Getting To Israel Using Starwood Starpoints!

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Currently posting from: Hamilton Island, Great Barrier Reef, Australia

Related:
Starwood AMEX Consumer Card Signup Linky
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Getting To Israel Using AMEX Membership Rewards Points!

As you probably know, the Starwood card is generally my favorite card for spending. The points you get from it are just so much more valuable than other point currencies.  Of course it’s still worth getting triple AMEX points when booking travel (or double for gas and groceries) by using the Premier Gold AMEX card if you have one handy, but generally Starwood is my go-to card.
Getting to Israel using Starpoints must be one of the most common questions on this site, maybe this will settle it once and for all?
Of course there are many other uses for Starpoints than just transferring them into miles. I just helped a friend book a Hawaiian vacation over the peak December holiday season when rooms for going for $600/night using Starwood Cash and Points and his rooms were as little as $60+4,000 Starpoints! Those points were worth their weight in gold (well, closer to 13.5 cents per point, but you catch my drift) And that’s besides for other awards like 5th night free.
If you are transferring points you may also want to consider Starwood’s Nights & Flights option where you can save 8,000 points on a mileage transfer and any future 5 night stay in a category 3 or 4 hotel.
And of course you have to consider other opportunities like the Southwest option now, or any of the past bonus offers that have come up, including bonuses from 25% to a whopping 312% for transfers to AA, Delta, and USAirways.

Still ready to transfer points to go to Israel? Great! Here’s how to do it for a little points as possible.
To make a transfer just login to your Starwood account at SPG.com.  If you have never made an account at SPG.com you may need to set one up.  Locate your SPG number on the Starwood AMEX statement where it lists how many points you earned in the past month and for the year.  Then you can setup for SPG.com account.  Click here to transfer Starpoints into airline miles. Transfers don’t happen instantly.  They can take between 1-20 days.  On average figure on about 3-7 days though.

While these aren’t nearly all of the possible transfer options, this should cover many of the good ones. If I’m missing any good Starwood transfer methods or if there any mistakes please post a comment!

The rates in this chart are for flights from NYC to Tel Aviv. Rates from other cities should be similar, but may differ depending on the airline.  Remember to try to do your own research online when searching for award flights.  With enough time and effort you should be able to easily book something over the phone.  Remember the phone agents just want to get you off the phone as quickly as possible and aren’t likely to want to try to find any creative routings to get you your free flight.

Confused about which airlines charge a fuel surcharge on award travel? The good news if that generally US based carriers never do, but I’ve been compiling a chart of the policies of 44 airlines on the Dansdeals Forums where you can read more about the murky policies of fuel surcharges.
I wish the offending airlines would just call them what they really are: Mileage co-pays. It has nothing to with fuel and everything to do with a deceitful cash grab that will ultimately kill the mileage cash cow that is the most (only?) profitable segment of the airline industry! The airline that books your reward ticket (not the operating carrier) decides whether to charge a fuel surcharge or not.  On principle I avoid accumulating miles with airlines that resort to charging them. For a trip like NYC-TLV a fuel surcharge may range from $250 to as much as $500 per ticket! I’ve noted which airlines below charge them.

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Airlines that fly nonstop from North America to Israel:
-Air Canada from Toronto (bookable via Star Alliance miles)
-Continental/United from Newark (bookable via Star Alliance miles)
-Delta from Atlanta and JFK (bookable via Skyteam miles)
-El Al from JFK, Los Angeles, Newark, and Toronto. (bookable via AA, connections to Eilat for the same mileage available)
-USAirways from Philadelphia (bookable via Star Alliance miles)
As none of these carriers offer First Class seating to Israel, I’ve only included the rates for Coach and Business Class. (El Al does offer First Class, but you can only use AA miles to redeem for Coach or Business Class on El Al).  It is of course possible to redeem for First Class seating (good routings would be with Oneworld on BA via London, or with Star Alliance with Swiss via Zurich, or Lufthansa via Frankfurt or Munich) but that is beyond the scope of this article.

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Star Alliance:
With 28 airlines (not even counting that most airlines have even more non-Star Alliance partners), Star Alliance offers the best availability for flights to Israel by leaps and bounds.

Using ANA miles.
-If there is availability on Continental or USAirways for your dates: Transfer enough points to ANA to have 60,000 miles per ticket for coach or 90,000 miles per ticket for business.
Transfer Ratio: 20,000 Starpoints=25,000 ANA miles. At a 1:1.25 ratio this means 48,000 Starpoints in coach or 72,000 Starpoints in business.
Notes:
-Fuel Surcharges: ANA does not charge fuel surcharges for travel on Continental, United, USAirways, and Virgin Atlantic, but they do charge fuel surcharges for travel on other airlines.
-Check availability for Continental rewards on Continental.com and USAirways awards on USAirways.com.
-It takes a number of days for Starpoints to transfer into ANA miles and there is no way to have ANA hold a ticket if have no miles in your account.
-ANA miles expire after 3 years, regardless of account activity.
-ANA partner flights must be booked 7 days in advance.
-ANA does not charge for date changes.
-ANA allows a ticket to be canceled and the miles to be redeposited for a fee of just 3,000 miles.
-You can book alliance travel on on ANA’s website once you have miles in your account, although you may need to call them to book travel for flights not found on their website.

Using USAirways miles.
-If there is Star Alliance availability besides for Continental and USAirways, transfer enough points to USAirways to have 80,000 miles per ticket for coach or 120,000 miles per ticket for business.
Transfer Ratio: 20,000 Starpoints=25,000 USAirways miles. At a 1:1.25 ratio this means 64,000 Starpoints in coach or 96,000 Starpoints in business.
Notes:
-Fuel Surcharges: USAirways never charges fuel surcharges, although they do have a modest $50 award ticketing fee offset by the fact that they waive the phone booking fee for Star Alliance tickets.
-While you can check availability for Star Alliance rewards on Continental.com and Aeroplan.com, many partner airlines will not show up. You must call USAirways to check availability and to book flights on many partner airlines. You may be able to check Star Alliance availability on ANA’s website and then call Continental to book. See this forum thread for info on using ANA to search Star Alliance availability and workarounds to use ANA’s website even if you don’t have any ANA miles.
-USAirways charges $150 for date and route changes and $75 for tickets booked within 14 days of departure.  See this post for a roundup of award fees that US-based airline charge.
-USAirways does not allow for changes after you take any flight on a Star Alliance itinerary.
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OneWorld:
Oneworld availability to Israel can be tough. Flights to Israel include BA from London, Iberia from Madrid and Barcelona, Royal Jordanian from Amman, and Malev from Budapest.
El Al does have decent avaialbility. While AA is partners with El Al, they are a non-alliance partner so you can book travel on El Al with AA miles, but not with other OneWorld mileage.

Using AA miles
-If there is OneWorld or El Al availability, transfer enough points to AA to have 80,000 miles per ticket (for coach via Europe during off-peak travel times) or 90,000 miles per ticket (for coach nonstop on El Al or via Europe during peak travel times) or 135,000 miles per ticket for business nonstop on El Al or via Europe).
Transfer Ratio: 20,000 Starpoints=25,000 AA miles. At a 1:1.25 ratio this means 64,000 or 72,000 Starpoints in coach or 108,000 Starpoints in business.
Notes:
-Fuel Surcharges: There are fuel surcharges if you want to travel on BA, but not for travel on AA or on any other partner airlines.
-You can check AA availability on AA.com. You can check OneWorld availability on BA.com or Qantas.com. (BA or Qantas frequent flyer account required) You can check El Al availability on elal.com (Matmid account required). You can also check availability by calling AA. Tickets must also be booked by calling AA.
The best shot at availability without paying fuel surcharges would be to take AA to London and then El Al from London to Tel Aviv. This route would be 80,000 miles between October-May or the same 90,000 miles as the nonstop El Al flight from the US during the summer.
-AA allows for free date changes and routing changes on award tickets.

Using BA miles
-If there is OneWorld availability for your dates: Transfer enough points to BA to have 65,000 miles per ticket for coach or 130,000 miles per ticket for business.
Transfer Ratio: 20,000 Starpoints=25,000 BA miles. At a 1:1.25 ratio this means 52,000 or 104,000 Starpoints in coach or 108,000 Starpoints in business.
Notes:
-Fuel Surcharges: BA has recently started charging fuel surcharges on most partner airline flights. They do not charge a surcharge for travel on LAN. They also do not charge a surcharge for travel on AA if booked online. If you book over the phone they charge a surcharge even for AA travel if it involves flights outside of North America.
-You can only search partner flights on BA.com after searching for BA availability. If there is no BA availability you will then see the option to include partners in the search. This search is far from perfect, you should call BA to check more partner availability, but beware that calling will subject you to fuel surcharges on AA travel.
-Oneworld availability can also be searched by creating an account and searching on Qantas.com.

Using JAL miles
-If there is BA availability, transfer enough points to JAL to have 40,000 miles per ticket (for coach between 10/15-05/15) or 60,000 miles per ticket (for coach between 05/16-10/14) or 80,000 miles per ticket for business.
-If there is OneWorld availability, transfer enough points to JAL to have 60,000 miles per ticket for coach or 90,000 miles per ticket for business.
Transfer Ratio: 20,000 Starpoints=25,000 JAL miles. At a 1:1.25 ratio this means 32,000 Starpoints for off-peak coach on BA, 48,000 Starpoints for other coach travel, 64,000 Starpoints for business on BA, or 72,000 Starpoints in business on other partner airlines.
-Fuel Surcharges: JAL seems to always charges a fuel surcharge.

Using LAN kilometers
-If there is availability on Royal Jordanian, transfer enough points to LAN to have 112,000 kilometers per ticket for coach or 224,000 kilometers per ticket for business.
Transfer Ratio: 20,000 Starpoints=50,000 LAN kilometers. At a 1:2.5 ratio this means 44,800 Starpoints in coach or 89,600 Starpoints in business.
Notes:
-Fuel Surcharges: LAN does not charge any fuel surcharges
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Skyteam:
Skyteam has by far the worst availability of the 3 alliances. You can try searching some Skyteam availability on Delta.com.

Using Alitalia miles
-If there is Skyteam availability transfer enough points to Alitalia to have 50,000 miles per ticket to Alitalia for coach or 80,000 miles per ticket for business,
Transfer Ratio: 20,000 Starpoints=25,000 Alitalia miles. At a 1:1.25 ratio this means 40,000 Starpoints in coach or 64,600 Starpoints in business.
-Fuel Surcharges: Alitalia charges a fuel surcharge for travel on all airlines, although it tends to be less than that Flying Blue charges.

Using Flying Blue (Air France/KLM) miles.
-If there is a promo award available on Flying Blue for your dates and you’re ready to work hard to get them to honor it and cut through red tape: Transfer enough points to Flying blue to have 25,000 miles per ticket for coach or 50,000 miles per ticket for business, plus expect to pay fuel surcharges.
Transfer Ratio: 20,000 Starpoints=25,000 Flying Blue miles. At a 1:1.25 ratio this means 20,000 Starpoints in coach or 40,000 Starpoints in business.
Flying Blue charges a larger fuel surcharge than Alitalia, so transfer to Alitalia if you don’t want the hassle of booking a promo award.
-Fuel Surcharges: Flying Blue charges a fuel surcharge for travel on all airlines.

Using Delta miles, from 80,000 AMEX points.
-You can also transfer to Delta Skypesos to avoid fuel surcharges for travel originating in the US (Delta charges fuel surcharges for travel originating outside of the US), but their mileage rates are variable. Coach can be between 80,000 and 190,000 and business can be between 120,000 and 370,000.
Transfer Ratio: 20,000 Starpoints=25,000 Delta miles. At a 1:1.25 ratio this means 64,000-152,000 Starpoints in coach or 96,000-296,000 Starpoints in business.
-Fuel Surcharges: Delta does not charge a fuel surcharge for round-trip travel originating from the US on Delta but does charge fuel surcharges on select partners.
Delta always charges a fuel surcharge for round-trip travel originating from outside the US on all airlines.