Buy Alaska miles with a 50% bonus until 20 May

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After a nail-biting 30 days without an Alaska Mileage Plan ‘buy miles’ bonus, the famine ended for us all on Wednesday as the airline rolled out the offer again, this time at its top rate with a 50% bonus for those stocking up on the largest amounts.

Last time Alaska offered a 50% bonus it was targeted to only some members, in November 2018.

The deal runs for a month this time, ending on 20th May 2019 in Singapore.

The current offer

Log on to your Mileage Plan account to check how the bonus is structured as it sometimes differs from account to account, depending on your customer profile.

With the current offer though we have only seen one bonus structure offered, with purchases of 40,000 – 60,000 miles attracting the highest bonus rate of 50%.

• 1,000 – 9,000 miles – no bonus (2.96 US ¢ / mile)
• 10,000 – 19,000 miles – 20% bonus (2.46 US ¢ / mile)
• 20,000 – 39,000 miles – 35% bonus (2.19 US ¢ / mile)
• 40,000 – 60,000 miles – 50% bonus (1.97 US ¢ / mile)

Offer ends 20th May

The offer closes at 11.59m PST on Sunday 19th May 2019, which is 2.59pm on Monday 20th May 2019 Singapore time.

The JAL stopover ‘trick’

Funny that Alaska should launch their top 50% buy miles bonus this week, since we’re actually on the JAL stopover ‘trick’ right now, as we write this article from the (rather dapper) executive club lounge at the beautiful Conrad Osaka having flown up on Wednesday night in JAL Business Class.

If the concept is new to you, or you need a refresher, essentially this is a ‘return’ JAL Business Class flight from Singapore to Japan for 25,000 Alaska miles plus around US$60 in taxes. Here’s how it works.

What’s the JAL ‘stopover trick’? An exceptional rate of 25,000 Alaska miles for a ‘return’ flight from Singapore to Japan in Business Class. This takes advantage of the ability under the Alaska scheme to book free stopovers on one-way redemption tickets. It means you can create a ‘pseudo return’ itinerary for a very low miles rate by booking a redemption to a close-by city, with a stopover in a distant one. The JAL trick is effectively booking Japan Airlines from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur, with a stopover in Tokyo. Sounds like it shouldn’t be possible – but it is, and it’s incredible value at 25,000 Alaska miles in Business Class (the equivalent of 12,500 miles for each 7 hour sector). Other routings are also possible, you could decide to start your journey in Kuala Lumpur or Bangkok for example and return non-stop to Singapore. Jakarta is also an option. Generally speaking, JAL Business Class award availability through Alaska MP is also quite good. The variety of aircraft types used on JAL flights in Asia means you’ll likely be able to try out their newest ‘Sky Suite III’ and ‘Sky Suite 787’ flat-bed products, not to mention renowned on-board service and cuisine. There’s also a selection of oneworld lounges to visit depending on your routing and the time of day, so this is your chance to try out facilities like the Qantas Singapore Lounge, JAL’s Tokyo lounges or the Qatar / Cathay offerings in Bangkok. Something new if you’re used to flying the Singapore Airlines / Star Alliance network. In order to search and book such an itinerary on the Alaska Airlines website, select ‘all search options’ under the booking area, then select ‘multi-city’ and of course ensure the ‘use miles’ option is selected. After that simply enter each leg separately (e.g. Singapore to Tokyo for the first flight, Tokyo to Kuala Lumpur on the second flight), select the dates you want (your stopover in Tokyo can be as long as you like), then search to check award availability.

For the particular trip we’re currently on we wanted to start in Osaka, so we commenced the journey in Bangkok as JAL doesn’t fly to Osaka directly from Singapore.

That meant taking a cheap Scoot flight SIN-BKK on Wednesday evening, then sampling the excellent and relatively new Qatar Airways Bangkok lounge for a few hours before taking the non-stop overnight BKK-KIX flight.

If you haven’t tried the new Qatar lounge in Bangkok, all we can say is “wow”. This is our new favourite lounge at the airport. Stay tuned for a review coming soon, in the meantime we have some photos on our Instagram.

For the return sector we’ll be heading back from Tokyo non-stop from Narita to Singapore. Total cost per person was 25,000 Alaska miles + US$60, in addition to the Scoot flight. We also had the cost of positioning between Osaka and Tokyo, but you wouldn’t need to do that if like most people you use the trick just for a Tokyo trip.

Top tip for domestic JAL flights in Japan, if you need them, is to use Avios from 4,500 points with zero taxes, see here for details.

Cathay Pacific First and Business Class

If the JAL stopover ‘trick’ doesn’t interest you, the next best way to use Alaska miles for Singapore-based flyers is in First or Business Class on Cathay Pacific.

Singapore to Los Angeles First Class	160,000	130,000	70,000
Singapore to Los Angeles Business Class	135,000	85,000	50,000
Sydney to New York First Class*	200,000	130,000	80,000
Sydney to New York Business Class	165,000	85,000	60,000
Hong Kong to London Business Class	90,000	65,000	42,500
Vancouver to New York First Class	50,000	40,000	35,000

* Business Class Sydney to Hong Kong, First Class Hong Kong to New York

Even though the Alaska award chart shows that redeeming Europe flights on Cathay Pacific is only possible to or from Hong Kong, you can fly Singapore to Europe on Cathay using Alaska miles, but they will charge you for the Singapore – Hong Kong (Intra-Asia) and Hong Kong – Europe rates combined (22,500 + 42,500), making it a relatively poor deal at 65,000 miles in Business Class.

Both flights are combined into a single itinerary for you so it’s a simple option, but we think it’s better to position to Hong Kong with a low-cost airline then take the competitive Business Class rate with Alaska miles from there in our opinion.

Alternatively use Avios and position to Hong Kong on Cathay for 20,000 points in Business, they will also check you through for your onward Europe flight redeemed using Alaska miles despite separate itineraries, provided you have built in a 1hr+ connection time.

The only downside when using Alaska miles to book Cathay Pacific flights is that availability is not searchable online. You’ll have to search using another tool (we recommend using the British Airways Avios site), then call Alaska to book.

As we’ve mentioned before, there are varying accounts regarding what Cathay Pacific availability Alaska phone agents can and cannot see. We generally find the Cathay availability shown on the BA Avios site to be accurate.

Other good redemptions

Japan Airlines

Singapore to New York First Class*	200,000	85,000	75,000
Singapore to New York Business Class	165,000	70,000	65,000

* Business Class Singapore to Tokyo, First Class Tokyo to New York

Korean Air

Singapore to Chicago Business Class	200,000 (return)	150,000 (return)	120,000 (return)

Qantas

Sydney to Dallas First Class	200,000	168,000	70,000
Sydney to Dallas Business Class	165,000	112,000	55,000
Perth to Sydney Business Class	37,500	36,000	20,000

Emirates

Singapore to New York First Class	178,750	168,000	180,000
Singapore to New York Business Class	131,250	112,000	105,000

Finnair

Singapore to London Business Class	105,000	70,000	60,000

The full partner award charts are also available to search on the Alaska Mileage Plan site.

Click here to buy Alaska miles

Are Singapore Airlines awards coming?

Singapore Airlines is a recent Alaska Airlines partner, with redemptions on SIA flights using Alaska miles promised ‘soon’.

That hasn’t transpired yet, but InsideFlyer noticed earlier this month that certain award itineraries using Alaska miles were available including Singapore Airlines flights.

That seems to have been withdrawn as we could no longer replicate it, but it could be a sign that this functionality may be added soon.

Whether Singapore Airlines extends its long-haul Business and First Class cabin awards to Alaska members remains to be seen, currently these are only offered to KrisFlyer and Virgin Australia (Velocity) members.

Sign up to Alaska now for a bonus

Last year Alaska Airlines removed their limitation that only accounts 10 days or older were able to buy miles. That means you can sign up for an Alaska Mileage Plan account at any time and see what miles purchase bonus you are entitled to right away.

The exact bonus structure offered won’t be known until you register, but it’s worth a try so sign up now if you don’t yet have an account. Even if they don’t give you a very good bonus this time, you’ll be all set for the next one.

Miles purchased are limited to 150,000 per year

Assuming you don’t hold elite status in the Alaska Mileage Plan scheme (MVP, MVP Gold or MVP Gold 75K), you are limited to 150,000 miles credited per calendar year from points.com (i.e. buying miles as in this promotion). That includes the applicable bonus, and any miles gifted to you through points.com.

If this restricts you and you book as a couple then one option is to have your partner open an Alaska account too, which would then allow you to buy up to 150,000 miles each per calendar year, if required.

Remember this only applies to miles credited by points.com, and you are still free to transfer miles into Alaska on top of that limit from hotel loyalty programs for example, and of course from eligible revenue flying.

Which card to use

Assuming like most of our readers you are based in Singapore, you’ll want to achieve the maximum number of credit card miles for the purchase itself when buying Alaska miles. If you do go ahead and buy, the transaction happens in US dollars (i.e. non-SGD) and is processed by points.com.

You can earn the most extra miles for the purchase transaction by using one of the following Singapore issued credit cards if you can:

Card	Miles per S$1	Notes
DBS Women’s World Mastercard (see our review)	4.0	4mpd on all online spend in a calendar month, capped at S$2,000.
UOB Visa Signature	4.0	4mpd on all overseas spend of at least S$1,000 in a statement period, capped at S$2,000.
BOC Elite Miles World Mastercard (see our review)	3.0	3mpd on all non-SGD spend, with no cap.
Standard Chartered Visa Infinite (see our review)	3.0	For non-SGD spend, provided total card spend (any currency) is S$2,000 or greater in the same statement cycle.
UOB PRVI Miles (see our review)	2.4	All non-SGD spend.
OCBC Voyage Visa (see our review)	2.3	All non-SGD spend.
Citi PremierMiles (see our review)	2.0	All non-SGD spend.
Citi Prestige (see our review)	2.0	All non-SGD spend.

The Citi Rewards Visa or Mastercard should earn at the 10x bonus rewards rates (4 miles per dollar) on points.com (online) transactions, though as we haven’t tried this do be cautious and don’t scold us if the bonus is not credited! A monthly cap of S$1,000 applies for the bonus points.

Card	Miles per S$1	Notes
Citi Rewards Visa / MasterCard (see our review)	4.0	points.com transactions qualify for 10x Rewards Points (4mpd). Remember a monthly cap now applies.

Don’t buy speculatively

As we always say – Alaska miles aren’t for everybody. You should not buy Alaska miles speculatively. Have a solid redemption plan in mind in the near future, or know exactly what you want to redeem now (having checked it’s available), as changes in both partner redemption relationships and valuations can occur.

Summary

One thing’s certain – you should never buy Alaska miles at full price. You shouldn’t even buy them at anything less than 40% bonus, because frankly this is the usual offer. This top 50% bonus offer is historically the best around, previously appearing only once a year but lately appearing more often than that.

As for whether to buy at all, our advice never changes. Have a plan to use these miles first. Alaska miles are useful and valuable (we wouldn’t write about them if they weren’t), and you can achieve excellent value from them in a variety of cases.

That doesn’t mean they are immune from partner agreement changes and devaluations, so as always when buying miles – tread carefully.

Click here to buy Alaska miles

(Cover Photo: MainlyMiles)