Get me on a First Class long haul flight before I turn 25!!!

[Happy Dude]

5 per year: I think that is poor advice to a 21 year old as they would run too great a risk of creating a poor credit record. And at 21 they are just starting out in independent life. The OP needs to appreciate that life is a balancing act and that they need to look after all aspects of their life, and that some long-termthinking is just as necessary as short-term benefits.. Investing in memories through travel is highly recommended but not at the price of risking financial handicaps. They may be seeking home or investment loans in not that long a time and so do not want a poor credit rating.

By all means they can take some credit card sign on bonii (though at 21 their income may limit them from getting the best deals). I would suggest that they focus on the ones that for them are best value, but not to overdo things. Churning many many cards is best done later once you have a number of financial aspects in place.

Agreed +100. Chasing a few points to spend a day at the pointy end at the risk of ruining your credit record is very silly.

 

[CaptJCool]

Someone mentioned USA. And yea only Bus class but worth a look http://www.australianfrequentflyer..../qf-akl-lax-j-return-77922-2.html#post1502341

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Ooo Okay! I didn't realise the UA is return price that's unreal.
What's the top up option with LM? Is that referring to the pay for only 40% of the miles straight up thing??
Sorry, I'm a rookie haha

In order to use your Lifemiles for an award you only need your acccount balance to have 40% of the required number of miles. The additional miles can be bought on the spot to top up to the full award price. There is a sliding scale for the top up points prices, but at the 50-60% max top up range the cost works out to 1.5c per mile - the same as when buying at a 100% bonus.

Advantage? When the next 100% bonus is on you only need to buy 40% of the points. You save cash at the time. Then when you go to ticket you fork out more cash. For a Lifemiles 50K award to Tokyo you'd need 20K base miles. 40K for the return.

 

[brown891]

In order to use your Lifemiles for an award you only need your acccount balance to have 40% of the required number of miles. The additional miles can be bought on the spot to top up to the full award price. There is a sliding scale for the top up points prices, but at the 50-60% max top up range the cost works out to 1.5c per mile - the same as when buying at a 100% bonus.

Advantage? When the next 100% bonus is on you only need to buy 40% of the points. You save cash at the time. Then when you go to ticket you fork out more cash. For a Lifemiles 50K award to Tokyo you'd need 20K base miles. 40K for the return.

Yep I'm with ya now. Thanks for that. Now I wait for a LM or UA promotion! Meanwhile start brainstorming routes I would want to take!

Someone mentioned USA. And yea only Bus class but worth a look http://www.australianfrequentflyer..../qf-akl-lax-j-return-77922-2.html#post1502341

Yeah I saw, is a good find but yes looking to go straight into First class for the moment haha

 

[junbugging]

For a Lifemiles 50K award to Tokyo you'd need 20K base miles.

Yes, but better if you have 21K.

 

[lovetravellingoz]

WOW! She's done a great job. How did she manage that?!

A mixture.

- Yes cc sign on bonii .....but not 5 per year She has just picked up the better offers that have come along rather than every offer.
- CC spend
- WOW while it lasted
- bonus point cc promos
- stacking points by buying via online portals through various airlines and particularly when bonus point special were on too (ie the lead up the Xmas etc)
- paid flights including a few work ones. Mainly domestic, but she just had her first international work trip trip to Japan for 2 weeks flying on SQ via SIN each way.
- bonus points here and there for surveys etc

 

[andyhui01]

Do you have any interest and time to start a side business? Lots of AFF's including myself get virtually all my points from CC Spend (I average 30-50k Velocity points/ Month) and hit my 1,000,000 points cap on my CBA Diamond a couple of times.

My creative suggestion is to find a type of product you have interest in and do some buying a selling on eBay or any Website (Paid using your Paypal account linked to your Amex card of course). To churn some large numbers you wouldn't be making much money (make sure you make enough to cover selling fees) and find products that are sold in America or China that people might be willing to pay a small premium for to get it quicker. Obviously bear in mind you carry the risk of the inventory you have to keep, dead stock, taxation liabilities... etc. You would also have to work a little for free But still a great way to buy something while not spending money.

 

[brown891]

Do you have any interest and time to start a side business? Lots of AFF's including myself get virtually all my points from CC Spend (I average 30-50k Velocity points/ Month) and hit my 1,000,000 points cap on my CBA Diamond a couple of times.

My creative suggestion is to find a type of product you have interest in and do some buying a selling on eBay or any Website (Paid using your Paypal account linked to your Amex card of course). To churn some large numbers you wouldn't be making much money (make sure you make enough to cover selling fees) and find products that are sold in America or China that people might be willing to pay a small premium for to get it quicker. Obviously bear in mind you carry the risk of the inventory you have to keep, dead stock, taxation liabilities... etc. You would also have to work a little for free But still a great way to buy something while not spending money.

I have been running my own business for the last few years now but not enough turnover to look at getting that amount of points per month. A good idea tho to start an online business that you buy stuff with and sell it for virtually the same price - basically for just the points! I may look into more ways of doing this. Do you know of any cards that don't require a minimum wage?

A mixture.

- Yes cc sign on bonii .....but not 5 per year She has just picked up the better offers that have come along rather than every offer.
- CC spend
- WOW while it lasted
- bonus point cc promos
- stacking points by buying via online portals through various airlines and particularly when bonus point special were on too (ie the lead up the Xmas etc)
- paid flights including a few work ones. Mainly domestic, but she just had her first international work trip trip to Japan for 2 weeks flying on SQ via SIN each way.
- bonus points here and there for surveys etc

Do you mean the old store WOW?
But thats awesome. Buying through online portals is definitely a big helper. I got 1800 points from bonds through Qantas the other month when it was 12 points per $ spent.
I will be trying my best to purchase stuff more through these ways. Do you know from her experience what airlines seem to offer the better ways of earning points in this way? SQ/VA/QF etc.

 

[brown891]

Can Anyone tell me.. I read this but not sure if it's an actual thing or not.

In order to claim UA points on partner airlines etc. At least 50% must be points accrued and 50% can be points actually PURCHASED.
Just wondering if this is real or if like has been discussed above ^, Can just buy points on a promotion and redeem them on a flight. In other words, use 100% of PURCHASED POINTS for an award flight.
Eg. SYD-BKK-HKG on Thai Airways First Class.

 

[Mattg]

Can Anyone tell me.. I read this but not sure if it's an actual thing or not.

In order to claim UA points on partner airlines etc. At least 50% must be points accrued and 50% can be points actually PURCHASED.
Just wondering if this is real or if like has been discussed above ^, Can just buy points on a promotion and redeem them on a flight. In other words, use 100% of PURCHASED POINTS for an award flight.
Eg. SYD-BKK-HKG on Thai Airways First Class.

Where did you hear that? I'm not aware of any rules about how the points for a particular redemption were acquired.

 

[brown891]

Where did you hear that? I'm not aware of any rules about how the points for a particular redemption were acquired.

I think it may even have been a thread in the UA Mileage program area of AFF. Down the bottom there is a post about 50% or something that confused me.
This one? :
http://www.australianfrequentflyer....eage-plus/buying-ua-miles-cant-use-75829.html

 

[MEL_Traveller]

I think it may even have been a thread in the UA Mileage program area of AFF. Down the bottom there is a post about 50% or something that confused me.
This one? :
http://www.australianfrequentflyer....eage-plus/buying-ua-miles-cant-use-75829.html

yeah- not sure what was going on in that thread. Maybe the agent was saying that if you wish to put an award on hold you need to have at least 50% of the miles in the account (to secure the hold). No idea. Anyway - the booking engine and the Terms and Conditions don't make any mention.

Agents sometimes don't really know why a proposed itinerary isn't being accepted by the system. So they will tell you their best guess. That 'guess' isn't always what is causing the problem. In the thread above it might have been that the itinerary was actually an illegal routing, rather than the issue of having enough miles in the account. But the agent might have incorrectly assumed it was a miles issue. (This used to be quite common with US Airways redemptions, so knowing the rules was actually quite important.)

 

[brown891]

yeah- not sure what was going on in that thread. Maybe the agent was saying that if you wish to put an award on hold you need to have at least 50% of the miles in the account (to secure the hold). No idea. Anyway - the booking engine and the Terms and Conditions don't make any mention.

Agents sometimes don't really know why a proposed itinerary isn't being accepted by the system. So they will tell you their best guess. That 'guess' isn't always what is causing the problem. In the thread above it might have been that the itinerary was actually an illegal routing, rather than the issue of having enough miles in the account. But the agent might have incorrectly assumed it was a miles issue. (This used to be quite common with US Airways redemptions, so knowing the rules was actually quite important.)

Okay so as far as you are (and me as I read TC's on UA website also) - there is no issue with using 100% of purchased points for an award flight??
Seems to me that all the other threads in the UA forum appear to have successful award bookings with points....

 

[Mattg]

Okay so as far as you are (and me as I read TC's on UA website also) - there is no issue with using 100% of purchased points for an award flight??
Seems to me that all the other threads in the UA forum appear to have successful award bookings with points....

I wouldn't be worried. I haven't heard of this "rule" being applied in any other instances, nor is it mentioned in the Mileage Club T&Cs. I suspect the call centre agent in question didn't know what they were talking about.

 

[brown891]

Agreed Mattg. ​Just thought I would double check to make sure

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Okay so as far as you are (and me as I read TC's on UA website also) - there is no issue with using 100% of purchased points for an award flight??
Seems to me that all the other threads in the UA forum appear to have successful award bookings with points....

if the agent had been correct (50% in account and 50% purchased) everyone on the other thread would have confirmed that is indeed the case. no one did. so it is safe to assume an agent misunderstanding.

appreciate it is you first booking, and many people think this is all too easy or too good to be true. but many tens of thousands of these are issued to millions of members worldwide every year. it really is a straight forward process... get the miles, jump on line, select the flights, pay the taxes and off you go the only difficulty comes with availability at peak times, but if you are flexible you will generally have a good selection of flights. you don't need any miles at all in your united account to search for availability, so you can have a look at what's out there right now.

airlines make good money out of selling miles, so it doesn't really fit into the 'too good to be true' category as far as they're concerned. award seats are seats that would be empty anyway, and selling miles to passengers for 1.5c each beats them selling to banks and credit card companies for 1c each. they're making good money off these sales!

 

[brown891]

if the agent had been correct (50% in account and 50% purchased) everyone on the other thread would have confirmed that is indeed the case. no one did. so it is safe to assume an agent misunderstanding.

appreciate it is you first booking, and many people think this is all too easy or too good to be true. but many tens of thousands of these are issued to millions of members worldwide every year. it really is a straight forward process... get the miles, jump on line, select the flights, pay the taxes and off you go the only difficulty comes with availability at peak times, but if you are flexible you will generally have a good selection of flights. you don't need any miles at all in your united account to search for availability, so you can have a look at what's out there right now.

airlines make good money out of selling miles, so it doesn't really fit into the 'too good to be true' category as far as they're concerned. award seats are seats that would be empty anyway, and selling miles to passengers for 1.5c each beats them selling to banks and credit card companies for 1c each. they're making good money off these sales!

Yep like you said just wanted to be 100% sure with it haha. Cheers for the info and help so far!

 

[Wingin..it]

You could always add an extra person /s to your woolies reward card if you have one .I'm sure you can and be it a relative friend etc they may let the points go to you.

My only suggestion is a shorter flight in first ;maybe NZ which only costs about $1,200. (one way of course)
This could be obtained quicker or yes as others advise you have to go another airline .
I would not feel too bad though about not flying in first just because others are .The flight itself is still a great experience and many travellers tourists will often go economy to put extra funds into the holiday .
Sounds like you are after the ultimate flight experience "though" so it is a great goal.

 

[Wingin..it]

Meant to add would be on Emirates but a Qantas flight.Buy the business class about $800. then use points to upgrade to F?

 

[MEL_Traveller]

You could always add an extra person /s to your woolies reward card if you have one .I'm sure you can and be it a relative friend etc they may let the points go to you.

My only suggestion is a shorter flight in first ;maybe NZ which only costs about $1,200. (one way of course)
This could be obtained quicker or yes as others advise you have to go another airline .
I would not feel too bad though about not flying in first just because others are .The flight itself is still a great experience and many travellers tourists will often go economy to put extra funds into the holiday .
Sounds like you are after the ultimate flight experience "though" so it is a great goal.

Meant to add would be on Emirates but a Qantas flight.Buy the business class about $800. then use points to upgrade to F?

Unfortunately Qantas points cannot be used for upgrades on Emirates aircraft, even if flying on a Qantas flight number.

For the $1200 you mention, just a few dollars more gets a long haul multi-segment first class offering, much better than the couple of hours trans-tasman.