BA and AA Miles, good award value out of SIN?
 

So I have accumulated roughly 150k AA and 150k BA miles and am looking for good redemption value for 1st/Biz tickets out of Singapore. I've used the BA tool and I am not finding anything interesting other than the SE Asia -> USA. I was looking to take the misses to Italy or New Zealand and avoid the outrageous fees for flying on BA metal. Any OW gurus have any suggestions?

Regards

Don't know anything about BA award flights - so will not make any comment

However you can use your AA miles as follows:

• 2 x first class All Partner Award to NZ - flying QF to SYD or MEL (A380 F hopefully) and on to NZ. Cost is 45,000 miles each = total 90,000
• 2 x business class All Partner Award from NZ back to SIN - perhaps flying CX via HKG. Cost is 35,000 miles each = total 70,000

Grand Total 160,000 miles. So you are 10,000 short. It will cost you about USD300 to buy 10,000 miles.

See the All Partner Award chart here
Notes:

• for the same cost in miles you could travel as far as Tahiti instead of NZ
• no stopovers allowed
• no fuel surcharges, just the local taxes (maybe about AUD150) plus a booking fee of USD25
• availability is likely to be a problem - especially for QF F on an A380

I don't think AA will allow SIN-HKG-Australia on a single award. I tried to get HKG-SIN-SYD before and was told that was an invalid routing, so I highly doubt that going via HKG will be valid (since it's even further out of the way).

You may be right

I was suggesting NZ-SIN via HKG on CX
and CX does have a published J fare AKL-SIN, with a MPM of 6272
(wierd because AKL-HKG-SIN is 7276mi according to gcm)
but 6272 +25% is 7840, and so maybe AA would allow it

OTOH the CX MPM for SYD-SIN is 4694, so +25% is 5868 and SYD-HKG-SIN is 6168mi and so I would expect AA to not allow that

:confused:why would an airline publish a fare which it would not be able to fulfill? I mean it seems CX would not sell you a ticket and fly you SYD-HKG-SIN; would they put you on a QF non-stop?

Thanks guys for the tips.. The wife has been dying to go to New Zealeand, Marlborough region specifically, and I'd like to use these miles on the Qantas A380. She just flew delta econ back from the states and is starting to become spoiled to only business travel. Seems to be a recurring theme around these parts.

If anyone has any other ideas then please chime in.

Did you miss any applicable ticketed point mileage deductions?

I have to admit that I do not know what they are:o
Looking at the CX fare rules in KVS (SYD-SIN/cx/jrt5/7341AUD)
there is no mention of ticketed point

So, can someone educate on them?

In a fare that is based on a maximum permitted mileage (MPM), there is often a "ticketed point mileage deduction" (TPMD) for routing via particular airports. You subtract the amount of the TPMD from the number of miles actually flown. You then compare this difference to the MPM. This allows you to route via a particular airport that would not be allowed (or would be surcharged) without the TPMD.

A TPMD can be very substantial. For example, AA specifies a TPMD of 2,900 miles when traveling ARI to FLL via DFW.

This is good - I'm learning new stuff:p

So, can someone decipher the following for me?I see the two TPMs - and they are very close to the actual mileage according to gcmap (for SYD-HKG and HKG-SIN respectively)
The MPM column is the MPM for SYD-HKG and SYD-SIN respectively
The CUM column is the cumulation of the TPMs
The DC is the Global Indicator? (and in this case is EH = Eastern Hemisphere right?)
25M is the corresponding MPM plus 25%

So, what are:
- the ‘3’ after the city
- SUR
- HGL (I see that the 919 in the first row is the difference between the MPM and the CUM)
- LWL (I see that the 322 in the second row is the difference between the CUM and the 25M)
- XTRA
and what do their values in the above example mean?

Please see http://Help.KVSTool.com/#MPM

Hi Guys,

So was looking to travel to Italy or Spain and not fly on BA metal and with our dog in C on our Oneworld miles. Is this even possible or do I need to wake up?

If you look at AA's All Partner Award chart (link in my post #2 above) - from Asia Zone 2 to Europe, 1-way in J costs 52,500 AA miles per person. If you fly QF (non-stop, probably on an A380) or AY (via HEL on an A340 as far as HEL) then there will be no fuel surcharges. If you fly BA, then I believe AA will charge you BA's fuel surcharge.

An alternative would be to fly RJ out of KUL.

To get on QF in a premium cabin using AA miles, you probably have to book 330 days out. I believe availability on AY is much better.

Just a thought: since you have 150K AA miles - both of you can fly in F for 70K each. QF's A380 in F would be nice, I expect;)

As for your dog - I have no idea!
As for using BA miles - I also have no idea

pandaperth,

Many thanks for your suggestions!

How do I go about searching online for availability? I've tried the BA tool and they limit themselves to just BA seats. Also, of the 3 carriers besides QF, which would you recommend the most?
We are looking to book possibly out of here in the next month.

Cheers!

You're welcome

I use the KVS tool to search for availability, but you need to subscribe to that

I've just plugged in some dates in mid-July for SIN-LHR. No availaiblity showing for the non-stop flights; limited availability in all cabins for 1-stop flights:
- QF via FRA
- CX via HKG (and some of these are then via FRA) - Hadn't thought of CX, remiss of me!
- only seeing via HKG on CX for KUL-LHR - in other words no RJ availability showing
- not seeing any AY avaialbility via HEL

I have only flown economy in RJ (good) and AY (average). BA and CX long-haul J are good IMHO

Thanks again pandaperth. Looks like this KVS tool might be a good investment for booking award travel.

Do you know if something like this is possible..

Book CX back to the US 1 way in C on 50k miles with a stopover in BKK for 2 weeks?