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People complain about frequent flyer programs. When the The New York Times writes about how to use your miles to get an award seat, a laundry list of complaints come up in the comments. There are legitimate annoyances with award tickets:
- Low-miles-price tickets are capacity controlled. If you want to fly at peak times, you have to pay double the miles you were expecting to pay.
- More award tickets are requiring a large cash component in the form of fuel surcharges.
- You often have to book by phone. It takes a few minutes to ticket a cash ticket online. It can take quite a bit longer to book if you have a complicated award and incompetent phone agents who are booking it.
But award tickets are better than cash tickets in most cases. Here are some huge benefits of award tickets, areas where cash tickets are inferior.
1. Award tickets have better change rules.
Change rules on award tickets vary based on the miles you used, but they’re pretty favorable compared to cash tickets.
I buy the cheapest nonrefundable fares I can when I buy cash tickets. On American Airlines, such tickets cost $200 plus the fare difference to change. If I need to make a change, it is likely to be at the last minute when the fare difference between the cheap ticket I bought and the last minute ticket I need is huge. In short, changing a paid ticket is generally incredibly expensive–several hundred dollars.
Award tickets cost much less to change. On American, you can change the date of your award for free if you make the change 22+ days in advance. If you want to change something else–origin, destination, airline, cabin–it costs $150.
So some changes to award tickets are free, and the rest cost less, and sometimes a lot less, than changes to cash tickets.
2. Award tickets have better cancellation rules.
Delta, American, and US Airways charge $150 for a full refund of the miles and taxes you paid for the award ticket. British Airways charges only $40.
Compare that to nonrefundable cash tickets, which are nonrefundable. You can’t get back what you paid for the tickets in cash.
3. Award tickets have better stopover rules.
Some cash tickets allow free stopovers. I see a lot of chances for free stopovers on paid Turkish Airlines and Iceland Air tickets at their hubs.
But on most cash tickets, adding a stopover will cause the ticket to price differently and often much higher.
Compare that to award tickets. United, Delta, and US Airways allow one free stopover per roundtrip awards. American allows two free stopovers per roundtrip award. British Airways allows unlimited free stopovers on all awards. (Restrictions and caveats apply to all of these.)
That means a cash ticket will generally take you to one city, but an award can take you to two, three, or more cities for the same price.
4. Award tickets allow free oneways.
Similar to the free stopovers advantage that awards have, try to add a free oneway to your next cash ticket. It will certainly price as a separate ticket instead of free.
5. Award tickets have better upgrade rules, kind of.
If you buy a cheap cash ticket on United to Europe and want to upgrade to business class, it will cost you $550 plus 20,000 miles to upgrade one way!
If you book an economy award to Europe and decide later to change that award to business class, it will cost 20,000 miles plus $75 because this is just a standard award change.
6. First class and business class are attainable on award tickets.
Next year, I’m flying from New York to Hong Kong in Cathay Pacific First Class. Roundtrip flights on the route go for over $26,000 in First Class.
Most people will never have $26,000 extra to spend on flights. But most people can earn 135k American Airlines miles pretty easily to get the flights by opening a few credit cards.
(Even easier is getting 67,500 miles for one way in first class and booking the return in economy. That’s another benefit of miles, you can mix-and-match cabins easily.)
For many people, this is the best part of awards, flying on less than an economy budget and having access to the most luxurious commercial flights in the world.
7. Many award tickets are the same price at the last minute.
Cash ticket prices go through the roof in the last few days before departure. To fly Los Angeles to New York this week roundtrip is $870, about $500 more than if you had booked in advance.
Low-level awards cost the same number of miles no matter when they’re booked relative to departure, and many airlines even open up extra award space in the last few days and weeks before departure.
Some airlines charge a fee for ticketing awards within 21 days of departure of up to $100, but some airlines like British Airways and Delta don’t even charge an extra cash component.
8. Award tickets have far better routing rules.
For instance, next month my award from Argentina to Europe will have a nine-day stop in South Africa, which would not have been possible on a cash ticket.
Or you can route from the east coast to the west coast to Europe on American Airlines awards.
These flexible routing rules let you meet your goals for your next trip more easily with awards whether those goals are seeing more places, adding a free oneway, or getting more flying in a premium cabin.
Plus the main reason award tickets are better…
The best award tickets only require you to pay the taxes out of pocket, which are often less than a hundred dollars instead of paying for a ticket that can cost thousands of dollars.
What other reasons do you prefer award tickets to cash tickets? What did I forget?
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I will fly over 120+ segments this year. For expensive international travel and some domestic I look at award travel. However, most of my flights I book economy and look for upgrades, I am a Delta Diamond. Award travel does not earn any status points, which if you do not travel a lot, doesn’t make any difference. In my case it would seem to. Any comments on earning status. See you in Chicago.
I will fly over 120+ segments this year. For expensive international travel and some domestic I look at award travel. However, most of my flights I book economy and look for upgrades, I am a Delta Diamond. Award travel does not earn any status points, which if you do not travel a lot, doesn’t make any difference. In my case it would seem to. Any comments on earning status. See you in Chicago.
Your points about the benefits of award travel are well taken. And while I will certainly use award miles for some international trips, as Craig points out above, you don’t earn elite status points with award travel. As most of my travel is domestic, elite status matters as it results in frequent free upgrades and other perks.
I would like to hear more on MilesValue about strategies for balancing award travel with earning elite status. In what situations does one use award miles vs purchase cash tickets and, if cash, what are the best upgrade strategies.
One quibble with #2: You don’t lose the value of a cash ticket when you cancel it. Most airlines let you put the value of a ticket towards another ticket (minus a change fee) booked in the next year.
Your points about the benefits of award travel are well taken. And while I will certainly use award miles for some international trips, as Craig points out above, you don’t earn elite status points with award travel. As most of my travel is domestic, elite status matters as it results in frequent free upgrades and other perks.
I would like to hear more on MilesValue about strategies for balancing award travel with earning elite status. In what situations does one use award miles vs purchase cash tickets and, if cash, what are the best upgrade strategies.
One quibble with #2: You don’t lose the value of a cash ticket when you cancel it. Most airlines let you put the value of a ticket towards another ticket (minus a change fee) booked in the next year.
Nice post. Regarding #1, my understanding for AAdvantage awards is that you can change dates for free for awards with the same origin and destination, as long as the new date is at least 22 days after the original booking date. In other words, if I booked a trip from JFK-LAX 22+ days ago for a trip sometime in the future, I should be able to change that future date to tomorrow with no charge, (assuming saver space is available, of course).
Nice post. Regarding #1, my understanding for AAdvantage awards is that you can change dates for free for awards with the same origin and destination, as long as the new date is at least 22 days after the original booking date. In other words, if I booked a trip from JFK-LAX 22+ days ago for a trip sometime in the future, I should be able to change that future date to tomorrow with no charge, (assuming saver space is available, of course).
have you booked your big asia trip yet?
One third of it –> https://milevalu.wpengine.com/anatomy-of-an-award-getting-extra-first-class-on-cathay-pacific/
have you booked your big asia trip yet?
One third of it –> https://milevalu.wpengine.com/anatomy-of-an-award-getting-extra-first-class-on-cathay-pacific/
Reason #3 about Stopovers on American Airlines is incorrect. AA do NOT allow stopovers as of 2 yrs ago. So stopovers are no longer free. Stopovers will be allow only if you are willing to spend much more miles on the award ticket as they now consider this an add on segment to the trip.
Reason #3 about Stopovers on American Airlines is incorrect. AA do NOT allow stopovers as of 2 yrs ago. So stopovers are no longer free. Stopovers will be allow only if you are willing to spend much more miles on the award ticket as they now consider this an add on segment to the trip.
I’m happy to inform you that you’re incorrect. Enjoy two free stopovers on your next international AA roundtrip award! –> https://milevalu.wpengine.com/how-to-book-free-stopovers-online-american-airlines/
Regarding #2, I don’t think there is much difference between award and revenue flights.
Most “non-refundable” tickets can be cancelled with a credit toward a future flight. There is a change fee deduced from that credit, about $150. This is essentially the same for award tickets where miles are returned for a future flight, and a change fee is deducted from that credit. The only difference is that the change fee is charged separately because you can’t deduct dollars from miles.
Regarding #2, I don’t think there is much difference between award and revenue flights.
Most “non-refundable” tickets can be cancelled with a credit toward a future flight. There is a change fee deduced from that credit, about $150. This is essentially the same for award tickets where miles are returned for a future flight, and a change fee is deducted from that credit. The only difference is that the change fee is charged separately because you can’t deduct dollars from miles.
Award tickets can extend a trip or actually make a trip happen. I would not be going to Europe for two weeks next February if I was not traveling on a US Air non peak travel award. By only only paying the fees and taxes I can afford to travel for two weeks instead of my usual 7-8 days. It also helps 9 nights are points stays at 3-4 star hotels.
Award tickets can extend a trip or actually make a trip happen. I would not be going to Europe for two weeks next February if I was not traveling on a US Air non peak travel award. By only only paying the fees and taxes I can afford to travel for two weeks instead of my usual 7-8 days. It also helps 9 nights are points stays at 3-4 star hotels.
I had a question about #5 above. With your example of United, you have elsewhere written that additional Business and First class space often opens up closer to the departure date. Does it sound like a good strategy to book flights in economy as two one-way tickets for the dates/flights you are interested in travelling, and then trying to upgrade those portions that have business/first class space open up last minute? Will this always cost just $75 plus the difference in miles between business/first saver and economy saver? And what about if you had to book standard economy at the higher amount of miles to get the date you wanted, would you be able to just pay $75 and get the difference in miles returned to you (between standard economy and saver business) if saver business space opens up last minute?
That’s a good strategy that I’ve used before. If you change, you always pay or get refunded the miles difference, so moving Standard Economy to Saver Business to Europe equals a 5k mile refund for instance.
sorry, Tried to read up on some past post on getting free stopover but confusion is it did not work for me when I booked on their partner Cathay Pacific. Flew last year on CX from (my home city NYC- JFK) to Hong Kong and them onward to my final destination in mainland China (CTU). Couldnt find listing on AA site so had to call up AA rep. Was told AA no longer allow free stopover in HK even though Cathay hub is located there. If wanted a stopover in HK, will cost an additonal 15000 AA miles+ taxes. Since I needed to travel that route, I booked that route and total AA miles (economy) was: 70,000(RT) + 15000 stopover in HK= 85000 miles. Fees were about $65 + 25 booking fee= $90.
Not sure if I could’ve done better???
As the post says, you can only take stopover on AA awards at the North American International Gateway City, in the case of your award, JFK.
I agree with number #1 on change rules. I had to change flights/date before with little or no penalty (back then when you can change award flights without a fee as long as the origin and destination remains the same). That was immensely helpful. I remembered talking to one of my colleagues who booked a flight, but there was some issues. I accidentally said, “can’t you just change the dates?” to which she said it was a non-refundable ticket.
I totally forgot how annoying non-refundable tickets can be.