Just checking to see if anything has changed in the FF world. Are American Airlines and Virgin Atlantic still the only two airlines that allow one way flights with miles? Thinking about doing a transatlantic in the fall.

I know AA and British Air do. Hoping all airlines will jump on board, it makes it so much easier !!!

I just read at Amex that there is a 30% bonus right now if you transfer miles from membership rewards to your BA account. I don't have any experience trying to get flights with BA with points. Are they impossible? I have a ton of Delta points that I can't use because there are never any flights (except for double mileage) for either domestic or international flights.

Julie, We're using BA f.f. miles to fly RT LAX-JFK on AA this Spring. We had a BA f.f. itinerary earlier one flight on BA and one flight on AA, no problem getting it but cancelled that trip and redeposited the miles.

Sounds good. The BA site for checking on flight availability has been down for a couple of hours at least, so I can't check on flights. Maybe it's overloaded with all the flights being cancelled in Europe because of the weather.

BA charges a fairly hefty fuel surcharge on their award flights.

United also does one-way awards now.

Peter, is this hefty fee only for flying on BA ? I can't remember what we paid for our RT AA flight using BA miles (all domestic) but didn't remember them being excessive ???

There's also a deal right now that if you book a BA award for travel through (I think) October 2011, you get 20% of your miles back. This helps make up for some of those hefty fees. I think this is tied to the BA Visa card that many obtained when the 100,000 miles was being given at the beginning of the year.

I actually redeposited our BA Award tickets for WINES and rebooked with Delta/AF. It saved more than $300 pp in fees, even with the redeposit fee.

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Eugene

That sounds good Eugene. We have over 400,000 miles between both of our BA credit cards, all in 1 family account. We never once flew BA, ALL from getting cc's. I wish they'd bring back that promotion again.

Oh how I wish as well. And yes, I have heard bad stories about BA and the fuel/other surcharges.

Delta has horrible fees too. Continental doesn't and I have a lot of Continental miles but I don't think they do one way flights. Once they merge with United I should be able to use my CO miles for one way flights on United but I think that's still a long way off.
When I look at a ticket on Delta to the UK it's about $900 or 60K miles (the LOW amount of mileage believe it or not) and about $450 in taxes and fees. It's hardly worth all the hassle of trying to find a flight and using 60k miles to save $450. Bring back Northwest! How I miss them.

I have priced British Air vs Continental to London and BA charges double for "taxes/fees. Outrageous!
Julie, I hope you're right and that once Continental and United merge we can use CO miles for one way awards on CO flights.
For WINES we are using Virgin Atlantic and Lufthansa (with FF miles) and taxes are low.

Here is more info, more codeshares between AA, BA and Iberia.
http://aa.mediaroom.com/index.php?s=43&item=3102

I'm not jumping on the bonus promotion for converting miles to BA.

Some anecdotal evidence from our tickets booked for the August Russian River cruise; business class; connecting through Heathrow:

outbound to Moscow - one way award on AA/BA - booked through AA - $47.30 pp taxes/fees

return from Berlin - one way award on BA - booked through BA - $350.42 pp taxes/fees

Does anyone know if Continental will be United and go into Star Alliance, or will it go the other way, and *Alliance will lose United?

Continental joined Star Alliance last year in preparation for the merger. So the combined United/Continental will be Star Alliance.

Oh goody! This seems to be the "super Alliance", is it not? Gary Leff seems to love *Alliance for getting award travel. I have had very good luck burning off many points over the past couple of years. Ran into a wall for TUT, and Gary in about 30 minutes had me set with a choice of Biz or First. I had never flown First before and said YES!

Fortunately, Regent did the most wonderful job of taking care of me when that cruise was canceled, even for my award travel that wasn't. Sorry for getting off topic.

On topic, USAir will still not do one way to my knowledge.

Hi Olivia

Continental joined Star Alliance a few years ago. The resulting merged airline (sometime in 2011 or 2012) will be Star Alliance - Continental colors on planes & interiors; United as the operating name - or that's the plan as of now

In the meantime, it's a mess trying to book the codeshare flights. Buy ticket on Continental website; have to check in on UA website. UA website stores no data re: Continental customers. They love to tell you your ticketed information doesn't match your ID, but won't store the updated information to print on the boarding pass. US Air & United have this all worked out.

I've flown a few times on both United and Continental since they officially merged in October. The Continental service benefits are gone & there's no rush to add the 35-36" legroom of Economy Plus. It appears to this loyal & frequent traveler we have achieved a Lowest Common Denominator airline. $6 for direct TV, anyone?

Cheers, Anne