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I originally posted the article (below) on August 5, 2019. I thought it would be great to repost this article as a reminder that the bonus expires in 10 days.
American One thing that I love about American Express are their transfer bonuses and over the last few months, Amex has been dishing them out! American Express offered multiple transfer bonuses to Membership Rewards (MR) partners including Virgin Atlantic Flying Club, JetBlue True Blue, and Qantas. This is one of my favorite transfer bonuses and if you are planning future travel, there is a great chance that you will be flying to your destination for a fraction of the miles too.
LET’S DIG IN
American Express is offering a 40% transfer bonus to British Airways Executive Club (Avios) and you have until Oct. 1 to complete the transfer.
“BUT I DON’T FLY BRITISH AIRWAYS”
But do you fly on American Airlines?
Pro Secret: A lot of people are not aware of this but you can use British Airway Avios to fly on American Airlines. This is why it’s one of my favorites bonuses. For more information READ THIS.
SHOULD YOU TRANSFER YOUR POINTS?
Possibly. <— how is that for clarity?
Personally, I would not transfer points without a, rather immediate, use in mind. Once the transfer is complete, the points/miles are with that airline (or hotel) and will remain in that account until they are used or expire. American Express points are a valuable “transferrable currency.” In other words, they are more valuable as American Express Membership Rewards (MR) points than sitting, in this case, in a British Airways account.
However, there are circumstances where you can obtain significantly more value for transferring them to BA. For example…
EXAMPLE #1: New York (LGA) to Washington D.C. (DCA)
LGA to DCA is a popular business route and is priced as such. As you can see, a one-way, economy ticket will cost, at the minimum, $179.
…or you can book an award ticket through British Airways for the same 10AM flight and it will cost 7500 Avios and $5.60. In other words, you would only need to transfer 5400 MR to British Airways. That’s great value!
EXAMPLE #2: Miami (MIA) to St. Kitts (SKB)
Within the last few weeks, the price of this trip increased from 7,500 Avios but still offers serious value. Let’s take a look…you can buy a one-way, economy ticket from Miami to St. Kitts for $300+…
…or you can pay $15.60 and transfer 7900 MR to British Airways (which is 11,000 with the bonus) for same exact flight. PHENOMENAL VALUE!!
Assuming awards are available to your desired destination, transferring MR points can be a no-brainer with this promotion.
INTERESTED IN FLYING BUSINESS CLASS?
Did you click on this article because you saw “Business Class For Less Than 12k Miles?” Well, there is a sweet spot that is niche but if you’re interested, let’s dig in…
Here’s how this sweet spot breaks down… American Airlines sometimes uses their big, fancy, internationally-configured aircraft for domestic routes. This is great for you because the first class seats are used as business class seats and it only costs 16,500 British Airways Avios for nonstop business class awards on flights less than 1,151 miles. To determine the distance between two airports, use this COOL TOOL.
With the 40% transfer bonus from Membership Rewards to British Airways Avios, you only have to transfer 12,000 MR points to BA to book these award flights. For example, a simple search on British Airways will yield these results…
DALLAS/FORTWORTH (DFW) – MIAMI (MIA)
…and you’ll be flying in style in these seats…
DALLAS/FORT WORTH (DFW) – Chicago (ORD)…
…and you’ll be flying in style on these seats…
These routes are, largely, between AA hubs but if your upcoming plans include travel between…
- BOS-PHL
- PHL-MIA
- ORD-DFW
…you may want to investigate the seating options. It may be your lucky day!!
How to Book
First, make sure that you find award availability before transferring points. Then, to transfer points, log in to your American Express Account, navigate to the points transfer page, and transfer your points under the British Airways logo.
FINAL STAMP
Again, there are definitely opportunities to obtain some nice value from the 40% transfer but you should only transfer when you have plans for those points. The sooner they are used, the better.
In this hobby, you never know when things may change. Recently, there was a slight devaluation in British Airways Avios and there have been rumors of a big devaluation for some time now.
Ultimately, it will happen. However, it will be even more disappointing if you have transferred the points (without a plan), a devaluation takes place, and you are left with a large number of Avios in your account and no good way to spend them.
Are you going to take advantage of the 40% transfer bonus to British Airways?
1TattedPassport 