Foreign carriers and awards
U.S. airlines’ frequent-flier programs have undergone big changes in recent years. Delta, United and American, for instance, now award miles based on how much you spend, not how far you’ve flown.
These legacy carriers also have revamped their award charts. Now many awards require several thousand more miles than before.
This could be the right time to consider switching your loyalty to the frequent-flier program of a foreign carrier.
One caveat: Some foreign carriers do charge taxes and fees on award tickets that can be hundreds of dollars more than their U.S. counterparts. Check this out before you commit. Now for some of the pluses: Earning miles may be easier. Because each of these U.S. legacy carriers is in an airline alliance — American is in Oneworld, Delta is in SkyTeam and United is in Star Alliance — you can credit miles flown on them to any number of partner programs.
Many foreign frequent-flier programs base mileage earnings on the distance flown and the fare class of the ticket. Fliers might earn anywhere from 25% to 150% of the miles they fly when crediting a foreign program. You can find this information on the section of a carrier’s website about earning rates on partner flights.
More transfer partners. All four major transferable (also called convertible) points programs in the U.S. — American Express Membership Rewards, Chase Ultimate Rewards, Starwood Preferred Guest and Citi ThankYou Rewards — partner with several foreign frequent-flier programs. That means you can convert points into miles with those airlines.
For example, Singapore Airlines’ KrisFlyer and Air France/KLM’s Flying Blue mileage programs are partners with all four. British Airways accepts transfers from all but Citi.
Short-haul redemptions. Although the major U.S. legacy carriers offer some bargain shorthaul redemptions, including American’s new 7,500-mile level for flights of less than 500 miles, several foreign programs offer great values on short-distance awards as well.
On British Airways, some awards start as low as 4,500 miles each way on its own flights, and 7,500 miles on American Airlines flights.
Discounted awards. Some foreign programs also offer off-peak or discounted awards. Flying Blue offers monthly “Promo Awards” in which fliers can score rebates of up to 50% on awards in economy, premium economy and business class on Air France and KLM flights. A round-trip business-class award from the U.S. to Europe could be redeemed for as few as 62,500 miles total, and economy awards for 25,000 miles round trip.
By comparison, Delta, Air France/KLM’s U.S. partner, would charge 125,000 miles for business class and 60,000 miles for economy awards.
Better award charts. Although many foreign frequent-flier programs have increased their award redemption levels recently, some have not done so as drastically as domestic carriers.
Air Canada’s Aeroplan program charges 70,000 miles each way to fly first class on its partner Lufthansa from North America to Western Europe, compared with the 110,000 miles United requires.
All Nippon Airways (an American Express transfer partner) requires 104,000 miles for business class or 195,000 miles for first class on its partner Etihad to fly round trip from the U.S. to the Middle East.
By comparison, American Airlines (another partner of Etihad) would charge 140,000 miles for business or 230,000 for first class.
More nonalliance partners. Like U.S. carriers, foreign airlines often have nonalliance partnerships with other airlines, which means more chances to redeem miles.
For example, besides Star Alliance partners, All Nippon also partners with Etihad, Garuda Indonesia, Hawaiian, Philippine and Virgin Atlantic.
More premium awards. Some airlines, including Singapore, Air France and Swiss, block first-class awards from partner mileage redemptions. For instance, if you want to fly Singapore’s first-class suites without shelling out thousands of dollars, you will need to use Singapore’s KrisFlyer miles for an award.
Although Korean Air and Delta are in SkyTeam, Delta will not allow redemption of SkyMiles for firstclass partner awards, so to fly Korean’s first-class seats, you will need to redeem Korean’s miles.
More credit cards and bonuses. Several U.S. credit-card issuers offer products co-branded with foreign frequent-flier programs. Chase fields a British Airways Visa that offers a sign-up bonus of up to 50,000 Avios (British Airways’ mileage posts) as well as benefits such as a 10% discount on British Airways tickets.