If you have a co-branded American Airlines credit card, such as the Aviator Red MasterCard, the Citi AAdvantage Executive World Elite MasterCard or the Citi AAdvantage Platinum Select MasterCard, you can get 7,500 miles off the usual round trip price of 25,000 miles per domestic
saver award if you are heading to a city on this rotating monthly list.
You can also upgrade your flight to the First Class
Saver award if you call reservations at least 26 hours before your flight departure.
Not exact matches
In order to get the most value from your miles, you need to do everything possible to find these rare
saver awards, and consider saving your miles
if only the so - called standard
awards are available.
If you have any of these cards, you will have access to additional
saver level economy
award space.
The reason we say «
if you could» is because finding a Delta
Saver non-stop
award to Israel in any class of service is an adventure, and you shouldn't count on it.
Additionally, even
if your goal happens to be short flights on American Airlines within the U.S., AA has sharply reduced their
saver award space (which is the space open to partners such as British Airways) so Avios are less useful for those
awards.
If you are flexible and think you can always score the limited
Saver level seats from airlines, then you can earn even higher
awards.
While Delta SkyMiles can be tough to use for booking
award flights to Australia because of incredibly high redemption rates, your miles can be useful
if you find
saver level
award space.
Do you know
if this needs to be a
saver - level
award or anytime?
Although Delta doesn't publish its
award chart, it's easy to figure out what the lowest (
saver) price for a particular route is, and, especially
if you plan your travel a few months in advance, Delta can be generous when it comes to releasing space in the economy cabin.
You can get a 20 % discount on miles used for
saver awards flights
if you book by 3/14/18 11:59 pm CST and travel between 4/9/2018 and 5/20/2018.
If you have any of these cards, you will have access to additional
saver level economy
award space.
Second, United only shows the lowest
award rate, which doesn't tell you
if this is the best («
Saver»)
award rate to your destination.
Using yesterday's example,
if there were no
Saver level
awards on AA we would be stuck without a flight to book with BA Avios.
However,
if you can find
award space on Virgin Atlantic and a separate
saver level
award for a connecting flight, there is a way to make this work.
Downgrade to the Chase MileagePlus Card (no Explorer in the name) and you'll still have [ever so slightly] expanded domestic
saver level Economy
award availability, no fee, and the ability to switch back to the $ 95 annual fee Explorer card
if your travel patterns change in the future.
Pretty much everyone who belongs to a frequent - flyer program is familiar with the ubiquitous 12,500 - mile domestic
saver one - way
award on airlines such as United and American, but what
if I told you that you could fly on that very same domestic flight, operated by those very same U.S. - based airlines, for only 7,500 miles?
If Global Services member books a cash ticket, she or he may bring along a companion for the cost of a
saver level
award ticket.
If you use manufactured spend to put $ 20,000 in purchases on these cards, you'll have a total of 160,000 miles instead and that is enough for two First Class
Saver awards (40,000 miles per person each way).
If you're able to find
saver level
award space on the dates you need, the process of searching and booking is pretty straightforward and can be completed entirely online.
If Saver Award space is available on United Airlines, you could transfer 25,000 miles to Singapore Airlines» KrisFlyer program to book the United flight.
The reason we say «
if you could» is because finding a Delta
Saver non-stop
award to Israel in any class of service is an adventure, and you shouldn't count on it.
If you happen to find
saver level
award space on American Airlines, Avios are also great for short flights within the U.S.
While finding
saver level business class
award space on Hawaiian Airlines can be very tough, there are lots of routes with lie - flat seats
if you can find the space.
If the lowest cost roundtrip available is 50,000, then the return flight costs 30,000 miles and is therefore a
Saver award.
Use
if: Singapore Airlines allows one free stopover on a round - trip
Saver flight (or 2 free on a Standard
Award flight), which will allow you to visit a new destination.
But I don't have good experience finding SuperSaver
award space and couldn't determine
if this discount also applies to more common
Saver awards.
but,
if you can find a Business Class United
Saver award for dates that work for you, it would set you back just 120,000 miles + taxes.
I do think Hawaiian has good service
if you've never tried them before, but
awards from North America to Hawaii are 20,000 miles one - way at the SuperSaver level, and you're more likely to find them at the 30,000
Saver level.
It is true you may have to spend more miles to fly on a peak date than an off - peak date, but it can be done, and
if you use some strategy you can sometimes fly home for the holidays at the lower,
saver award level.
If you're lucky enough to find a
saver award on United it will cost you 150,000 miles + taxes and, in this sale, the miles would cost $ 3,375.
Currently,
if you want to fly from New York City to Miami for Thanksgiving, there are no United
saver awards available
if you fly out on the day before Thanksgiving and return home that following Sunday as those are the peak travel dates.
You will still want to book as early as possible to ensure you can get one of the low - cost
Saver Awards, but, this is one less way you can get nickel - and - dimed by the airlines
if you can not book a flight until the last - minute.
Finding
Saver Award availability with Delta is always an adventure, especially during the summer, so don't get upset
if you cant find anything for the dates you want.
If you can find
saver space on Delta, you can get a round trip business class
award within US for 45,000 miles.
You can only book American
award flights on Alaska
if American has
saver award availability for these flights.
If off - peak,
saver award availability is there, it automatically prices out at the lower rates on aa.com.
If you can see that an award you'd like to book is available right now (or if your research tells you that the award you're looking to book isn't scarce) then buying miles at 1.72 cents each may be a good money saver..
If you can see that an
award you'd like to book is available right now (or
if your research tells you that the award you're looking to book isn't scarce) then buying miles at 1.72 cents each may be a good money saver..
if your research tells you that the
award you're looking to book isn't scarce) then buying miles at 1.72 cents each may be a good money
saver....
In peak season things can be different —
if you can find
award availability points can be a money
saver.
If you manage to fins the unicorn that is an international long - haul Business Class
saver award on American Airlines this us what the costs look like:
As stated,
award availability for (
saver) business class to New Zealand on United is not great and you'll need to book far in advance
if you want to even have a chance to snag redemptions with business class seats between the US and Australia / New Zealand.
If you fly United, that's enough for a roundtrip business class ticket from North America to Europe on a
Saver Award and enough for two round trips from North America to Europe in economy on a
Saver Award.
If you can find
Saver Award availability on United.com with 2 or fewer connections then you can book the same flight over the phone.
If these flights area available as a
Saver Award on United.com then you will be able to call in and book the flight using Miles & More miles.
If you really need a flight on a specific date and
saver level space isn't available, cardholders also have guaranteed access to standard level
award space.
Fortunately,
if you have the United MileagePlus Explorer card, you have access to more
saver level
awards.
My family's favorite vacation destination is Hawaii, and via their own version of a «Cyber Monday» offering, United is making it 20 % cheaper to get there on miles
if you book a roundtrip economy
saver award by December 8th and travel between January 7 — March 10, 2018.
None of the changes to
award fees can be classified as good news for travelers, especially
if you're booking
saver level
awards — why would you do anything else?!
Yes, you still have to pay fees with Iberia, and they're much more than those typically tied to United
award flights, but
if there's no availability in business class through other alliances, it might be worth it to you to pay the fee to get your business class
saver tickets.
However, finding a Delta
saver non-stop
award to Israel in any class of service is an adventure, and you can only book a partner's flight
if it has a
saver award available.