Flying... some love it, some hate it. Personally I’m not a fan. But I’m sure we can all agree that we hate being stuck next to annoying passengers:
Be it the bitch who stole my aisle seat (which I specifically chose on check-in) because she didn’t want to sit next to her husband, then claims MY ticket is wrong. I had downed quite a few drinks to make my takeoff easy so making a scene or getting the flight crew’s attention with my booze breath wasn’t an option. Her and her husband proceeded to yell at each other most of the 9 hr flight.
The oversized man with the oversized suitcase both of which shouldn’t have made it on the flight.
The breastfeeding mother who was placed next to me making it so that I couldn't look to my left the whole flight. Awkward...
We all have stories like these to share, and the one thing they all have in common is that they all took place in the economy class cabin.
Time for an upgrade!
Recently I became aware of a special sale on US Airways Dividend Miles. These are US Airways’ frequent flyer miles which to our benefit are also valid for any Star Alliance flight. The special is for every 10 000 you buy, you get 10 000 free, up to 50 000. So basically if you buy 50k, you get 50k totalling 100k which gives you enough to go almost anywhere in the world economy, and many places business class. 50k miles at the time would set you back $1325 plus a 7% tax recovery fee, plus 13% HST for Canadians like me.
My flight required 110k miles for business class, so add another $400-some to my total.
Now booking a star alliance flight with US Airways is a little tricky. You’re forced to call in to book it, which means that you’re at the mercy of your call-centre agent’s intelligence. You can make the whole process much easier if you do all your research before hand. You can then call in with all your flight segments.
For this you can use the ANA award flight search tool. ANA has tried to curb people from abusing this tool this by restricting Star Alliance searches to people with a certain minimum miles. To get around this, make an initial ANA International Flight Awards search with any two cities, then on the results screen at the bottom you’ll see a button “Use Star Alliance Member Airlines.” YOU’RE IN! Now you can search throughout Star Alliance. Search longer flight segments first, as those are usually the toughest ones to get.
Gather all your flight segments, with a few alternates and phone in. I called at 2am, worked out well for me. Now I’m booking a flight from North America to the South Pacific so the total cost should be 110k miles (There’s no difference in cost for one way or round trip). The way I routed my flight, I would have a 5-day stopover in Korea which is considered the “North Asia” zone. My delightful phone agent put this in as a round trip to North Asia. North Asia - North America is 90k miles, North Asia - South Pacific is 90k miles. So counted as a round trip I save 20k miles which I can use for a round trip flight to Fiji :)
All in all, the flights cost me about $2300. Did I save money? Last I checked, economy class lowest fare one-way was $3261. Hell yeah!
Like a boss!
Be it the bitch who stole my aisle seat (which I specifically chose on check-in) because she didn’t want to sit next to her husband, then claims MY ticket is wrong. I had downed quite a few drinks to make my takeoff easy so making a scene or getting the flight crew’s attention with my booze breath wasn’t an option. Her and her husband proceeded to yell at each other most of the 9 hr flight.
The oversized man with the oversized suitcase both of which shouldn’t have made it on the flight.
The breastfeeding mother who was placed next to me making it so that I couldn't look to my left the whole flight. Awkward...
We all have stories like these to share, and the one thing they all have in common is that they all took place in the economy class cabin.
Time for an upgrade!
Recently I became aware of a special sale on US Airways Dividend Miles. These are US Airways’ frequent flyer miles which to our benefit are also valid for any Star Alliance flight. The special is for every 10 000 you buy, you get 10 000 free, up to 50 000. So basically if you buy 50k, you get 50k totalling 100k which gives you enough to go almost anywhere in the world economy, and many places business class. 50k miles at the time would set you back $1325 plus a 7% tax recovery fee, plus 13% HST for Canadians like me.
My flight required 110k miles for business class, so add another $400-some to my total.
Now booking a star alliance flight with US Airways is a little tricky. You’re forced to call in to book it, which means that you’re at the mercy of your call-centre agent’s intelligence. You can make the whole process much easier if you do all your research before hand. You can then call in with all your flight segments.
For this you can use the ANA award flight search tool. ANA has tried to curb people from abusing this tool this by restricting Star Alliance searches to people with a certain minimum miles. To get around this, make an initial ANA International Flight Awards search with any two cities, then on the results screen at the bottom you’ll see a button “Use Star Alliance Member Airlines.” YOU’RE IN! Now you can search throughout Star Alliance. Search longer flight segments first, as those are usually the toughest ones to get.
Gather all your flight segments, with a few alternates and phone in. I called at 2am, worked out well for me. Now I’m booking a flight from North America to the South Pacific so the total cost should be 110k miles (There’s no difference in cost for one way or round trip). The way I routed my flight, I would have a 5-day stopover in Korea which is considered the “North Asia” zone. My delightful phone agent put this in as a round trip to North Asia. North Asia - North America is 90k miles, North Asia - South Pacific is 90k miles. So counted as a round trip I save 20k miles which I can use for a round trip flight to Fiji :)
All in all, the flights cost me about $2300. Did I save money? Last I checked, economy class lowest fare one-way was $3261. Hell yeah!
Like a boss!
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