Transfer AMEX Points To Virgin Atlantic And Get A 30% Bonus: Book Discounted Delta Domestic And International Awards, Incredible ANA Bargains, And More!

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Update, 12/1: You can now get a 30% bonus for transfers from AMEX to Virgin Atlantic through 12/31!

Update, 10/2: You can now get a 30% bonus for transfers from Chase to Virgin Atlantic through 11/15!

Update, 9/18: You can now get a 30% bonus for transfers from Citi to Virgin Atlantic through 10/14!


You can get a 30% bonus when you transfer AMEX Points to Virgin Atlantic until 12/31. The points typically transfer instantly at a 1K:1.3K ratio with this promo.

Virgin Atlantic points never expire!

In general, Virgin Atlantic charges high fuel surcharges that kill the value of many of their awards.

Note that you can save big by booking travel as 2 one-way trips from the US, instead of a round-trip. Fuel surcharges for one-way or round-trip travel originating in Israel are also very low.

You may even save more by calling Virgin Atlantic at 800-365-9500 and asking for a companion discount.

You can hold award tickets for 3 days.

Dates changes or cancellations cost $50 ($35 if originating in UK).

Flying on Delta:

There are some notable sweet spots on partner airlines:

Virgin Atlantic points can be a bargain for flying on Delta. They also can book saver award space, even when there’s none available on Delta.com!

Click here to access the Virgin Atlantic award booking page.

If you have problems typing in your desired airport you will need to click the location icon as shown below and manually search for your destination by country and state. If your destination still isn’t available you will have to call Virgin Atlantic to book award travel to that destination.

If the option to search for points isn’t available you also may need to try selecting another airport, click on pay with points, and then switch the airport. For example NYC to LAX didn’t work for me at first, but I switched the destination to San Francisco, clicked on pay with points, and then switched back to Los Angeles.

On the search page you can select one-way or round-trip, exact dates, flexible within 1 week, or within 5 weeks. You can also change the class of service by clicking on “Show advanced options.” When you are viewing the award calendar you can toggle it to show direct flights only.

You generally won’t want to use Virgin points for Delta flights to the UK, as they tack on fuel surcharges.

However you can fly on Delta to the rest of Europe for just 30K points in coach or 50K points in business class each way.



For the rest of the world besides Europe, Virgin has a distance based award chart for travel on Delta:

 

You can check what a ticket will cost by checking the distance between city pairs on GCmap.com.

There are lots of domestic bargains, though Delta often blocks partner award space within 3 weeks of a flight.

For example a flight from Cleveland to NYC will be 7.5K Virgin points in main cabin (under 6K bank points) or 17.5K in first class (under 14K bank points) with this is a zone 1 award as the flight distance between Cleveland and NYC is under 500 miles.

 

Vs 14K in main cabin with Delta miles or 22.5K in first class with Delta miles:

 

Detroit to NYC is also a zone 1 award.

 

 

JFK to Tel Aviv costs 35K points each way in coach as a zone 8 award. That’s under 27K bank points!


Similar to BA Avios, you have to pay for each segment separately.

That means if I want to fly from Cleveland to Tel Aviv via JFK, it will cost 42.5K points (35K for JFK-TLV+7.5K for CLE-JFK):

 

Infant lap child awards on international flights are a bargain. While Delta charges 10% of the paid fare, which can be astronomical on one-way flights, Virgin charges just 1,000 points in coach or 5,000 points in business class each way:

 


Flying on ANA:

ANA is an incredible Japanese airline with great first class suites that have very comfortable beds and amazing service.

I reviewed them here towards the end of the 4th part of my Island Hopper adventure and just flew on ANA’s new first class cabin yesterday on a flight home from Tokyo:

 

On long-haul flights you can enjoy divine Hibiki 21:

ANA whisky offering from Tokyo to JFK, May 2015

 

And on medium-haul flights you can enjoy also excellent Hibiki 17:

 

You only need 72.5K Virgin Atlantic points to fly one-way from the west coast to Japan or 85K points to fly one-way from the east coast to Japan in first class. There are fuel surcharges which are tied the price of oil from a couple months ago. Those are currently about $250 each way.

Or you can fly in business class for just 45K Virgin Atlantic points one-way from the west coast to Japan or 47.5K points to fly one-way from the east coast to Japan.

Unfortunately, you do need to call Virgin Atlantic to book travel on ANA at 800-365-9500. You can search for ANA award space on United.com.

ANA flies between Tokyo Haneda or Narita from Chicago, Houston, JFK, Los Angeles, San Francisco, or Washington DC.

Search for first class saver awards on United.com to TYO and then call Virgin Atlantic to book:


ANA has introduced new first class suites and business class suites that are amazing!

New ANA First, with a 43″ 4K LED, a door for privacy, windows, and more:

ANA New First Class

 

The middle seats have a partition for privacy that goes up and down so that companions can talk to each other:


New ANA business:

 

Business class is staggered with forward and rear facing seats that also have privacy doors and middle partitions and go up and down:

Want to earn Virgin Atlantic points?

  • You can transfer AMEX, Chase, Capital One, Or Citi points to Virgin Atlantic at a 1:1 ratio or Marriott points at a 60K:25K ratio. 

AMEX cards with transferable Membership Rewards points include:

If you, a member in your household, or an authorized user has one of the following Chase cards, you can transfer points into miles:

Chase no-annual fee cards that are fantastic for earning points, but require one of the cards above for points transfers include:

  • Ink Business Cash® Credit Card earns 5 points per dollar on cable, TV, telecom, cellular, office supply stores, and gift cards from office supply stores, plus 2 points per dollar on dining and gas ($0 annual fee). Read more here.
  • Ink Business Unlimited® Credit Card earns 1.5 points per dollar everywhere ($0 annual fee). Read more here.
  • Chase Freedom Flex has a 20K signup bonus, plus 5 points on rotating categories, 5 points per dollar on travel purchased through the Chase Ultimate Rewards portal, and 3 points per dollar on dining and drugstores ($0 annual fee). Read more here.
  • Chase Freedom Unlimited® has a signup bonus offering 3 points per dollar on up to $20K of spending in your first 12 month, afterwards earn at least 1.5 points per dollar everywhere, 5 points per dollar on travel purchased through the Chase Ultimate Rewards portal, and 3 points per dollar on dining and drugstores ($0 annual fee). Read more here.

If you or a friend has one of the following Citi cards, you can transfer points into miles:

  • Citi Premier® Card has a 60,000 point bonus for spending $4,000 in 3 months, 3 points per dollar on airfare, hotels, travel agents, groceries, gas, and dining. $95 annual fee. Read more here.

Citi no-annual fee cards that are fantastic for earning points, but require one of the cards above for points transfers include:

  • The Citi Double Cash® Card offers 2% cash back or 2 points per dollar spent everywhere that can be transferred into ThankYou points. If you also have a Citi Premier® Card Card you can transfer points into miles. No annual fee. Read more here.
  • The Citi Custom Cash® Card offers 5 points per dollar on up to $500 in purchases in your top eligible spending category each billing cycle. This is marketed as 5% cash back, but will actually come in the form of 5 ThankYou points per dollar spent! Eligible categories include Restaurants, Gas Stations, Grocery Stores, Select Travel, Select Transit, Select Streaming Services, Drugstores, Home Improvement Stores, Fitness Clubs, and Live Entertainment. You will also get 0% APR on purchases and balance transfers for 15 months. No annual fee. Read more here.
  • The Citi Rewards+® Card offering 20,000 points for spending $1,500 in 3 months. This card can’t transfer points on its own, but can transfer points if you have one of the Citi cards above. This card automatically rounds up rewards earned on every purchase to the nearest 10 points, meaning you earn 10 points on a $0.50 Amazon balance reload. Earn 2 points on $6K in annual spending at supermarkets, and a 10% points rebate when you redeem points, up to a 10K points rebate per year. If you also have a Citi Premier® Card Card you can transfer points into miles and get a 10% points rebate on transferred or redeemed miles. No annual fee. Read more here.

Capital One cards with transferable points include:

Marriott cards with transferable points include:

Will you transfer points from Citi to Virgin Atlantic to take advantage of this bonus? What other award sweet spots do you take advantage of?

HT: Eluzer K.

Leave a Reply

105 Comments On "Transfer AMEX Points To Virgin Atlantic And Get A 30% Bonus: Book Discounted Delta Domestic And International Awards, Incredible ANA Bargains, And More!"

All opinions expressed below are user generated and the opinions aren’t provided, reviewed or endorsed by any advertiser or DansDeals.

anonymous

what is mile refund/cancellation policy?

Lufthansa

Dan and JJ,

Thanks for amazing blog. We need more posts like this about what is a good value, tips/tricks, and finding availability + which partners are the best. Meanwhile, is there an organized place we can learn this? (it’s very time consuming to go through 1000+ posts on the forums)

A

Seconded for at least a forum post or DDMS post that indexes other posts about award sweet spots. Also an always up to date page with transfer bonuses would be amazing as well. I know it takes work but I always do use your referral links for credit card signups and Amazon purchases!

I knew it

Hi Dan,

I wanted to book Virgian atlantic award tickets but I was debating to see if Chase will run a promotion. However, I was afraid that I will lose their availability so I went ahead and booked the tickets. Two days later this promotion went into affect. Is there an option to send ultimate rewards team a secure message (just like Chase has with the credit card bonuses) and ask them if they would honor to retroactive the bonus transfer

JSo

How much is NYC-TLV in business one way / rt? How much is Europe-TLV rt economy & business?

yy

Good luck finding JFK-TLV on Delta. I haven’t seen any in ages.

Aaron

Ya fake news

jg

can someone give more detailed info on if one would book through virgin atlantic and how worth it it is to get miles transferred from chase points?

Ely

How do you find availability when there’s no saver award available on Delta? I didn’t catch that part.

ybincr

Thank you for the Post what is the companion discount?

DCee

Hi Dan,
I keep trying to find tickets from NYC to TLV in July or August as well as NYC to London in July and award tickets seem to have $255 fees/surcharges/taxes each way.
How come I can’t find the flights with the $5 surcharges?

Thanks,
DCee

yy

See my comment above. There is practically no Delta availability JFK-TLV, especially in the summer. Flight on Virgin Atlantic have have fuel surcharges.

Danfan

Only delta flights would be $5 tax

naf naf

Anyone see any JFK-TLV availibilty?

MD

Can you buy tickets for someone else with points? thanks

Danfan

You can (with most airlines), but according to airline rules you are not allowed to “sell” your points…. and virgin has actually been cracking down on that lately, I know several people who were stopped at check in and thoroughly investigated if they paid for the points, so make sure you friend knows that you gave him the points as a gift and you’ll be fine

BH

Thank you so much!
BH Booked a one way from ATL to JNB on June 25th for only 35,000 UR points. It’s a delta flight but we booked through partner Virgin Atlantic for a better valuation, made even better thanks to this bonus.
That gives the points quite the value, not sure exactly but it would have cost $1,627 in cash.

Looking for a good point redemption for NYC to ATL to put the cherry on top of any one can send my way, thanks!

Again, all the knowledge of amassing points and finally being able to redeem them is thanks to all the info gathered here on DansDeals, thank a million!

Danfan

NYC to ATL is a busy route, should be tons of options, I guess you have chase points, so either United, JetBlue, or Delta (With virgin points) Should cost you only 5-10K

Leonard Yehuda Oppenheimer

I tried all the ways listed in this post to use virgin to book domestic flights, including trying to put san Franciso in and then changing. I keep getting same message – No reward flights available for your search, no matter what cities or what dates I put in. How do you get it to search for flights on Delta?

Thanks

Danfan

It might just be that there are no saver awards for your route, Check on air france flying blue miles if you don’t see it there either, you know there is no availability

Moshe A

I Have a Delta credit card, do I get a free suitcase within the US when booking with Virgin points?

John

Do ANA business seats lie flat?

Bonvoyer

Can Virgin Atlantic points be used for Virgin Australia flights, and if so, is it a good use of points?

paron

When I search in Virgin Atlantic, I don’t see any Delta flights showing up. What am I doing wrong?

MV

Nonstop JFK to CDG now shows $275 in taxes per passenger one way (February 2024)

yelped

That’s because you didn’t find availability on a Delta flight.

yelped

Workaround to select airport that won’t allow you to use points is not working for me. Tried it on desktop and mobile. Started with JFK-ZRH with points, switched destination to MXP, and it switched back to money.

Any ideas?

Emes

NYC – lax not working no matter what I do even using Dan’s method.

meir

Can book with virgin non stop flight jfk -tlv? it doesn’t come up on virgin.
Thank you

Dan1

Which points are more valuable Chase or Amex since have both and wondering which to transfer?

Zack

Kinda depends on your circumstances. Do you have significantly more of one than the other? Are you more likely to want to transfer to Southwest or Hyatt (Chase) or to Delta or ANA (Amex) somewhere down the line? Will it be easier for you to replenish one more than the other?

Baron

https://travelplus.virginatlantic.com/reward-flight-finder
Still in Beta but this is epic if more destinations added. Would be epic if anyone follows suit

Danfan

You can try different destinations by editing the URL, just find the airport code in the URL and replace it with your airport code (Cap letters like TLV).
Does not work always, but when it does it’s amazing…

Shlomo

Just confirming YY comments above: Checked some 50 random dates – off dated primarily like in the winter – and found absolutely no direct flights JFK-TLV on delta. O well for that

Jacob

Any luck for those who want to fly from LAX- TLV? Fuel charges are $550!

Rabbi Red

Cannot find any flights from IAH. I tried all airpots and it says no flights available. Should I call the 800#

Maier A

Sorry for this question, but how do I transfer the points/miles from: Amex or Chase? Just no clue how to go about it. Another Q, Can I transfer miles from Delta to Virgin?

Zack

https://www.dansdeals.com/points-travel/milespoints/transfer-chase-points-flying-blue-miles-get-25-bonus-fly-israel-21k-28k-points-coach-57k-76k-points-business-class/#comment-1631979

And no you cannot transfer from Delta to Virgin but you can sometimes book one’s flights thru the others mileage program

audrey

how do I transfer the chase points to virgin? I don’t see anywhere on my ultimate rewards account to transfer (although I do see all the ways to spend the points/book travel with chase which I do not want to do)

Allen

With the fuel surcharge, is it still a good deal to book ANA economy class flight to Japan from US using VA miles? (I know it is for business and first class)

MD

If you don’t use your points at Virgin can you move it back or convert to something else?

Myi

Nope you won’t be able to pull it back.

Myi

Anyone else having issues transferring points to virgin from chase? Shows pending then gets canceled right away.
Tried from two different accounts.

nn

I am having issues transferring points to virgin as well. It seems to be an issue from virgin because my transfers got canceled by chase and amex. Any ideas to work around this?

Myi

Got it to work for chase. They fixed it bh.

Eli

Disregard… i knew that when dan posts something and it doesn’t work it’s rather my issue… i played around a bit and i figured it out!! Dan rox

Eli

The points option doesnt work for my las to nyc im trying the lax that u mention in the post but as soon as i change the lax to nyc it gets blanked out again… can u help plz

Jeff

I am finding that the only reward flights that Virgin Atlantic is listing for either one-way or round-trip from the Washington, DC area are their own, with the huge additional fees. Any way to game their site to get the Delta flights connecting through Boston, JFK, or Atlanta, or is the only way to do that to book each segment separately (or book it as two round-trip tickets)?

Jew

What’s the best card/membership/alliance for someone who flies Turkish a lot.

Jeff

Turkish is part of the Star Alliance, which includes United, among many other airlines.

helo

thank you , just did

Polly

Can you elaborate on the companion fare? I don’t see any info about it on their site

Mikel

How can you book discounts on delta? Don’t see an option on their site to book delta flights
Thank you

Jw

If I transferred 80k from chase to virgin last week any chance they’ll compensate?

AYC

“JFK to Tel Aviv costs 35K points each way in coach as a zone 8 award. That’s under 27K bank points!”

Worth noting that these are very rare, and there are currently no dates available.

Ly

January 12,25-28 April 14 currently available. However I do agree that it is rare

Mendel

I just transferred through chase last week would they honor to give me 30%

AYC

“For the rest of the world besides Europe, Virgin has a distance based award chart for travel on Delta”

Has this chart been updated? Right now ATL-CDG (4,001-5000 miles distance) costs 30K miles, not 27,500. I am looking at Jan 17, 2024.

EB

How long does it take for Citi points to transfer?

Dovid

Be aware when booking virgin Atlantic rewards tickets I booked a virgin Atlantic from TLV to JFK for my brother and I using rewards transferred from my Amex Platinum When I got to check in I was told that my tickets were canceled with no future explanation there was no one to talk to The only thing I was told to email to Loyalty.fraud.queries@fly.virgin.com they replied that they believe there was fraudulent activity on my account therefore my account is suspended and I have not received a refund for the rewards if anyone can please recommend a solution for my issue I would greatly appreciate it

Danfan

Call them and fight it out, I had success with that. They just need proof that you are the owner of the account (YMMV).

To avoid this on future bookings use the transfer points option in your account to transfer your points to the travelers account, there is only a small handling fee.

Dovid

I called multiple times They do not want to speak to me All they tell me is to email to the above mentioned email address

Ly

update?

Joe

Had the same issue. Called today and they told me to email. I got an auto reply saying they’ll get back in 5 days lets see. Hoping account doesn’t get perma banned.

Dovid L

What are the odds this bonus comes back sometime this year for Virgin? How frequently do these Chase transfer bonuses come out for airlines?

Marky

Thank you so much for the reminder. It saved me around $200 today on a Delta flight but I already booked and I canceled it to take care of this deal.

SG

Thank you so much! I’ve never bought a travel ticket with points before, though I’ve followed your site for years. It would be a dream come true to go on a quick getaway using points! Hope to do so, from nyc to mia! I transferred chase to virgin – how would it work the best to go nyc-mia, with virgin or delta? I’m a little confused how they work together/how to book it. Thanks so much! 🙂

Z

How come when I look Lax to Tyo the lowest first class fair is 170,000 miles each way? What am I doing wrong? Thanks

David

Is it worth transferring Amex to virgin now with this bonus even if I don’t have specific travel plans yet?

S

Is the Companion Discount only valid on Virgin operated flights? (i.e. no Delta or ITA flights)?

Plat

I need to transfer out amex points before closing account
I don’t have a biz to open a biz MR account to transfer to

My concerns :
1. Airline like vs prob expire
2. Delta don’t make award seats available on vs for close to chagim when I need flights

Thoughts?

Card fees $695, won’t keep another year

Thabk you

R

Be sure to call AMEX before you cancel. Sometimes they will give you an offer that makes keeping the card open for another year worth it — you can then cancel the next year

yankel

time to update the screen grab dates. these images are from 2021. show me some real availability into 2024 🙂

J

What’s the latest on ANA biz/F availability? Haven’t found anything over the past year when checking but haven’t been diligent about it.

Yitzchak

Due to the new el al partnership with delta, I was able to get switched to a direct delta flight from a delta flight I booked with virgin miles for free. (Can even select pesach dates etc with no fare difference on el al)

Yitzchak

Due to the new el al partnership with delta, I was able to get switched to a direct EL AL flight from a delta flight I booked with virgin miles for free. (Can even select pesach dates etc with no fare difference on el al)

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