Serendipity
Newbie
- Joined
- Jun 16, 2011
- Posts
- 4
Version:1.0 StartHTML:0000000105 EndHTML:0000004824 StartFragment:0000001918 EndFragment:0000004788Hi, I’m a newby to this site (I can’t believe I didn’t know it existed) and need some help with dividend miles. Apologies if I’ve posted in the wrong place or if this type of question has already been answered.
On the weekend someone told me about dividend miles and I thought whoo hoo – I’m going to Turkey in March and wouldn’t it be fabulous to fly J Class.
I went to the US Airways site and registered myself and my daughter (aged 11) as members. I saw that after 12 days I could buy up to 50,000 miles for $1350 and would receive a bonus 50,000 miles. All good. I could use them on Star Alliance flights Thai/ Singapore and Turkish airlines.
Then the problems started. There was no way on the site I could see what award flights would be available as I was starting the trip from Australia. And I also couldn’t find out how many miles would be required for my itinerary. So I resorted to calling the USA and after 25 minutes on the phone I was eventually told it would cost 120,000 miles for a trip Melbourne/ Bangkok/ Istanbul return in J class but such a trip couldn’t be booked online. I would have to call the US for anything I wanted to book. The operator had a look and told me she could get us there but couldn’t get us home.
It seems to me a catch 22 – there is no point in buying miles if you can’t use them and it’s almost impossible to find out if you can use them!
As the trip was 120,000 miles, I would have to buy an additional 20,000 miles (which I assume is possible). This would make the total cost of the trip $1,900 (plus taxes ?) which is great so I’m persevering!
How have you all got around this problem? Am I doing anything wrong? What am I missing!!!
Should I just forget it and book an Emirates economy ticket!
All advice gratefully received.
On the weekend someone told me about dividend miles and I thought whoo hoo – I’m going to Turkey in March and wouldn’t it be fabulous to fly J Class.
I went to the US Airways site and registered myself and my daughter (aged 11) as members. I saw that after 12 days I could buy up to 50,000 miles for $1350 and would receive a bonus 50,000 miles. All good. I could use them on Star Alliance flights Thai/ Singapore and Turkish airlines.
Then the problems started. There was no way on the site I could see what award flights would be available as I was starting the trip from Australia. And I also couldn’t find out how many miles would be required for my itinerary. So I resorted to calling the USA and after 25 minutes on the phone I was eventually told it would cost 120,000 miles for a trip Melbourne/ Bangkok/ Istanbul return in J class but such a trip couldn’t be booked online. I would have to call the US for anything I wanted to book. The operator had a look and told me she could get us there but couldn’t get us home.
It seems to me a catch 22 – there is no point in buying miles if you can’t use them and it’s almost impossible to find out if you can use them!
As the trip was 120,000 miles, I would have to buy an additional 20,000 miles (which I assume is possible). This would make the total cost of the trip $1,900 (plus taxes ?) which is great so I’m persevering!
How have you all got around this problem? Am I doing anything wrong? What am I missing!!!
Should I just forget it and book an Emirates economy ticket!
All advice gratefully received.
