares in these programs are designed to compete with European bargain airlines.