Before You Book That Award Ticket, Be Sure To Shop Around; How I Booked My Flight To NYC Last Week

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Related post: Master Chart: Here Are The Best Ways To Book Every American Or Alaska Award Flight Within The US And Canada!


Earlier this week I wrote about my experience flying from NYC to Cleveland and watching a pair of gate agents argue with a pair of flight attendants and a mother flying with her infant, over her Doona.

I booked that Sunday-Monday trip 2 days beforehand.

I love using miles for aspirational trips, as that’s where the best value can be had for trips that you could otherwise not afford. We have used miles to fly in first class to 6 continents (well, 7 if you count the flight to a boat) and treasure those memories.

But you can also get great value out of your miles domestically.

For example, the cheapest last minute flight from Cleveland to NYC that Sunday was $400, or over $500 for a flight leaving after I could catch a Shacharis at home:

 

And the return flight was similarly priced as well:

 

So, of course. I looked at my mileage options.

You can do quick math to figure out the bank points needed, without having to open those sites. With aĀ Sapphire Reserve you’ll get a value of 1.5 cents per point and with an AMEX Business Platinum Card you’ll get a value of 1.54 cents per point after the 35% points rebate. Divide the cost of a $950 round-trip flight by 1.5 to see that it would cost around 63K bank points for those flights.

What about airline miles?

American wanted 24,000 miles for a flight that would get me to NYC in time for the Lā€™chaim:

 

Delta wanted 22.5K miles for an early-morning flight, or 50K miles for a flight at a reasonable time:

 

United wanted 15K miles, or 16.7K miles for a flight at a reasonable time:

 

Or 13.5K United miles for Club cardholders:

 

Of course, anyone mileage savvy knows that you also have to look at partner airlines.

Skyteam carriers Virgin Atlantic and Air France Flying Blue have Delta flights between Cleveland and NYC for just 7.5K milesĀ or 5.5K miles respectively, however Delta blocks all domestic partner award space within 3 weeks of the flight.

I confirmed that was still the case on the Virgin site and ruled out Delta:

 

Star Alliance carrier Air Canada charges just 6,000 miles+$34 to fly on United, but United only releases a limited subset of flights to partners, so the only option there was for a 6am flight.

Same goes for Lifemiles at 6.5K miles+$15.

 

OneWorld carrier BA had the AA flights available in first class for 24K Avios+$5.60. That’s certainly better than 24K in coach with AA miles, especially considering that it’s much easier to obtain Avios from bank point transfers and that there are often 30% transfer bonuses.

Qatar would be able to book this for 20K Avios+$10, but would have to be booked over the phone.

Qantas would be able to book this for 18.4K Miles.

 

And finally, there’s Alaska. In a few days from now, you’ll be able to transfer AMEX points to Hawaiian and from Hawaiian to Alaska at a 1:1 ratio.

They wanted just 9K miles+$19 in first class, so this was an easy choice:

 

For the return flight, AA wanted just 8.5K or 9.5K miles:

 

United wanted 15K miles:

 

 

Or 13.5K United miles for Club cardholders:

 

 

BA wanted 12K Avios, though Qatar would have been 9.5K Avios over the phone, Qantas would have been 8K miles, and Etihad would have been 6,043 miles:

 

Air Canada was just 6K miles, but only had the 8:29pm flight available:

 

And Alaska wanted just 4.5K miles for coach:

 

Thanks to AA status, I booked AA4366 for 4.5K miles, got upgraded to first class, and even had an empty seat next to me. And thus began the showdown at the gate.

What are your favorite uses of miles?

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71 Comments On "Before You Book That Award Ticket, Be Sure To Shop Around; How I Booked My Flight To NYC Last Week"

All opinions expressed below are user generated and the opinions arenā€™t provided, reviewed or endorsed by any advertiser or DansDeals.

Chaim

for a mileage geek its fun but for avg joe thats a lot of effort for a 1 hr flight

Avi

Only DD followers know that miles are their own currency

Myi

Nice post.

Vlad

This is a master class in the art of travel hacking and understanding the importance of partnerships. The only part I didn’t understand is why your AA status helped you get upgraded to first class when you booked with Alaska miles? I thought that if you book with miles there is no way to swap out the frequent flyer number on the reservation like you can with revenue fares?

Also, it’s stuff like this that makes me jealous of people who live in NY šŸ™‚ You have viable options with all the major carriers. I usually fly out of BWI and only UA and WN make sense on most routes.

Chaim

once booked add your status thru finair

EBG

There wre lots of options out of IAD if you’re not too far.

CtownBin

The downside is- now that Alaska miles are going to become easy to obtain, due to the Amex–> Hawaiian-> Alaska route, everyone is going to find out and hit this hard, and the 4500 rate is going to get devalued sooner than many of us will be to able to use the big stash of miles we just transferred for the 20% bonus….

Yitz Weiss

I really enjoyed this post! Well done!

David

Great post. Easy to read and understand and follow. I have been doing the mini version of this comparing between just aa, United and ba where it makes sense. I feel I need a cheat sheet to look up which ones to check for which routes from sna and lax area.

LD

Excellent post broken down clearly. Was fun to read!! Kind of felt like I was with you on the journey while reading it. Thanks Dan!!

Mille_Bornes

Do you have miles sitting in all those different airlinesā€™ mileage accounts? Or do you only transfer the points in once you determine which flight you want to take? The other night I tried to look at Virgin Atlantic reward availability but it didnā€™t let me, maybe because I donā€™t yet have a VA freq flyer acct. Will simply having the account with no miles within it allow one to see reward availability? Thanks for the advice.

Yisroel

Thanks for a quick, but in depth post. You showed all the airline options and their repsective booking options very clearly.
Greatly appreciated. I love such posts

Baron

Why do you write Club cardholders?

SA

United has expanded availability for card-holders (any paid card, if not the free one, too).

Texas Totty

What are good partner options with United?

eli18

Dan I noticed when booking flights recently that AA had availability on Alaska, but no other partners had. Does AA have expanded awards due to their partnership? and is it vice versa?

Avrohom

Hi Dan. What would be the steps if I want to fly to CLE from EWR or PHL. JFK is a bit far for Lakewooders. TY

Don

No jetblue? They’re so easy and cheap no need for 3rd party booking…

VisualLearner

Love this, keep ’em coming @dan ! Nothing like learning through watching!

VisualLearner

@dan have you done a writeup on all the partners you can book through?

BT

Biggest takeaway from the post is that booking UA or DL through partners is pretty much dead no matter how tantalizing the rates are as they simply don’t release many seats to partners.

LG

This is my travel hacking weak spot. This would take me literal hours and I still may not have ended up with the deals you found.

Mendy

@dan do you have any thoughts on points.me ?
is it a good service to use or better to do the legwork alone?

Max

You haven’t mentioned Ethiad for 6k or qantas 7800

APS

LOVE.
DAN YOU ROCK!

My thoughts

Apply that effort and brain power to actually make money, you would be benefiting society more instead of mooching. Just like all those who work so hard to figure out how to stay on government programs, use that energy to respectfully make a parnasah instead of taking from society.

Moish

Got jet lagged just reading the post!

ross

“What are your favorite uses of miles?”

Driving. I just need to compare gas stations, and no one argues about the Doona.

AI

Great Post, Sensei!

Cee

Who transfers to Etihad?

Newbie

Thanks this is super helpful! One question: do airlines ever add partner award availability as time goes on? In other words, if a specific AA flight in February is not bookable on Alaska today, is there a chance it will become available when it gets closer? Or is it a one-way (downhill) street and availability will only decrease as it gets closer to the flight? Trying to figure out if it makes sense to wait.

Kay

Thanks for the great write up, Dan. Much to digest.
Appreciate anyone’s opinion so I can learn how to best compare award.
Example: Cle to DFW
AA wants 8.5k +$5.60 for a red eye flight while alaskaair wants 7.5K+ $19 +$12.50 partner fee for the same flight. How do you valuate which is better value? Thank you!

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