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For your domestic flight(s) within the U.S., it might make sense to use your Southwest points on Southwest, rather than BA Avios on AA, especially since you have the Southwest companion pass.

If you are going to have to transfer some BA Avios to Iberia Plus anyway, I would just send the Amex MR points to BAEC: those transfers are usually pretty speedy; not sure about the speed of MR => Iberia Plus. Don't know whether there will be another MR => BAEC transfer bonus anytime soon.

Some people on the FT BA forum have complained of problems transferring Avios from BAEC to Iberia Plus. I would check to see if those transfer problems have been resolved before going much further. ;)

I think I will see how long it takes for 1k in miles from Chase to BA to Iberia :). Man I need more miles lol.

I can do Southwest to Boston for 70k in miles, 8 hours travel time. Then Boston to MAD to San Sebastian and back to Boston for 340,000 plus $920 for coach one way between MAD and BOS and the way back in Business Class for all 4.

We can break up flight and check out Boston I guess. Cannot find Business Class options on flights from LAX to MAD at all.

This is a question for the BA & IB forums. IIRC they have threads on this topic
My limited understanding (which may be incorrect)
- is transfer is BAEC to avois.com to IBPlus
- you need some avios in IB ffp to start with (correct?)
- there are limitations on signing up for http://www.avios.com

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U.S. residents are ineligible for an avios.com account. If a direct transfer from BAEC to Iberia Plus is no longer possible, then the OP is in trouble. Although Amex MR points can transfer directly to Iberia Plus, Chase UR points cannot.

I actually was testing things today. I am not sure what BAEC means btw. However, I made sure to try my best setting up transfer pathways months ago. Today I tested a few. 1) AMEX to BA - no problem. 2) AMEX to IB - no problem but delayed.

However, if I transfer from AMEX to BA - almost immediate and then from BA to Iberia immediate :). I transferred 200 Avios from AMEX to both IB and BA easily.

3) Chase to BA - within an hour or so it showed up in my BA account.

Bottomline - I hope I am ok on this but I can transfer all my Chase to BA and then to IB. All AMEX to IB direct or via BA which is actually faster then to IB.

Sorry, very confusing but it all showed up with the only delay being AMEX to IB direct. So once I know for sure what I am doing, will drop most points into BA for pending transfer to Iberia.

I probably could of said that better and I hope I am not missing things. Months ago, I made sure to transfer AMEX to Iberia to show activity after having the Iberia account for 3 months. Now that opened up Iberia to direct transfers from BA. Argh but its working lol.

Any secret to squeezing or finding business class from LA to MAD?

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BAEC = "British Airways Executive Club," the name of BA's frequent-flyer program.

IB operates LAX-MAD only certain days of the week. There is no secret to finding award seats in Business (or any other) Class: they are either there or they are not. However, there are some paid services (Expert Flyer, Award Nexus) that let you set an alert for award seats. If you are willing to use one of those, that may give you an edge.

How soon is the trip, and how soon do you plan to book? Are you going to wait to see if Amex offers a new transfer bonus to BAEC?

Flying family of four in July 2016. I want to be back in states by July 24th in Calif. I am going through each day to see if I can find a flight with Business Class on one leg either to or from Madrid since I have younger kiddos.

If I cut out Boston, I definitely want to see if I can get at least one business class to help them deal with long flight.

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Finding four Business Class award seats on the same TATL flight for travel in July will prove quite challenging.

I can do it out of Boston but not sure I want to fly Southwest to Boston unless we can really enjoy it for a few days. Then Business class to Spain, then from Spain to LAX.

There are Business Class seats on the LAX flights but they are just not coming up for awards. Perhaps they may release them later but not sure if I can switch them over if I book coach. Gah long flight for upright with kids :).

guv1976 - I would love to get the better transfer but if I am traveling in July with a family of four, I figure I better book now versus waiting too long and seeing if AMEX offers better transfer points.

I would love to have more options but points are limiting me. Just talked with Iberia and, while they business class from LAX to MAD, they aren't available for rewards at this time. I guess that is a popular flight being direct.

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You have to decide which is more important to you: getting Business Class on the outbound, or seeing Washington/Boston. If your first priority is getting Business Class, then check award availability to Madrid from all of IB's North American gateways (which you can find by Googling "MAD airport wiki").

Or call BAEC and check Business Class award availability from LAX/BOS/JFK/IAD/ORD/MCO/SFO on EI to DUB, with either an award or a cash Coach flight from DUB to MAD. (You could even spend a day or two touring DUB.) You would have to use BA Avios -- not IB Avios -- for redemptions on EI, but BAEC assesses very low surcharges for TATL award travel on EI.

As the OP is seeking to use miles/points across several platforms, we're relocating this to TravelBuzz.

~beckoa, co-moderator Information Desk

Just as a thank you update. I am booked to a wonderful trip from LAX to Madrid and even fit in a side trip to Rome. I had tons of help on this forum and ended up with the LAX to Madrid direct flight in coach.

Family of 4 was about $1000 total using Avios points. I managed to get that round trip for 240,000 Avios. Actually, I am flying from Madrid to Bilboa which is included in that round trip. Then I was able to squeeze 60,000 avios to fly direct to Rome for 4 days, cost about $200 in taxes only.

I wish I could of gotten business class but no luck there. But I am thrilled to have such a wonderful trip planned for 4 people that cost about $1300 total and 300,000 Avios. I hope that is considered a good deal as I looked everywhere.

Thanks again for all the help. Now I just need a awesome Rome hotel for 4 nights.. any ideas? I have also selected seats. row 5 JL, row 6 JL on way there. But can't find a good seating of the A342 model - frustrating!