Update: As the sale for buying Melia Miles is now over, you can expect the price of the ticket to be around $450-500, which is still a great deal if revenue ticket prices are through the roof.
How to get a United BusinessFirst Lie-Flat seat for $325:
Nearly everything is about evaluating the value of miles. This an instance of where it is really important to look for the best redemption. Remember, you can only get the best value from your points only if you know how to use them. I haven’t been around as long as other bloggers, but things I (think) I am good is experimenting with redemptions, maximizing awards, and staying up to date on all information from forums and blogs (*hem* mistake fare :)).
This is one of the “scenarios” that I have been playing with for a few weeks, and since it looks like the window for purchase is closing fast, I thought I might as well post it. This is how you can get a lie-flat bed on a domestic flight for a steal of a deal. Note that I have not yet tried this personally but this might be very lucrative for those who want to do it. Now back to the topic…
I think that domestic first isn’t that worth that much. Frequent Miler presents several options to maximize your miles while flying first class. But I disagree, and I think this might revolutionize “purchasing” domestic first with miles. In my opinion, this is the best and most cost-effective way to fly domestic first class. So either you can spend 34,000 Aeroplan miles, 25,000 United miles, or ~$350. What would you choose?
MeliáRewards, a hotel chain with many hotels in Spain and in the Caribbean is selling points with 25% bonus. You can sign up here (I get 250 points per signup to a maximum of a few thousand points – thanks for your support!).
This makes every block of 10,000 miles only 64 Euros, or ~$88 Canadian, with each mile only costing 0.88 cents. You can buy miles here.
Why is this important? This is because Melia is a 2:1 transfer partner to Miles & More, which allows you to book tickets on Star Alliance Airlines. This means you can essentially buy Miles & More for 1.76 cents each.
The cost of each award then, by directly buying miles, is the 1.76 cents per mile multiplied by the award amount. For example, that means a roundtrip award to Europe is just under $2000 if you directly buy the miles, excluding fuel surcharge.
But what Miles and More is a great redemption for is using their miles for domestic flights within a single country. Since Canada and US are big countries, this is a HUGE sweet spot (no pun intended). The award price for a one-way is just 17,000 miles. You can annually buy a maximum of 100,000 miles, which transfers to 50,000 Miles & More. his means you can at least get three one-way domestic/transcon business class awards pre year through this method.
This means you can fly United Domestic First and Air Canada Executive Class for just $320 plus a maximum of around $50 in airport taxes. This is an AMAZING VALUE. Sure, domestic first class might not be worth paying the premium for. But being able to get the LAX-JFK p.s service with flat beds with connecting flights given that there is space for $320 by purchasing miles and $2.50 in airport taxes is an amazing deal.
This is when the flight normally goes for at least $2,000 when buying a revenue ticket. I’m not saying that I would be paying $2000, but at least it means you’re better off using your United miles for transatlantic and transpacific tickets in premium classes.
This is nearly exactly the same case in Canada. For example, look at this itinerary which is a one-way flight in Executive Class (Air Canada Domestic Premium Class) which is pricing at just over $2000.
This includes the YYZ-YVR in a lie-flat pod (Executive First).
The taxes and fees are just $32.60 in addition to purchasing the miles.
This isn’t just for the “flagship routes” with a lie-flat bed. This is any route within one country that has exorbitantly high fare prices yet award availability. For example YYC-YEG-YUL which is pricing at over $300 one-way in economy class. Or even an expensive transcon such as SEA-DEN-MIA which is pricing at over $270 one way in economy class. If there is award space, why not outright buy the miles and get an “upgrade” for under a hundred dollars?
Of course the value proposition is slightly different if you have elite status, but it is a fantastic deal to lock in a confirmed domestic first flight months in advance with an award from purchased miles given that the price is this sweet.
See what I’m doing here? I’m leveraging three different promotions to achieve the cheapest redemption possible for a flight. When the promotion ends, that means each Mile & More mile will be 2.2 cents, with a 17,000 business one-way domestic ticket pricing at ~$374. Is that a great deal? Still acceptable although not a lot better. But right I think lie-flat seats across the country for under $400 is a definitely a decent if not good deal.
Summary:
I am buying miles at a discount, transferring to a good airline partner, and then redeeming for a sweet spot on the chart to pull out this deal. By tackling the sweet spots of three promotions this is why this kind of deal can appear. Here is the process if you are numbers person:
224 Euro = 308 Cad$ = 35,000 Melia Points = 17,000 Miles & More = 1 domestic business redemption = lie-flat bed/pod = deal
Does this make your miles useless?
No. In nearly all other cases, miles are the best way for international business and first class. But domestic first class is something that I don’t find it is worth spending the money on. So for those who don’t have elite status, this might be a good alternative.
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Hey Jeff,
Great job on finding this redemption option for the current Mas Rewards bonus! It provides people with even more options beyond the one I proposed for airberlin with this buy points offer:
http://blog.frequentflyerbonuses.com/2013/06/melia-international-25-bonus-on-buying.html
I have to admit I didn’t even look at the Miles&More option for domestic North American flights. Kudos to you!
Why you say its 17000 points ? Round trip is 35000 based on the info on this page. It should be 17500 each way ? Economy is half of this ?
Rounds down per one way, so 17k in business and 12k in economy
This is an interesting idea – I do not fly domestically in Canada as much – but I can see the value.
I signed up under your referral.
Thanks!
Great work Jeff and thank you for sharing! An important note for Canadians is that points.com will charge GST/HST. Make sure you consider the extra cost before jumping into this deal.
Good point! Or have a US billing address 🙂
I don’t understand. On the award chart, I see North America to North America cost is 30K/55K/75K. I guess Domestic table on their chart concerns domestic flights in Germany. What do you think ?
Domestic is within one country. This includes Canada. Many bloggers who have done posts on miles and more have verified this.
thanks !
I am not sure if you get this if you sign up with referral, but if you go to their website separately, you get a 2000 point signup bonus.
And doesn’t the Domestic table refer to German domestic flights? Have you actually bought via this method?
You can use 12k / 17k for a one-way within the US or Canada as seen here: http://boardingarea.com/onemileatatime/2013/06/26/potentially-only-a-few-more-days-for-the-barclays-lufthansa-miles-more-world-mastercard-increased-sign-up-bonus/
I used Jeff’s sign up link and got the 2000 points immediately
Jeff, can you link to some posts that confirms the domestic comment you made?
http://millionmilesecrets.com/2013/05/22/use-lufthansa-miles/ #1 and #2
http://milevalue.com/miles-more-program-primer-six-great-uses-and-two-bad-ones-of-the-lufthansa-cards-50k-sign-up-bonus/
http://boardingarea.com/onemileatatime/2013/06/26/potentially-only-a-few-more-days-for-the-barclays-lufthansa-miles-more-world-mastercard-increased-sign-up-bonus/
This is very interesting. Of all the bloggers out there you have had some of the best posts lately. Well done!
Anyhow, when I checked for availability on say SFO-JFK (to get the best seats) on Air Canada, it lists the product as business – Is this the business section of the PS aircraft? When I went to united and checked SFO-JFK it says first/business 25,000 Again is this first or is this business?
Thank you! Air Canada does not fly SFO-JFK but United does. The retrofit of the UA planes is ongoing so it would be business class lie-flat beds for 17,000 Miles & More. You want to be ignoring the 25,000 number on united.com because you are not using United miles. For details about premium service see this website: http://www.united.com/web/en-us/content/travel/inflight/premiumservices.aspx
Nice find!
70k (56k + 14k) points come out to $448 euro or $582 USD. 2 business class tickets in lie flat seats for less than $600 sounds awesome.
Did I miscalculate?
Great post.
Where are you getting 70k from?
My guess is he is looking at the option of a return flight, rather than 2 one-ways – if the Melia transfer is 2:1 then you’d have to get 70k to get the return … what he’s missing (and I did too!) is that two one-ways comes out better at 34k (17K x 2), needing only 68k in Melia points.
Unfortunately I don’t fly domestically in Canada or US, just Canada to US and vice versa 🙁
Melia.com seems to be down.. How many followers does this blog have 😀
Ha!
Very cool Jeff! Nice find! Thanks for sharing!
Great Job! I signed up even if it was to support you 😉
I recently traded Melia earned miles to Delta at a 3 Melia to 1 Delta ratio. Would have traded to Lufthansa at 2:1 were it not for living in Cincinnati. Even United is not a prize for me in this Delta hub. I still really appreciate your analysis. Another option for us groundlings! It gives us something to think about.
Melia point exchanges are good and I love their hotels. Some thoughts at http://notmyvacationpictures.com/2012/11/16/melia-hotels-mas-rewards-points-why-i-exchanged-mine-for-skymiles/
I used your link to sign up but not sure I’ll pull the trigger on buying the points for miles. Good deal though.
Thanks!