Most of us typically use our KrisFlyer miles for relatively straightforward routings, a simple one-way saver redemption or perhaps a return trip or an upgrade, but there’s a less well known way of extracting more value from your miles – the $100 stopover trick.
We haven’t mentioned this strategy much over the last couple of years, due to the complexities of travel planning due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but with border restrictions mostly a thing of the past it’s now a good time to take another look at the savings on offer, for a little extra effort and forward planning.
What’s a stopover?
Singapore Airlines defines a stopover as “any layover longer than 24 hours”. Effectively you’ll fly from A to B via C and spend at least one day in C (your stopover point).
One thing to remember is that you don’t need to use the stopover trick when all you’re doing is a layover (which allows up to 23 hours 55 minutes at your stopover point).
Layover example
Stopover example
The rules
The basic KrisFlyer rules state that you can add one free stopover to a Saver round-trip redemption ticket or two free stopovers to an Advantage round-trip redemption ticket. For one-way awards, one free stopover is only available if you book an Advantage redemption.
In fact the website implies this is the only way to achieve a stopover at all for a one-way award.
Straight away that puts most people off – you want to be securing a Saver award flight wherever you can, since the additional miles cost for an Advantage redemption is almost always very significant and would wipe out any savings made using this method.
Thankfully, this isn’t the whole story though.
What many people don’t realise is that you can add a stopover even to a one-way saver redemption, or add additional stopovers to round-trip saver tickets, for US$100 each.
A one-way Saver Award does not include a complimentary stopover. A round-trip Saver Award includes one complimentary stopover. Each stopover in addition to the number you are entitled to is chargeable at US$100, regardless of the class of travel.
Singapore Airlines
The maximum number of stopovers you can add to a Singapore Airlines itinerary is three, as shown below.
| Award Type | Number of Stopovers | ||
| 1 | 2 | 3 | |
| One-way Saver | US$100 | US$200 | US$300 |
| One-way Advantage | Free | US$100 | US$200 |
| Round-trip Saver | Free | US$100 | US$200 |
| Round-trip Advantage | Free | Free | US$100 |
US$100 is approximately S$139 at 8th May 2022.
How long can you stopover for?
Good news here – it’s anything from 1 day to 1 year, though you can’t ticket the second sector more than one year from the booking date, so for example if you’re booking the first sector six months ahead that gives you a further six-month window to choose the second sector.
Once you’ve flown the first sector, you can shift the second one but it must be used within a year of the first flight completion.
Once the first leg on a stopover itinerary is flown, subsequent legs cannot be rerouted or refunded and must be completed within the one-year ticket validity window. Make sure you have firm plans or sufficient flexibility before committing to this ‘trick’.
$100, you say?
We call this the ‘$100 stopover trick’, but in reality it’s not quite that simple. Depending on how and where you do the stopover, it’s really the ‘up to S$182 stopover trick’, which doesn’t quite have the same ring to it.
The reason is twofold:
- The $100 fee for adding a stopover to a saver award ticket is in US Dollars, which at the time of writing converts to around S$139.
- Taxes and fees increase when you do a stopover, if your alternative would instead be layover. S$43.30 more is payable when you stopover in Singapore on any routing, compared to a layover. This is more likely to affect our non-Singapore readers.
| Stopover in SIN vs. Layover in SIN |
||
| Tax / Fee | Layover | Stopover |
| Singapore Airport Development Levy | S$3.00 | S$10.80 |
| Singapore Passenger Service & Security Fee | S$6.00 | S$35.40 |
| Singapore Aviation Levy | Nil | S$6.10 |
| Total | S$9.00 | S$52.30 |
| Stopover vs. Layover | → | + S$43.30 |
As you can see you are hit with an increase in both the Airport Development Levy and the Passenger Service & Security fee if you do a stopover in Singapore instead of a layover. You’ll also have to pay the Aviation Levy.
Since most of our readers will be taking the stopover in Singapore on a saver award ticket in between two separate trips at different times of year, the additional S$43.30 is payable anyway, and so you won’t notice the difference.
It only affects those whose alternative to a stopover would be a layover, like a London-based reader opting to spend a few nights in Singapore on the way to Bali, rather than a simple transit through Changi.
It can be even worse
It’s a lot worse if you want to stopover somewhere with higher taxes, like Manchester on the way to Houston or Frankfurt on the way to New York.
Since you will pay taxes as a departing passenger for the second flight in those cases, including the dreaded APD in the UK, the additional fees come in at S$174.60 for an Economy Class redemption from Singapore to Houston with a stopover in Manchester and S$119.00 from Singapore to New York with a stopover in Frankfurt.
In both cases that’s over and above the US$100 (S$139) you’ll pay per person for the stopover itself.
The main drawback
To take advantage of the stopover trick on a one-way saver redemption, you have to call KrisFlyer to make your booking (it can’t be done online).
That’s not a huge problem as you can still check redemption availability online first then call to book, just make it clear that you wish to pay the extra US$100 for a stopover as part of your itinerary so the agent does not get confused and try to charge you for two one-way redemptions, or price up an Advantage award ticket with a free stopover.
Yes, we’ve had them try to do both – and yes it is frustrating. Just persevere – it’s worth it, as you’ll see.
How does this save miles?
The beauty of the stopover trick is that you pay the prevailing miles rate from your original origin zone to your ultimate destination zone, which can be significantly less than the alternative, which would be to book two one-way awards instead.
Let’s say you’re based in Singapore and you plan to use your KrisFlyer miles to visit Los Angeles in Business Class, but you would like to spend a few nights in Tokyo on the way.
Ordinarily you’d have to secure the following redemptions:
- A one-way business saver SIN-NRT
47,000 miles + S$52 - A one-way business saver NRT-LAX
92,000 miles + S$62 - Total Cost
139,000 miles + S$114
By paying an extra US$100, you can take advantage of the direct Singapore to Los Angeles miles rate:
- A one-way business saver SIN-LAX (stopover NRT)
95,000 miles + S$114 (taxes) + US$100 / S$139 (stopover fee) - Extra cost
S$139 - Saving: 44,000 miles
Would you pay an extra S$139 to save 44,000 miles? At 0.3 cents per mile, we certainly would!
That’s a nice example of how you can save miles using the stopover trick for a two-centre holiday perhaps, but it’s a but limited. For one thing, most of our Singapore-based readers are then restricted to one of SIA’s five (soon to be four) ‘fifth freedom’ routes:
- Singapore – Tokyo – Los Angeles
- Singapore – Manchester – Houston
- Singapore – Frankfurt – New York
- Singapore – Milan – Barcelona
- Singapore – Rome – Copenhagen*
* Until 1 June 2022
Multiple trips planned over the year
A more useful method for most of our readers based in Singapore is to save using the stopover trick by planning multiple trips well in advance. This way you can save miles by tagging the first leg of your next trip to the end of your first trip.
Sounds a little confusing, so here’s how it works.
Let’s say you’re planning to visit Seoul in September and Auckland the following January using your KrisFlyer miles in Business Class. This would probably be your ‘usual’ redemption:
- A return business class saver SIN-ICN-SIN
94,000 miles + S$83 - A return business class saver SIN-AKL-SIN
124,000 miles + S$143 - Total Cost
218,000 miles + S$226
Here you’ll have to play a slightly different game to get the $100 stopover trick to work. By changing your flight to Seoul to a one-way redemption, you can then book Seoul to Auckland with a stopover in Singapore as your second redemption (in fact, the stopover is your time at home between the two trips).
Then round off with a one-way redemption back to Singapore from Auckland. It’ll look like this:
- A one-way business saver SIN-ICN
47,000 miles + S$52 - A one-way business saver ICN-AKL (stopover SIN)
91,000 miles + S$92 + US$100 (S$139) - A one-way business saver AKL-SIN
62,000 miles + S$38 - Total Cost
200,000 miles + S$321 - Saving: 18,000 miles
Even if you don’t have firm dates for your trip, for example you’re not 100% sure which day you’ll want to head to Auckland, simply book the closest flight you expect for the second part of the ICN-SIN-AKL itinerary with a Business Class saver redemption available.
You’ll then be able to change the date of the SIN-AKL flight for a US$25 fee, even long after you’ve returned to Singapore, provided a saver redemption is available on the date you want. We think that’s still worth it given the number of miles you are saving.
For example, SIN-ICN-SIN in January followed by SIN-AKL-SIN in July, based on the stopover outlined above, but with a separate SIN-PEN-SIN trip in March.
SIA couldn’t care less about you doing this.
The award chart doesn’t always quote a rate
The KrisFlyer award chart for Singapore Airlines redemptions doesn’t always quote a rate for every zone combination, which may lead you to assume that means you can’t make a particular redemption, but it doesn’t always mean that.
For example, if you want to redeem from Paris (Zone 11) to Shanghai (Zone 5), the award chart asks you to contact KrisFlyer Membership Services to confirm the rate.
Well you don’t even have to call, a simple search on the Singapore Airlines website or app will show you that the saver award rates on this routing are:
- Economy: 42,500 miles
- Premium: 86,500 miles
- Business: 101,000 miles
- First / Suites: 138,000 miles
That’s right – it’s less than going from Paris to Hong Kong (Zone 4), a much shorter flight from Singapore! Except in Premium Economy that is, where it’s more expensive to go to Shanghai than Hong Kong, which makes little sense when the other classes are all cheaper.
In fact the reason a Zone 11 to Zone 5 award rate is not shown is because you can’t do Paris – Singapore – Beijing redemption, which is also Zone 11 to Zone 5, but you can do Paris – Singapore – Shanghai.
More about the cryptic ‘no backtracking’ rule later on!
First Class saves even more
As you’d expect, the stopover trick gives you an even bigger saving in First Class or Suites.
Let’s say you want to do a Paris and a Sydney trip over the 12 months. Using the stopover method above we applied to the Seoul / Auckland combination in Business Class, the first thing you need to know is how many miles you’ll be charged from Paris (Zone 11) to Sydney (Zone 9).
This is the routing you’ll use the stopover on and where you’ll make the miles saving.
As you can see, the award rate is 163,000 miles one-way.
That’s only 38,000 miles more for Paris – Singapore – Sydney than just Paris – Singapore. Normally a saver First / Suites redemption from Singapore to Sydney is 85,000 miles, so we’re saving 47k here.
Here’s how it looks.
Regular Redemption
- A return first class saver SIN-CDG-SIN
250,000 miles - A return first class saver SIN-SYD-SIN
170,000 miles - Total Cost
420,000 miles
Stopover Redemption
- A one-way first class saver SIN-CDG
125,000 miles - A one-way first class saver CDG-SYD (stopover SIN)
163,000 miles - A one-way business saver SYD-SIN
85,000 miles - Total Cost
373,000 miles - Saving: 47,000 miles
That 47,000 miles saving is more than enough for a Business Class flight from Singapore to Tokyo or Seoul, or a return Business Class flight to Manila, so this is definitely worth doing for an additional cost of just S$139.
Closer to home
You don’t have to think long distance to make use of the $100 stopover trick. It can even save you miles on trips closer to home, for example if you’re using your KrisFlyer miles to fly Business Class to Jakarta one month, then the following month doing the same again but to Bangkok instead, the two return saver awards would normally set you back a total of 81,000 miles + S$159.
Simply repeat the process above to save 19,000 miles by instead booking:
- A one-way business saver SIN-CGK
19,000 miles + S$52 - A one-way business saver CGK-BKK (stopover SIN)
21,500 miles + S$76 + US$100 (S$139) - A one-way business saver BKK-SIN
21,500 miles + S$30 - Total Cost
62,000 miles + S$297 - Saving: 19,000 miles
You’re saving enough miles here for a future Singapore – Bali redemption in Business Class, for an additional cost of around S$140.
If you don’t know exactly when you’ll head to Bangkok in this example, just pick an available date later in the year for the SIN-BKK sector since you can always change it for a US$25 fee. Then book the final BKK-SIN redemption once you know your plans.
Use a layover if you can
Most of our readers based in Singapore will be using the stopover trick to save miles by adding two trips at different times of year together on the same redemption booking, as we’ve shown in the examples above.
For some people though, especially those based outside Singapore who may want a brief stop on the way through, it pays to try and do a layover instead.
You can leave Changi airport’s transit area on any layover, provided you meet Singapore’s entry criteria.
For example a few years ago my parents flew from Perth to Hong Kong in Business Class on Singapore Airlines using their KrisFlyer miles, but they also stopped over to see us in Singapore for the night en-route.
Getting into Singapore at 7.30pm gave us enough time to take them to their favourite Zi Char place (ok it’s our favourite too!), then after a good night’s sleep it was a relaxing morning for them before heading off to the airport again for a lunchtime departure to Hong Kong.
Remember, they didn’t the stopover trick to do this! It was a completely free ‘layover’ of 17 hours 35 minutes in Singapore.
Better still, 36,500 miles each is the usual rate from Perth to Singapore, but also applies for those continuing to Zones 2, 3 and 4 (Hong Kong is Zone 4), so effectively the 4-hour flight from Singapore to Hong Kong in the 2013 Business Class was free for them.
If they wanted to stay in Singapore longer (> 24 hours) and use the stopover trick they would pay an extra US$100 (S$139) each, plus S$43.30 in extra taxes (that total of S$182 each we spoke about above), but in this case it wasn’t necessary.
Checked luggage on a layover
If you have a long layover in Singapore, like in the Perth – Singapore – Hong Kong example used above, you can ask for your bags to be checked only to Singapore at the point of departure. They are happy to do this, and it’s commonly expected when passengers have an overnight layover as most will want access to their belongings.
Alternatively you can have your luggage checked all the way to your final destination on a layover if you wish. If you can pack enough items in your hand luggage to see you through for less than 24 hours, this may actually be preferable.
Star Alliance awards
Stopovers are permitted on award tickets booked partly or wholly with a Star Alliance carrier or SIA partner airline, but there are a few things to be aware of:
- As with Singapore Airlines saver awards, a single complimentary stopover is only permitted on round-trip itineraries.
- Additional stopovers are charged at US$100 each.
- The mileage required for one-way Star Alliance awards that include at least one stopover will be calculated based on each flight sector in the itinerary (so unfortunately you need to do a return booking to benefit from any miles saving).
- The rules on award stopovers for the most restrictive carrier will apply. Some airlines don’t allow stopovers at all on a saver redemption, even a round-trip one, others significantly restrict the duration of a stopover.
- No stopovers on domestic tickets (e.g. San Francisco to Washington with a stopover in Denver won’t work).
- No stopovers on intra-Europe itineraries (e.g. Rome to London with a stopover in Munich won’t work).
- No stopovers within the country of departure (e.g. Phuket to Hong Kong with a stopover in Bangkok won’t work).
- A stopover is defined as a connection above four hours in an itinerary within or between the United States, Canada, Puerto Rico or the U.S. Virgin Islands, or a connection above 24 hours in all other itineraries.
- Backtracking is not permitted. Travel must be made via the most direct route. Rules vary from airline to airline.
Remember this does not prevent layovers on these tickets, so you can potentially squeeze up to 24 hours in another city en-route to your final destination, if flight schedules allow, and not even pay a stopover fee on a saver redemption.
The major exception is within the USA, where a transit of just four hours or longer equals a stopover in SIA’s eyes, and means paying sector-by-sector award rates on a one-way itinerary.
No backtracking, but what does it mean?
One of the more poorly understood concepts for KrisFlyer redemption tickets is the ‘no backtracking’ rule. We only say it’s poorly understood because Singapore Airlines keep the exact criteria to itself!
Backtracking, according to the airline, is “when a journey does not occur in the same direction as that in which it was begun”.
That’s a bit vague.
For example if you want to redeem from Bangkok to Taipei via Singapore (with the intention to stopover in SIN) that’s not allowed, as it’s backtracking. Fair enough, it certainly looks like it is.
If you want to redeem from Bangkok to Beijing however, that’s not backtracking – it’s a valid routing, despite being a more acute angle than BKK-SIN-TPE.
Distance, not only direction, also plays a part, and by that we mean relative distance between the two legs of the journey. Singapore Airlines may also override a standard rule to offer redemptions on a market it wants to serve (e.g. Bangkok to Singapore to London, which is allowed).
Many routes you think probably are backtracking – like Kuala Lumpur or Penang to Singapore to Shanghai, often aren’t. Likewise routes you might think aren’t backtracking, like Delhi to Singapore to Beijing, often are.
The good news is you don’t have to second guess this. You can check if your stopover is a valid routing (i.e. doesn’t violate the ‘no backtracking’ rule) by searching it as a basic redemption (e.g. KUL-PVG, to see if it’s valid as a layover).
Previously the website or app would generate a backtracking warning in this case, but now it simply prices the itinerary as the sum of two separate redemptions, rather than at the applicable zone-to-zone rate.
For example to redeem a saver award from India (Zone 6) to Thailand (Zone 3) the following rates apply per the award chart.
As you can see from the note, SIA already knows not all routings between these zones will price at these rates – some will be regarded as backtracking.
You can identify which routes are valid and which are not by making a basic redemption search.
As you can see here, Delhi to Bangkok is considered backtracking, so the system simply adds the Delhi – Singapore and Singapore – Bangkok redemption rates (39,000 + 21,500 = 60,500 miles in this case) because the zone-to-zone rate does not apply.
However, Delhi to Phuket is not backtracking, and can be locked in at the applicable rate from the chart of 39,000 miles.
Other routings between these zones which constitute backtracking include Chennai to Bangkok (but Mumbai to Bangkok is ok) and Delhi to Beijing (but Mumbai to Beijing is ok).
It’s a bit of a minefield, so just search a standard award if you’re not sure and see which award rate is being charged.
You can also use the KrisFlyer online mileage redemption calculator to check whether a route is considered backtracking (an error message for a city pair = backtracking).
Checking the taxes
The taxes and fees you’ll pay for your stopover routing depend on the routes themselves. Essentially if you are using the stopover trick to have time at home in between your two redemptions, like a Seoul trip followed by an Auckland trip later in the year, the taxes are no different than they would be if you booked those two trips independently.
For stopovers / layovers in places like Manchester on the way to Houston or Frankfurt on the way to New York, it’s a little more complicated.
The easiest way to confirm what the taxes will be is to make a dummy award booking on the Singapore Airlines website for the routing you are proposing as an Advantage award. Disregard the miles rate (you won’t actually be booking this), but the taxes and fees will be accurate.
The usual taxes and fees rate for a Singapore to New York flight via Frankfurt with no stopover is S$108.70 (again, don’t worry about the Advantage miles rate). Above the search results you can add a stopover and then check how the taxes change.
The taxes and fees for this routing with a stopover in Frankfurt are S$227.70 each, S$119 more per person than transiting with no stopover.
You will still have to add on US$100 (S$139) for each stopover per person, as this will not reflect in the charges for an Advantage award stopover (remember, you’ll actually be booking a saver award), so in this case you’re looking at around S$366 per person instead of S$109.
A small catch when using this method to check the taxes and fees is that the online system will not let you search and book an award itinerary including a stopover of more than 30 days, even though you can book a stopover of up to a year over the phone.
Again we are only using this method to check the taxes and fees, not actually book the award itself, so just pick valid dates with Advantage availability in order to generate the quote.
Free stopover on a return saver award
If you are booking a single stopover on a round-trip saver award with immediate availability on all flight sectors this can be processed online, provided the duration of your stopover is up to 30 days.
If your stopover duration will be longer than 30 days, however, you’ll need to call to book an itinerary like this (with no stopover fee charged).
Is the stopover fee refundable?
Yes, provided you cancel before taking the first sector of the journey the US$100 fee is refundable when you elect to redeposit your miles and not go ahead with the trip. However, the miles redeposit fee (US$75 for a Saver award) is still charged as usual.
Once you have set off on the first leg of your journey, you can no longer refund any stopover fees charged for that itinerary.
Other catches
- You can’t waitlist for a stopover routing, all the stages must be available for immediate redemption. As we’ve mentioned already, you can book a saver award for a date you know is available then if your preferred date comes up, simply change across to it for a US$25 fee.
- For mixed-class awards, for example if you want to fly Business Class from Seoul to Singapore but you can only secure an Economy Class redemption from Singapore to Auckland, the whole itinerary will be priced at the Business Class rate.
- The Stopover Trick cannot be combined with Spontaneous Escapes (Promo) awards.
Summary
There are some fantastic savings to be had by using the $100 stopover trick on a saver redemption next time you plan a trip with your KrisFlyer miles, especially in Business Class and even more so for First Class or Suites redemptions.
Some interrogation on the Singapore Airlines website will help you determine what the taxes and fees will come to (often these are higher than for layovers), and also which routings are and aren’t valid in line with the slightly cryptic ‘no backtracking’ rule.
Have a think about using the $100 stopover trick next time you plan a trip – and let us know what inventive routings you can come up with to save even more of those precious KrisFlyer miles.
(Cover Photo: Shutterstock)
would you be able to redeem a saver biz ticket first, then “convert” it by calling up SQ and adding the other leg (assuming the “rules” are all complied to and there is saver availability for that 2nd leg “
What happens if you do not use the second leg of the flight after stopover?
Now you can also use the SQ website Live Chat to book the awards redemption and also adding a stopover after you made a redemption through SQ website. I have tried it end of last year and it works just fine.
thanks info! does this mean you can book the 1st leg/segment first then add on afterwards the stopover with the 2nd leg?
Thanks for this very thorough post…thanks to you I was able to change a flight from EWR-SIN to EWR-SIN-REP for a side trip to Angkor Wat, sitting in the killer business class “throne” seat for the two hour hop to Siem Reap. I was planning that side trip anyway, and using your advice was able to add this leg for $100 and no more points – awesome!
How far ahead did you have to book the EWR-SIN? Finding it difficult to get an award tix for a flight 7 months from now.
If I have booked a SFO-SIN segment already, can I use this stopover trick to add SIN-AMD to the same booking if saver tickets are available for SIN-AMD?
Pretty sure the stopover trick for saver is dead.
Hi please add a disclaimer at the top of this article to reflect the latest info that the paid stopover option has been removed! Almost spent 40 minutes looking up how to add a stopover based on this article before realizing that the rule was updated in August last year!