We’re just a few hours away from the end of the most lucrative American Express Membership Rewards transfer bonus we’ve seen in more than a year. Last call to take advantage of the 40% British Airways Executive Club transfer bonus.
Did I take advantage? Yes, although I did not go crazy after word of an immense British Airways devaluation coming on 28 April 2015.
> Read More: Major British Airways Executive Club Devaluation in Late April
I keep about 125K Avios in my BA account and snagged a business class seat from Dublin to Boston on AerLingus for 25,000 miles yesterday so I just replenished that amount this evening. With high fuel surcharges and much higher rates than American Airlines AAdvantage to most regions of the world, I do not anticipate many longhaul premium redemptions using Avios and thus 125K should be more than enough for short-haul redemptions for at least the next year.
But a redemption does make sense for some — especially if you have found award space. An Award Expert client with American Express wanted to travel from Houston to London in business class direct — four tickets with very flexible dates. I found the space — four seats together both on the outbound and inbound. Cost is typically 100K r/t per ticket but with the transfer bonus, the total came out to only 72K per ticket! Instead of transferring 400,000 AMEX points to BA, only 286K AMEX points we needed. Not bad for four round-trip business class tickets, even with fuel surcharges!
Transfer wisely, remembering that there are many other valuable AMEX transfer partners including Aeroplan, Delta, Flying Blue, Singapore and Alitalia–but do not let this deal pass you by, for we may never see another deal again…at least not for a long time.
Next BA bonus will probably happen 3 weeks before the next BA Devaluation.
Do you have inside info on this?