Get All You Can from Mileage Tickets—as Many as Three Trips for the Price of One
When it comes to planning a trip, most of us have tunnel vision: We want Point A to Point B and return. In other words, a non-stop flight. It’s understandable. Time is scarce, changing planes is tiring. Why not get it over with?
Here’s one good answer:
Because you can often get more for your miles by taking advantage of the free stopovers that some airlines allow with mileage tickets. If you really want to squeeze value out of a free mileage award ticket, you can add a second or third destination (a side trip) by aggressively using award charts and stopover rule strategies.
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Stopover
In airline terms, a stopover is a stop of more than four hours on a domestic itinerary or more than 24 hours on an international one. If you can make a connection in a city, you can sometimes stopover there for free. In the U.S. and Europe, connecting cities are often an airline’s hub.
Side Trip
In FCF terms, a side trip is an add-on destination within a region. This strategy works with airlines that use a regional award chart, meaning a mileage award ticket costs the same number of miles for travel between all destinations served in regions A and B. For instance, New York (Continental U.S./Canada) and Frankfurt (Europe), allows a side trip in Budapest on an award ticket at no extra cost with Lufthansa, since both Budapest and Frankfurt are in the same award region, Europe.[/aside]
Rules to Keep in Mind
- The stopover always has to be enroute to your final destination.
- The hub city of the primary or partner airline is usually the stopover opportunity, or the jumping-off point, for the free side-trip.
- Some airlines do not allow a stop within the departure region. For example, Lufthansa does not allow a stopover in the U.S. if you are departing from the U.S., but it does allow one in Europe if that’s your destination. However, on the return from Europe to the U.S. you are allowed a stop in the U.S. because it is now your destination.
- Some airlines do not allow a stopover within North America.
Seven Ways to Exploit Free Stopovers and Side Trips
You are going to see family in London and are departing from Houston, and you’d like to “check off” two other cities, Athens and New York, on your bucket list. You have 85,000 Starwood points, but these three trips booked separately would cost 250,000 miles. The solution is to transfer your points to Lufthansa, which allows two stopovers (one stop in each direction), including flights on Star Alliance carriers. Here’s the itinerary: Houston-London on United non-stop; London-Munich or Frankfurt-Athens on Lufthansa; back to the U.S. on Lufthansa (Athens-Munich or Frankfurt-New York); and United back to Houston. All for 105,000 miles in Business Class.
The “partner bypass strategy”: Not all award partners allow the same type of stop
Air Canada is a partner of United and US Airways. But United doesn’t allow stopovers in North America on tickets booked with Air Canada miles. However, US Airways does. So you could travel Vancouver-New York, making a free stopover enroute in US Airways’ hub city, Phoenix.
Two international cities for the price of one
You are going to Istanbul from Chicago on vacation. You could add in a second European city for free, among them London, Frankfurt, Munich, Paris, or Zurich, as they are all hubs for various carriers, such as Delta, Lufthansa, United, and SWISS. And, if you have to make a connection anyway, why not get a second city stay for free?
The “tack-on” strategy: How to get Russia for 15,000 miles round-trip
Let’s say you are going to Germany on vacation and you have miles with Air Canada. A free Business Class award ticket costs 90,000 miles, but by paying just 15,000 miles more you could add a second destination, such as western Russia, Hungary, or Turkey. When I fly on awards, I seldom just go to one place—there are just too many places to go! This strategy makes it really affordable.
A free Hawaii stopover on an international trip
You are going to Tokyo from Dallas on American, which allows a free stopover in a North American gateway city on an international award ticket. Honolulu is an American gateway, so for 100,000 miles round-trip, you get a Business Class ticket and a stop in Hawaii on your way to Tokyo. The free stop in Hawaii would normally cost you about 70,000 miles were it booked on its own from Dallas on American. For the person who doesn’t like long flights, here’s a way to “break them up.”
By ‘mini round-the-world’ trip, I mean departing from North America with only four stops (not the usual seven or eight plus stops). Here is one possible itinerary: New York to Lon-don, Hong Kong, Sydney, and Honolulu. For this itinerary, United charges 350,000 miles round-trip in First Class, 260,000 in Business Class, and 180,000 in economy for an award ticket.
But if you use an oneworld flight distance award (offered by American or Japan Airlines), which, by the way, allows up to seven stops, you would only pay 150,000 miles for Business and 230,000 for First Class.
Net a free upgrade to First Class by combining two economy trips
Let’s say you’re going on a vacation to Southern California, flying New York-Los Angeles, and you also have a second trip planned around the same time to Atlanta to see your family. Atlanta is a Delta hub and the carrier also flies the transcon. Two separate round-trip economy tickets on Delta would cost you a total of 50,000 miles.
But if you combined the two trips and made Atlanta a free stopover on your way to Los Angeles— Delta allows a free stopover there and in Detroit, Minneapolis, or Salt Lake City—so you could fly First Class for 45,000 miles, 5,000 miles less than two economy tickets.