Yesterday, One Mile at a Time noted an exceptional redemption deal for Delta’s premium transcontinental service. By combining an attractive transfer bonus from American Express to Virgin Atlantic and unusually excellent award space from Delta, transcon flights could be booked for only 18K miles. Hours later, the deal and award space is still very much available.
While Delta charges 45,000 for a one-way “saver” award on premium transcontinental “Delta One” routes like LAX to JFK, Virgin Atlantic charges 22,500. The catch is that Delta releases virtually zero saver award space. Ever. Typically Delta charges upward of 90,000 miles one-way and may charges as much as 160,000 miles for a one-way ticket!
But whether a glitch or not, Delta opened the floodgates today. As many as eight seats per flight are available on an variety of dates. Space gets progressively better the further out you book.
Virgin Atlantic only has access to the “saver” space which means it has access to all this space. Factor in that American Express is offering a 30% transfer on Virgin Atlantic transfers and that 22,500 miles becomes only 18K miles. That’s the best price I’ve ever seen a transcon premium cabin flight on Delta! For reference, Flying Blue also has access to all this space but charges 31,250 miles one-way.
Book Now!
I’m surprised the space has lasted this long and can almost guarantee it will be either 1.) gone or 2.) booked up by morning. Don’t wait if you need to travel from coast to coast and want to use miles. You will not see a better deal than this. If you don’t have the miles in your account, you can place award space on hold by calling Virgin Atlantic before you transfer.
The Virgin Atlantic transfer bonus runs through 11/30/17.
CONCLUSION
There’s too much going on right now for me to book any new trips, especially just to sample a product. The two dates I needed the space on (pre-planned NYC trips) were not available. But I hope many of you can take advantage of this exceptional deal while it lasts.
your headline is a bit deceiving… Not 18k miles, but 18k Amex points, which are converted into 22.5K miles,
By the way, ou can get flat bed transcon award ticket on United with only 17k Miles and More miles. All year round. No gimmick.
I jumped on this yesterday evening as fast as I could for a JFK-LAX run in early March. Good thing I did; availability’s long gone on the date I booked. My guess is the deal is now dead, or at least close to it. Just hoping this doesn’t end up getting culled as a “mistake” fare.