Booked my first ANA round the world ticket for April 2025 for 4 mostly business class tickets, 17 to 18 days expected, booked a dummy return in economy with the hope I can change it as availability rolls around

Called 18002359262 at 6 am Pacific, on hold for 45 minutes, connected to agent in LA

YYZ-LIS on TP J
LIS-OPO on TP J
OPO-IST-HKG TK J
HKG-PEK CA J
PEK-HND CA J
HND-YVR NH Y (pending date change)

Total travel distance is 17880 miles which matches the expert flyer travel info calculated sector mileage output exactly (free 5 day trial). https://ibb.co/gynCXb4 GCMap shows 17909 for the same

Total cost 105k ANA miles, total taxes around $1350 USD per person for the adults and $1300 per person for the children

Notes:

Transferred 420k points from spouse's Amex US, took around 2 days to show up.

I added my account info and the kids info to ANA family member registry prior to calling. You must be married or related to redeem for others on your account, although I have not been asked to show proof with my marriage certificate or kids birth certificates yet

On the call P2 did not need to verify, agent was able to validate using my info as I had been added as spouse already

Used ANA multi city to do most of my searches as I assumed they would most accurately reflect what agents see. I stopped using points.me pro as rare availability I find got snapped up soon after multiple times (coincidental or others using my cached results?)

Tap Portugal: found a lot more availability on Ana multi city compared to air Canada Aeroplan. Saw 4J and 4Y out of YYZ and YUL on multiple dates that air Canada was showing 1J or 0J and 4Y, and still too far out for United calendar to cross check. Luckily was bookable and not phantom availability

Also, TP YQ on ita matrix showed significantly lower rates ex Canada on one way tickets than ex US ($423 USD YQ vs $744 USD YQ), which was why I chose to start and stop in Canada rather than my backup origin and destination of New York or Boston and Seattle on dates that Aeroplan also showed 4J. I don't know if it made a difference in the end or not

Turkish airlines: a lot of married segment logic, many routes are not possible searched segment by segment, agent was able to see TK when searching OPO-HKG, but not OPO-IST, IST-HKG in business for the exact same flights without a stopover. Even then my preferred date errored out on their end saying sales limit exceeded so I had to shift to another date. Original date still shows up as available on Ana and Aeroplan though. Will try again later.

Air China: substantial availability in business between HKG and PEK on both narrow body and wide body. Also saw 4F available which I think is the same as long haul J on Cathay. PEK to HND only business class I could see was on the wide body A333

Also, availability was affected by point of sale. Noticed that PEK-HND is available for 4J and 4Y when searching on Ana US English website, but only 4Y available when doing the same on the Japan English website. It also took the LA agent a refresh and see the 4J PEK to HND which was a bit concerning. Could not confirm if which call center and fare desk you get connected to might be impacted by this.

Agent also mentioned CA also requires passport info on ticketing so I had to have that on hand as well, but I will call back to get it changed when a passport gets replaced in the meantime (a few renewals need to be done between now and next April)

ANA: from what I've read NH releases 1J on most routes to the US and Canada, but also they seem to release 4Y daily. I wanted them all to be ticketed together in economy first because from prior experience Turkish airlines availability is super finicky and the moment you book a reservation for one day the rest of the availability on the same flight has a chance to disappear even if you didn't use it all up. So I grabbed 4 seats on all flights for now with the intention to move the NH flight later as it opens up, and then grab single NH business class seats as I see them

For routes that have multiple flights a day by the same carrier, confirmed with agent that I am able to change the time and date so it doesn't have to be the same flight number, just keep the carrier and route the same. This mostly affects intra Europe and intra Asia as Lisbon to Porto has like 7 to 9 flights a day available and Hong Kong to Beijing had maybe 4 to 6 flights available

Even with all the reading on Flyertalk and Reddit, there was so many edge cases that I couldn't find an answer to, so I hope the above contributes to future generations so that they wouldn't have to struggle as much as I did trying to find out

My itinerary can be mostly replicated on Aeroplan for around 95k Canada to Hong Kong with Lisbon stop and another 80k maybe for Hong Kong to Canada with Tokyo stop plus I'm guessing $300 to $400 USD in total taxes and airport fees so it's about a $900 USD vs 70000 AmEx points trade off assuming no transfer bonus in addition to the pros and cons of changes and cancellation fees of each program. In this case the additional TP seats available to Ana and no NH seats at all on Aeroplan made me lean this direction

Best of luck to everybody else attempting this.

Looking to book some travel to Japan next year!

Does anyone have recommendations on the best award tools to search ANA availability? The ANA website isn't great, and its tiring to check so many airports day by day for business/first class space. Do any tools like seats.aero or roame show ANA space?

I have been building my points in preparation of taking one last longer trip before my responsibilities change and I’ll have to take a few year break from anything too crazy. My points are diversified and so I’m open to any brand.

My problem is I have analysis paralyses right now, I’m confident in my ability to get a flight pretty much anywhere but I have no idea where I actually want to go. My initial thoughts include Japan (I know, typical), Vietnam, Australia, New Zealand. Thought about Africa but I might save that trip. Might make it an RTW trip so I’m open to anything.

So my question for this community is what was your best experience you’ve ever had anywhere in the world on an award stay?

To start the discussion I’ll add a few of my own:

Recently, WA Beverly Hills, this was my first WA experience and I was impressed. I would probably put this as my favorite city hotel now. Everything service related was perfect which I usually have at least one complaint about city hotels. Will certainly check out other WA properties after this one.

Spent my honeymoon at SR Maldives and only a couple resorts have even come close to this experience. I loved the large deck and specifically requested a room with total privacy, probably the best week of my life.

Mandapa (RC Reserve) was another that really stood out to me. I paid for an upgrade to a villa with rice field view and I think this was my favorite hotel room ever.

And last one I’ll mention is Al Maha (Luxury collection) this was one of my most unique stays and one of the few that I really want to do again. It was my first time in a desert and was even better than I expected.

These ones made it truly special, but not to leave out Hyatt I’ve done PH NY, PH SK, Alila Napa, and Alila Uluwatu. All great but slightly below what I mentioned above.

Taking the kids (9 and 5) to NYC for their first time. Any tips on hotels that don't have tiny rooms (really just need two queens) and are a good deal on pints?

Hi I am an elite status member via Miles and Smiles and want to make use of the opportunity to gift the status to another person. I am unable to find any info on how to do it. Can someone who’s done this please help?

Does JAL have one combined bucket of award space that they release to all one world members, or does each individual alliance member get a certain amount (cx gets some, aa gets some, ba gets some etc)? I want to book with aa as they have lowest taxes/fees for me, but I know they’re available much later than cx/ba. Wondering if aa has their own dedicated award tickets that won’t get taken by other airlines before aa even releases. Thanks!

I'll be traveling to Europe this fall and my last stop will be in Munich in September. I saw a flight on United that was direct for 30,000 points and $130 back to EWR, but was too late to pull the trigger. The flight direct back is now 40,000 points and $130

I know this sub loves FRA back to JFK on Singapore, but that flight leaves at 830am, which is a bit too early to get there from Munich, so that's not in an option

I did, however, find a flight on KLM in Economy that goes through Paris for 20,000 points on and $240 in fees that gets in at a reasonable time despite have a 3 hour layover. The fees are a bit steep, but this feels typical for KLM.

Any idea if this is a good deal or not? What's the best way to compare a 40,000 point flight with $130 in taxes vs a 20,000 point flight with $240 in taxes?

Have been searching flights Toronto to Tokyo and just saw there are 5 J seats on Lufthansa available two weeks from now. It’s also a reasonable number of points each. Have we seen this many J seats on this route before? How come we only talk ANA / JAL / AA for flying to Japan and not Lufthansa?

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Hi All,

New to this community, and wanted to quickly ask your thoughts on the below Virgin Atlantic redemption in Upper Class (business).

Granted Virgin Atlantic has high fees, would you consider this to be a good point redemption? I’d be taking advantage of the 30% transfer bonus from AMEX (totals below are already reduced 30%).

Early 2025

LAX-LHR-CPT 87.5K points

JNB-LHR-LAX 87.5K points

Let me know your thoughts! Curious if this is typically the “best” rate, or maybe you’ve seen a better deal with another carrier (open to other carriers, as long as I can transfer from AMEX).

Hi, I am looking to redeem 50k miles + 254 Euros for a business (J) ticket from Rome to Toronto on Air France. Due to certain uncertainties, I need the cancellation policy to be reasonable. The policy states that a 70 Euro cancellation charge applies. In the event that I cancel, does this mean that I will be refunded the miles (50,000) and the tax amount minus the cancellation charge (so, 184 Euros) or something else?

Thanks!

Hoping to find a little help/push to just book this dang flight already 😂 I’m very new to this so I’m worried I am missing something while researching flights. I have fixed dates in November and only 115k Chase points. I know that will only get me there one way, but I’m not sure what’s the best option. United is currently offering 110k+$10(for two) direct flights. It appears that there is no fee to transfer my chase points to United,right? It’s just a 1:1 transfer and I’ll wake up tomorrow with the 110k points in United miles? I’ve checked aeroplan and the price is basically the same +$60. Does United seem like a good deal? With my budget, the portal shows that round trip with two super long flights will be around $2500 and I’ll lose a day because of the layover. This would mean about 1100$ cash, which I think would be comparable to buying a pair of one way flights back to NYC I’m just looking at economy- don’t care too much about the flight back since I’ll be saving some time and a flight w a layover isn’t too terrible price wise on Google flights.

I've got a bunch of Delta SkyMiles and I don't have any specific trip plans to use them up. My home airport is a smaller regional airport but well connected to MSP, DTW and ATL. Is there a subscription service that will tell me when there are good SkyMiles deals from one airport to anywhere? I think that spontaneously using my miles on decent deals will be the best option for me.

Is it just me or are they not displaying the points, and the orange promo on their calendar?

Hey Folks, my Avios points have been sitting around for over 10 years. I am looking fo OW flights and yesterday I notice there were 7 PE seats on AA from LAX to HND using Avios. Today, it's all gone, however when I checked AA miles awards, it's still available for that date. Do I need to call BA to book over the phone? I'm fairly new to the flight points game, just been paying cash for my flights and have never flown anything besides economy.

I'm actually happy flying Economy Plus on a lot of carriers. On BA it's great. I've never booked award flights and I'm starting to plan my first trip. Do Economy Plus (or equivalent below-Business but above basic economy) seats have better availability than Business? Are they significantly cheaper in points that Business? Do I not need to book 361 days ahead?

Any opinions on JAL versus HA for Honolulu to Tokyo business class? Putting together a (non-award) trip for September. It looks like the JAL slight it bookable through HA for the same price, so I'm curious about the differences in quality of hard and soft product

Is this double?

This isn’t a lazy city suggestion post!…but curiosity in experience post.

We (P1/P2) decided to go to Europe from EWR/JFK on 5/24ish for a week. I am seeing good availability for LHR as always and some other stragglers.

Knowing I can get anywhere from LHR I’m considering pulling the trigger and flying E to another country after. But if I can avoid LHR taxes, I will.

Edit: avoid not afforded taxes/fees

TL;DR; would you settle for J to LHR now for weekend of 5/24 to avoid risk, or wait til 10 days out for more award space to a preferred location and avoid taxes.

Unrelated: British Airways has $500 in tax and 89K F one way, but it’s a short flight. Anyone ever do it? May consider for my first F experience!

Thank you

I've created an Excel spreadsheet to calculate the point value when transferring credit card points (e.g., American Express Membership Rewards points) to an airline frequent flyer program to book a rewards flight.

I'm wondering if this would be something that others would be interested in, and if so, how I can share it. I'm relatively new to reddit, so I don't know if I can attach a file? If not, I could possibly provide an iCloud link to the spreadsheet. Is there a better approach.

Anyway, here's how the spreadsheet works. You input the number of miles required on the airline for the flight you're looking at, the fee surcharge to book the flight, and the current transfer rate from Amex points to frequent flyer miles (e.g., with AeroMexico, there's a deal where 1,000 points equals 1,920 miles, so you would enter 1.92).

You also input how much it would cost if you paid for the flight outright. This would be the flight you would otherwise purchase if you didn't use frequent flyer miles.

The calculator determines the number of Amex points you need, and then determines the value of each point as the cost if you would pay for the flight that you otherwise would purchase minus the fee surcharge for using frequent flyer miles to get the reward flight, divided by the number of Amex points needed to get the frequent flyer miles.

I think this is the best way to determine the value of an Amex point, because it's the value to you -- i.e., considering the flight that you would otherwise purchase if you didn't use frequent flyer miles.

I also set it up so you can figure out the value per point if you wanted to have separate reward flight tickets for each leg of the flight.

E.g., say you want to go from Minneapolis to Madrid. If you didn't use frequent flyer miles, you may just buy a ticket on Delta, say from Mpls to Madrid (with a connection in Amsterdam, etc.).

However, you can "price out" the value of each Amex point if you booked one reward ticket on Virgin Atlantic from Mpls to London (at 1.30 miles per Amex pt at the current bonus level), and another reward ticket on Iberia from London to Madrid (at 1 mile per Amex pt).

Note that the spreadsheet only calculates the value of each Amex point for you -- you still have to enter the miles required, fee surcharges, etc., and thus you have to first go to the various web sites to get this information.

Wanted to get a quick sanity check to see if I'm missing anything here.

Planning on a last minute trip with P2 to Switzerland this summer, we already have return flights booked.

I've been monitoring close in booking for SFO/LAX to ZRH and the pattern seems to be that LH opens up award space T-3 days. I see that UA has some space as well but with the news that they're going to restrict partner award space I'm not holding my breath.

I plan on booking 2 LH Y award flights via Aeroplan for our dates and monitor J award space to see if we can snag 2 J when time gets closer.

I'm aware that this will incur a $200 change fee ($100/ea) but I'm willing to take this loss for peace of mind.

Am I missing anything here? I should be able to call Aeroplan and they can make this change without any headaches since it's a relatively simple change? This is my first time doing a close in booking so I'm feeling a bit anxious :)

Thanks!

So I looked around and found a UA flight that I would like to book and double checked with Air Canada and it's actually there.

I know you should to be able to book award flights through Turkish Airlines Smile&Miles but I look online everything says "Not available" and I've read that you can book it over the phone if the award is available to other Start Alliance partners so just wondering if it's true or if anyone has anymore insight on this.

Thanks in advance~

I'm planning my first visit to Paris and would like to book an award stay with 320K HH points, where I can take advantage of book four nights with points, get one night free. I'm considering the following options given the amount of Hilton Honors points that I have:

• Niepce Paris Hotel, Curio Collection by Hilton
• Hotel Camille Paris Gare de Lyon, Tapestry Collection by Hilton
• Hilton Garden Inn Paris La Villette

Which Hilton hotel above would be the best choice for a first-time tourist visiting Paris? Qualities that I am considering for comparison are room quality, location, and services and facilities.

I previously asked a variant of this question when I was considering Marriott hotels, but now I am looking at Hilton hotels instead.

Thanks!

Hi - hoping more experienced flyers can advise.

Am flying Cathay Pacific so downloaded their app to make online check in etc. easier. BUT they automatically issued me an Asia Miles account. 

I had wanted the miles earned to go to my BA Avios (my account is noted on the booking). In anyone’s experience, is this all good and normal - or do I need to cancel this Cathay Pacific account?

I spoke to their customer services who said it’s fine but then kept prompting me to delete my Cathay account which makes me uncertain.

Seats.aero is goated. Got 1 80k sfo-HND next feb.

Need to get a second ticket for my gf but I’ll book her business if that’s the only option for points. I’m so freaking pumped. It’s not the a350 but it’s still JAL first!

Curious if anyone’s figured out a way to travel as a family using business class award seats. Exploring Japan in 2026, and considering two paths:

1. ANA - rack up Aeroplan points, then book business class on ANA searching for seats 355 days ahead. Two are rare, one is common. Aim to book two on one flight, two on another flight, if the outbound and inbound dates align. Yes will fly to the US to position better.

2. JAL - book through BA (have 300K Avios already) but economy for four.

I’m thinking we may need to do economy and travel together? Kids will be aged 5 and 3 when do we do travel. And yes I realize the world wants to go to Japan and I shouldn’t aim high here, but I’ve started research 2 years in advance. Bonus question: which tool has the closest interface to cowtool? I haven’t found an immediate alternative and haven’t subscribed to points.me yet. Thank you.

Booked ticket through Amex that had my Alaska number attached and loaded in the Alaska app. Should I contact someone for the transpacific segment of my trip?

Hello,

I am looking to book an award flight on Virgin Atlantic and here is the situation. With cash, I see an option which has a 5 hr layver in LHR and when checking with points, it only shows a 9hr layover option at LHR.

Both the flights have the exact same cost when paying just using cash. I am trying to see if there is a way to use the points and get the 5 hr layover ticket. One way I am thinking is to book the ticket using the 9hr layover option and then call Virgin to check if I can switch the flight to the other option (maybe by paying some more cash).

Does anyone know if Virgin allows this or if anyone has ideas on how can I achieve the desired outcome using points?

Apologies if this information is available in the sidebar/wiki - I didn't have any luck searching for it. I'm looking to book 2 last minute award seats from SFO to ICN. I have flexibility on my side and am willing to wait to book something for a good value. I have plenty of Amex points, so ANA to Tokyo through VA with a cheap economy flight seems like a good option (many saver award seats on ANA J seem to be available last minute), but is there any other more direct options that anyone can recommend? I'm very new to award travel/appreciate all the knowledge you folks have here. TIA

I primarily use LGA and JFK for flights to FLL/PBI/MIA, but I don't like JetBlue's dynamic pricing. Should I use Qatar Airways rewards booking for all of my JetBlue and oneworld partner flights? I'm willing to move whatever I need back and forth from credit cards, BA, Iberia, etc.

Was trying to book a AF flight via Virgin and all of a sudden the flight disappeared. Called Virgin and spoke with a representative who said there was a “technical issue” and all AF/KLM flights have been removed from the system and that they cannot even see them. Anyone have any clarity on what the issue is?