I know Atmos recently changed its policy for lap infant seats from paying 10% of the cash business class fare to paying only taxes & fees. Are there any data points showing it works for Starlux J award seats?

Hey guys! I Booked this incredible first class journey on JAL through American for 115k miles + $80. It’s using The itinerary mentioned below and it seems the first leg is on the 777-300ER and the second on the new a350-1000. This will be my first time on JAL, does anyone have any experience or reccs when flying JAL??

I Want to take full advantage of the perks within the experience… any lounge/seat/amenities I should be aware of and ask for?

SYD-HND ~10 Hours onboard 777-300ER
Seat 1D
Takeoff: 10am
Arrival: 5:30pm

~15 overnight layover in Tokyo

HND-CDG ~13h30min onboard JAL’s Flagship a350-1000
Seat 2A
Takeoff: 8:30am
Arrival: 5pm

Hello, I’m AF for platinum card is coming up and I will not be renewing it as I’ll be traveling Asia for about a year. I have like 180k points and need to transfer them to a partner soon or else they’ll be gone cause I don’t wanna downgrade to the gold just to keep membership rewards points.

I’m looking into the best transfer partner for the best value. I don’t really stay in fancy hotels and hotels in SE Asia are so cheap so the Hilton transfer bonus has no value to me. I was thinking maybe Aeromexico cause they have a 1-1.9 bonus rn and they have some partner airlines in Asia which I could use.

Any advice helps thanks!

The route went on sale today, and doesn't begin flying until May 2027. I was looking at late August/early September, and J seats are 200k-400k per person, one way. I obviously wouldn't pull the trigger until they're at least <100k.

From my very limited understanding, FlyingBlue is pretty random in this regard. But I didn't know if I should be checking daily, or if I shouldn't even bother for a while. I suppose I could set an alert.

Currently weighing two options for a flight to London.

IAH-LHR BA direct J 99k Amex + says $400 but when I click then says $600 (I don’t know what is right). Leaves 3pm arrives 6am. BA 787-10 (not super familiar with BA’s product so idk if that’s their nice product.)

IAH-DFW short hop positioning on United then DFW-BOS-LHR on DL 1st then VS J on a 330neo with a 3 hour layover. 98k total Amex + $250 and its 11am to 7:30am total trip.

Hi all! I’ve been lurking on here for ages living vicariously through you all landing amazing business class tickets.

Now it’s my turn to book my honeymoon and I’m struggling! I have a smorgasbord of points ( ~200k with Capital one and then 20-50k each with delta, United, and Qatar). I’m trying to find 2 tickets from the east coast of us (ideally JFK, EWR, IAD, or BOS) to Tokyo departing March 11 or 12 and returning March 26 or 27.

On AA I’m seeing 109.5k miles each for Economy and 491k for business (AA 167 out, AA 168 return) on the direct flight

With JAL I’m seeing 610k + $1,500 for the direct JFK <> HND route (JL 005 outbound, JL 006 inbound) in Premium Economy

Can someone point me in the best direction for this? I’m really struggling!

Hey everyone!
I’m based in New Jersey and have a pretty good amount of United MileagePlus miles, but unfortunately no American Airlines AAdvantage miles.

My mother-in-law is coming to visit us from Morocco, and I found a Royal Air Maroc flight that requires relatively few AA miles compared to the cash price.

Unfortunately, United miles won’t help me book it.
I’m trying to figure out if there’s any legitimate way to exchange United miles for AA miles, or another creative way to book this flight without paying the full cash fare.
I also have a $500 Southwest travel credit from Chase that I don’t expect to use.

Has anyone dealt with something similar? Are there any legitimate options I’m overlooking?

Appreciate any advice!

Going to Italy for Spring break and was able to get 3 RT Y awards from ATL-FCO for 59,400+$74.49 each. The cash RT fare is $1,426 so that works out to 2.3 CPP. Now, maybe I should factor in the $150 I had to pay to get the 15% points discount with the Gold card but I also got a 40,000 SUB so I call it a wash. The biggest surprise to me was the return leg, if I booked it as a one way it was about double the cost but when I did a RT I was able to get it down to the same cost as the outbound.

This is the third trip I have used my Amex points to get an airline ticket. In order to save on the transfer fee I have transferred to Air Canada (United), KLM (Delta), and now Avianca (United). Each time I've had to make sure the tickets are showing up on my apps. I am adding a pet ticket on this flight and this has turned into a 45 minute procedure because it originated from another country. Anyway, I am wondering is it really worth this hassle. Instead of just transferring straight to United or Delta. Is the fee really that high to go through all this? Everything I read says to do it this way but I just figured out my fee would have been $18. Next time I will just transfer straight to the domestic airline. Am I missing something? Please share your thoughts. Thanks.

Planning on reserving a JFK to DEL and additionally a DEL to JFK, both via Air Canada / Aeroplan. But I came across a thread where Air India tried to deny a passenger on a similar ticket booked via Air Canada / Aeroplan (Origin was DEL) due to myraid reasons but then a supervisor was able to check in that person 2 hours later.

Wanted to check how common this is? Anyone else who had a similar experience, when 1 person is booked via Air Canada / Aeroplan and another directly through Air India (Cash), traveling together.

Looking for SIN -> HAN on Dec 20. Would appreciate it if someone with miles in their account searches it up and shares award availability!

(You need a certain at least 1k in KrisFlyer to search award availability)

I just reported https://www.reddit.com/user/EarCurious1147/ on https://www.reddit.com/r/BotBouncer/ (since they commented https://www.reddit.com/r/awardtravel/comments/1x4lcho/comment/pgeosl6/?context=3 ) and they told me that that user was already banned from BotBouncer communities **6 months ago**. See https://www.reddit.com/r/BotBouncer/comments/1sk77g7/overview_for_earcurious1147/

Per https://www.reddit.com/r/churning/comments/1x3wwka/comment/pge0bih/?force-legacy-sct=1 it seems like r/churning is already having a good experience with BotBouncer.

It's just very tedious dealing with the bots. It's been grinding me down.

I want to talk to humans about flying on points. I don't want to talk to these digital zombies, wearing our flesh and skin, reflecting back at me the consensus of the internet from six months ago.

EDIT:

THANK YOU MODS!!!

FYI: You can still do manual reports to BotBouncer for whichever bots still leak through by pasting their profile URL as a post on /r/BotBouncer (automod will catch and process it)

Looking for advice from anyone who has dealt with this specific LifeMiles issue.

I booked an award ticket for a United-operated flight (SFO \rightarrow AKL) through Avianca LifeMiles. I have the electronic ticket receipt from Avianca showing:

Ticket Number: Starts with 134...

Booking Ref / PNR: 6-character alphanumeric code

Status: Confirmed / Issued

Entering the 6-digit PNR on United’s "My Trips" gives an error / cannot find the reservation.

Entering the 134 eTicket number on United’s site/app also brings up nothing.

United Phone Support says they cannot find any record of the ticket or reservation on their end using my name, flight details, or eTicket number.

Avianca/LifeMiles Support insists that the booking is fully issued and that the United confirmation code is identical to the Avianca PNR, so they "can't do anything else."

Hi everyone,
Looking for some advice from frequent Qatar Airways flyers or anyone who has navigated a tight connection at Hamad International Airport (DOH).
Here is my situation:
Route: SFO to DOH to NBO (Nairobi)

Ticket Type: Business Class (Award Ticket) on a single booking reference

The Change: Qatar updated my flight (QR 738) out of SFO, shifting departure 35 minutes later.

New Schedule:
Arrive DOH at 18:00
Connecting flight (QR 1341 to NBO) departs at 19:00
Layover: Exactly 1 hour

I called Qatar Airways customer service to see if I could proactively move to the next flight to Nairobi (QR 1335 at 2:10 AM). The agent said:

1. Because the time shift was under 45 minutes and the connection is still at/above the 45-min (MCT) for DOH, it’s considered a minor change, so normal change rules apply.
2. Because this is an award ticket and there’s no award availability on the 2:10 AM flight, they can't move me in advance without charging fare differences.
3. The agent mentioned that if my first leg is delayed on the day of travel, the airport transfer desk in Doha would protect/rebook me onto the 2:10 AM flight (and possibly in Business if available).

I have a safari starting in Kenya on arrival day, so I’m trying to balance the risk:
1. How realistic is a 1-hour Business Class transfer at DOH? Since I'll be among the first off the plane and can use the priority transfer line, is 60 minutes doable if SFO departs on time?
2. Luggage risk: What are the odds checked bags make a 60-minute transfer at DOH?
3. If I misconnect: How smooth is the Al Mourjan transfer desk experience for placing misconnected Business Class passengers onto the 2:10 AM flight (or 8:40 AM flight) if award space wasn't open ahead of time?
Would you recommend keeping the itinerary as-is and trusting Qatar's misconnect protection on travel day, or pushing harder/paying to change ahead of time?

Thanks in advance for your insights!

According to DOC

Scammers Stealing Points via Amazon Shop With Points

https://www.doctorofcredit.com/scammers-stealing-points-via-amazon-shop-with-points/

Hi my partner are planning a trip to the Maldives for the first time. I was planning on doing a Hyatt hotel (got the points with their credit card) but looking PH only offers hotel rooms and we are dead set on an over water villa. I have the chase card, cap 1 and Amex points. We have around 200k on each card. We are going first week in July. What are resorts you would recommend? We want to stay for 5-6days, but I’m finding it hard to narrow down a resort that also has a night free. Budget under $10k. Debating all inclusive just because my partner can drink a lot and if drinks are $20 each we each easily have 10-20 drinks a day. We also want this to me a memorable experience, lots of water activities (which I hear is expensive). Appreciate any advice

Asiana is leaving Star Alliance at the end of this year.

Searching J-class redemptions for YYZ to INC only shows AC flights (and some economy-only United bookings). Are there any viable partner redemptions for next year?

I built a new tool: Qatar Airways Award Fee Checker

Qatar Airways is annoying in that it hides the taxes and fees on award flights if you don't have enough Avios in your account. Now you can quickly see the taxes and fees for your route before transferring Avios over.

Just plug in any two airports Qatar flies to and it shows the one-way cash cost in economy, business (Qsuites) and first, nonstop or connecting in Doha. For example, New York (JFK) to Bangkok through Doha is $163.90 in economy and $288.90 in business, and London (LHR) to Doha is $273.25 in economy and $527.15 in business.

It's free and you don't need an account. It's only Qatar Airways Privilege Club pricing and the numbers are estimates for 2027 travel, so they might be off by a few dollars. If you see any big discrepancies (>$5), let me know and I'll fix it. Hope it's useful!

Hi all!

I have some odd ANA award travel situations I wanted to get some feedback on. My wife and I are returning to Japan in February 2027 and have been working to try to secure some more comfortable seats than our first trip. I stranded like 400k Amex miles, which was mildly irresponsible, to try to do this. We've never flown lay-flat international, so we've been looking forward to it.

I am aware of the highly limited drops of J and F tickets a year out from departure. However, we were not able to participate as our schedule didn't clear up to confirm our trip until ~T+300. Accordingly, I have waitlisted us basically everywhere in the US to try to acquire lay-flat seats. I also have seats.aero alerts set up and manually check most routes daily. I check the wait-list sizes, and most first class have 2-3 waitlisted, and 10+ for J.

While we waited, I also secured round trip premium economy tickets out of ORD. We are ATL-based so will need to reposition regardless, but ATL has flights everywhere.

Then, about a month ago, by some miracle my aero alert went off and I was able to secure 1F one-way out of SFO. No idea how, considering it didn't go through waitlist, but I'm ticketed. It is the old product (despite the day before being the new product) but I don't mind.

The focus now shifts to getting another seat for my wife. She has said she'd be fine with 1J (all husbands know this is sort of dangerous... But she says it's fine).

I have the option to burn effectively all my remaining miles at a terrible rate to exchange to ANA's Sky Coins (their eCredits) and pay the cash rate on a business class seat, which would lock her in and avoid the wait-list gamble.This would make our lives easier and allow us to book our repositioning leg now and consider the flights entirely taken care of. However, it requires me to hunt for our return leg again, and probably ensures we'll be flying economy home (maybe Premium if we're lucky).

So... What would you do? I don't think there's a right answer, just curious.

Option 1 - Abandon the hope of 2F, 2J, or 1F 1J, take the locked-in Premium Economy seats, book a repositioning leg to ORD now, and spend the stranded ANA miles on fun but inefficient redemptions to make the Japan trip more enjoyable like restaurants and hotels.

Option 2 - Cancel the ORD round-trip, burn almost all your ANA miles to Sky Coins, use the coins to pay cash for 1J, and enjoy a really nice outbound flight to Japan in separate cabins, but probably be in economy or premium economy on the way back.

Option 3 - Keep all current bookings and play the T+14 or waitlist game. Hope we either get lucky on 1F or 1J out of SFO (or 2F/J somewhere else). Accept that the positioning flight will be booked very late, and likely expensive. I have ~150k SkyMiles to mitigate the cost.

Thanks for your time and thoughtfulness!

title. seats.aero renewal coming up, bought first time during black friday sale last year. is it possible to cancel renewal and wait for sale again to get discounted pricing again? having trouble quantifying the service's value.

booked around 8 one way award travels (LAX TPE or TPE LAX starlux biz) last year: 4 by camping T+330 drop, 2 by dumb luck during periodic checks, and 2 indirectly due to an aero notification for something else.

if this was you guys, would you consider the service worth it? thanks for any insight

Want to travel YYZ-TPE, have 2 choices:

YYZ-DEL on AI J (new dreamliner ?)

5.5h layover in DEL

DEL-TPE on BR A330 J

102.5K Aeroplan

Or

YYZ-SEA on AS Y

6h layover in SEA

SEA-TPE in JX A350 J

85K Atmos

I have 10x more Aeroplan than Atmos

What airline is everyone using for award flights now that Airfrance has stopped service? Is United the only player at the moment? I have capital one and chase and am trying to figure out the best transfer airlines. Interested to hear everyone’s techniques!

300k + $1800 / 2ppl lie-flat business JFK-CDG, CDG-JRO. 

Thanks to this sub! Thought I’d share as a datapoint since there isn’t so much out there on stopovers and AF is changing so much this year. 

Been tracking JFK/JRO via CDG business since March, for late Sept/early Oct. 2027 travel. Back in June, took advantage of the 25% AmEx transfer bonus to total 230k, the going price for 2ppl at the time. 

As everything started to shift w/ FB, kept focused on “Standard,” since economy is a nope and while the “Flex” is cheaper w/ taxes, wasn’t going to spend that many miles. Meanwhile the award price had jumped to 295k. Right at the end of September, it edged up to 298k, 299k, and then 300k. (Also, they seem to have added 2 more weekly flights on the CDG-JRO leg: Usually Tue, Thur, Sun; adding Monday & Friday, but Fridays weren’t showing up as affordable at all). It certainly wasn’t going down, since there was still availability at those prices throughout August. 

We set on a Tue. exit, 24 hours in Paris, and the Thurs. flight to JRO. The Thurs. leg finally opened up showing a 299k total availability, and I braced myself for an agonizing phone call. 

I was on the phone for only 24 minutes. 

Likely helped calling on a weekday, mid-afternoon in Paris. Agent put me on hold to make the booking, while I transferred the necessary AmEx points —having JUST realized the day before that the 25% bonus was back! Paid the taxes (ouch), done, ticketed.