EXPIRED This article relates to an offer or promotion which has now expired.
You never have to wait long between Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan ‘buy miles’ promotions. The last one wound up just a month ago, but this time it’s a short term 6-day promotion.
Unlike most Alaska Miles deals, which offer a percentage bonus offer (typically 40-50%), this one is a percentage discount instead. That’s strange because a percentage bonus always sounds better (30% discount is equivalent to a 43% bonus in cost per mile terms).
Indeed a 50% bonus, which Alaska sometimes offers, is only a 33% discount, which sounds a lot worse, so it’s strange they have chosen to refer to it this way.
Nonetheless here are the details this time round.
The June 2019 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 both Eddie and I are targeted for purchases of 20,000 – 60,000 miles attracting the discount rate of 30% (anything less than that is not discounted). Others may have a different discount structure from what we’ve seen in the past from Alaska.
- 1,000 – 19,000 miles – no bonus (2.96 US ¢ / mile)
- 20,000 – 60,000 miles – 30% discount (2.07 US ¢ / mile)
Offer ends 1st July
There’s almost exactly six days left to take part in this sale, as the offer closes at 11.59pm PST on Sunday 30th June 2019, which is 2.59pm on Monday 1st July 2019 Singapore time.
Alaska are strict about the offer deadline and it will completely disappear at the end time (we’ve tested it to the minute before), so we’d recommend acting before approximately 2pm on 1st July in Singapore if you’re interested.
The JAL stopover ‘trick’
There are many uses of Alaska Miles for members based in Singapore, but without question one of the best is the JAL stopover ‘trick’.
This is a ‘return’ JAL Business Class flight from Singapore to Japan for 25,000 Alaska miles plus around US$60 in taxes. The only snag? You’ll need to either depart on your first flight somewhere other than Singapore (e.g. Kuala Lumpur, Jakarta or Bangkok) and then fly back to Singapore at the end, or start in Singapore then end the trip in one of those places.
Here’s how it works in a bit more detail.
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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. |
On our most recent trip in April we commenced the journey in Bangkok as we wanted to start in and JAL doesn’t fly there directly from Singapore.
After positioning on a cheap Scoot flight SIN-BKK, then sampling the excellent and relatively new Qatar Airways Bangkok lounge for a few hours, we took the non-stop overnight BKK-KIX flight.
For the return sector we were leaving from Tokyo and flew 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.
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.
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| 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 in our opinion 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.
Alternatively use Avios and position to Hong Kong on Cathay for 22,000 points in Business (unfortunately this recently increased from 20,000 points), 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. Sometimes it’s more, sometimes it’s less.
Other good redemptions
Japan Airlines
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| 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
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