Another old post that will soon be partially redundant, at least for the within North America values....
There is an Avios calculator website that lets you plug in your location and destination. This is telling me for Dublin and Munich from Denver it would be around 27K or 30K each way. This compares with the other airlines, except for a lot of them might let us do an open jaw and see more places in Europe. Not sure I want to lock us into it costing more to do this by using Avios.
This post lists hubs of partners for Avios points. We are not a hub but we do get US Airways and American flights from DEN. There are not any fuel surcharges within North America (I think). I wonder how Avios would work for going to Ottawa. Flying DEN to YOW through Chicago would give 888 miles and 655 miles - under 650 is 4500 miles and to 1150 is 7500 so both of these would be 7500 or 15000 but this is only one way so it would be 30K return, so not as good as the base 25K. Wonder if there is a routing where one is under 650 and one is still under 1150. This would give 4500+7500 each way OR 12000, so 24000 return. Doesn't really help but could be an option.
Here is the Travel is Free Guide to Avios. And here is a discussion of the Household Accounts feature of Avios. Basically you can pool the rewards and they get used out of everyone's accounts.
TPG outlines how you would pick between BA and Virgin Atlantic:
"If it’s a question of transferring miles to Virgin Atlantic or to British Airways, it’s worth having a look at Virgin’s mileage chart and comparing it to BA’s mileage calculator to see which requires more on your route. For example, a roundtrip economy ticket from JFK to London on Virgin only costs 35,000* (26,000 if booked as two one-ways separately), 55,000 or 80,000 miles roundtrip in economy, premium economy and business class respectively, while BA would charge you 40,000, 60,000 or 80,000 Avios for the same classes of service, so in economy, I’d do Virgin to save a few thousand miles. However, if pricing awards one-way, they seem to be coming up cheaper. For instance, a one-way award from New York-London was pricing at only 13,000 miles and just under $97.50 in taxes and fees. There were very limited dates, so play around to see if you can find these lower priced awards."
As far as Europe the key is the fuel surcharges and whether you could find a route without too many. One option is to use BA on Aer Lingus.
Some other links:
- How direct flights are calculated: It turns out that at least with some American Airlines flights, Avios actually prices flights by flight number rather than by individual leg in some cases. In effect, only one Avios redemption is necessary for multiple flights in each direction so long as they are marketed with the same flight number.
- US Airways map
- AA map
- There are sometimes transfer bonuses to BA from AMEX
- Saving with stopovers
- Reducing fees
- Avios map for DEN
Hugs,
Jen
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