Not travelling most direct route – significant increase in points?

[slodki]

Hi All,

I’ve been a member of Emirates Skywards for a number of years, and my only means of obtaining points is credit card spend through the Citibank Emirates credit card. It’s served me well so far, getting 2x J and 2x F (A380) flights from AUS – NZ. Probably not the most economical way of burning points, but ohh well.

I’m planning a trip to Europe in 2015, and was thinking to significantly increase my credit card spending and stockpiles some points for this trip. I’m looking for 2xF return AUS-Europe. Ideally on the A380. I have around 100k points already, so still a while away.

Searching the online tool shows hardly any availability MEL-DXB which is understandable given the popularity of the route. Is there a way add transits and keep the amount of points required the same? Eg: MEL-SIN-DXB and onwards to Europe. Using the tool it keeps increasing the cost, I wonder if this really is the case if I were to call the reservation desk.

If MEL-DXB has very limited availability (especially now with Qantas on board), and adding transits increases the cost substantially then it doesn’t really make sense to stockpiles points for later use with Emirates.

Looking for some pointers/tips if any are available. Thanks!

 

[mushez]

Have a look at flying to NZ, and starting your UK trip from NZ on the one itinerary. Not only does it cost around the same (not considering your flight costs to NZ to start with), if not a few dollars less than flying ex MEL - or any Australian port - but you will find your miles and status credits increase significantly. Especially if you book a flexi fare. You can book it as a multi stop trip to get your status run to NZ done and out of the way a week or two prior, with the cost only being around $100 NZD more as it calculates the fare as still being.

My experience is miles earned will not change (increase) with the extra stops on your way - aka MEL-SIN-DXB will be the same miles as MEL-DXB - as it always calculates miles from the start, to last leg, and any stop overs in between have no relevance to miles. This is also the same with fare charged, and if you stop over for more than 24 hours, there is around $100 per stop extra in fare.

Also I have found booking in J, if you book a multi stop itinerary, you are bumped/forced to book it as a flexi fare, with flexi rules and status points.

 

[slodki]

Hi,

Sorry for the late reply. For some reason no email notifications came through...

Thanks for the tip, which is very useful when booking cash tickets, however I was actually asking the question from the angle of booking reward flights using my existing points.

Eg: The number of points for MEL-SIN-DXB is more than MEL-DXB. I wonder if this is really the case? There is no availability MEL-DXB, but much more by adding the transit in SIN. However its hard to swallow the additional points increase adding the transit.