Do you recall opening a Brex account (see Brex: The 110K Application, The Approval, But Only Conditionally, Brex 80k Posted! What About Payroll?, & Brex 110k Finally Complete)? I did it for the points and never used it. The company took notice and is giving me 30 days to move my 113,000 points to one of the following (below). Like selecting an arbitrator, I need to strike & rank these choices:
- Air France
- AeroMexico
- Avianca
- SQ
- Asia Miles
- Qantas
- Emirates
I’ll get rid of the following right away because admittedly I know nothing about the programs: AeroMexico, Asia Miles, Qantas.
Next to go is Emirates and SQ. I want to fly in the new first-class suites from the US, but who knows when that will happen. Since these miles expire and I don’t have concrete travel plans, these two programs are out.
That leaves me with Air France and Avianca. I once flew from Detroit to Naples for 18,750 points (see Flying Blue Promo! For 18k, I’ll Ride Coach to Napoli). I got what I paid for (Flying Blu, Literally Depressed: DTW-CDG Air France in Coach).
Turning to Avianca, despite the horror stories, I have found LifeMiles easy to redeem (see LifeMiles Great Customer Service: Seriously, True Story). For 87,000 miles I can fly from Germany to the US on Lufthansa First, something that I have yet to do. That sounds appealing.
Assuming I transfer 87k to LifeMiles, I will have 26k remaining. To diversify, I will transfer those to Air France to increase my balance from 16k to 42k, putting me in striking distance of a business class ticket to Europe.
Typically, I try to save my miles for flights to Asia or the Middle East and look for cheap options to get to Europe (see Iberia Business Booked for 25k Avios! Best Deal Ever?). Since I’m being forced to transfer the miles, I don’t feel guilty about allocating miles for a trip to Europe. Unless you have something better in mind, I believe this is the best course of action.
