30% bonus transferring Starpoints to British Air

[DeniseM]

More info. in this thread on flyertalk:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=550048

 

[duke]

Is British Air a good FF program?
Is it a good idea to transfer StarPoints now into the British Air FF program and hold them there for future use on partner airlines?

 

[sharktzu]

Denise, do you think this is a good deal? I read it earlier on FT myself. Ordinarily, I wouldn't transfer starwood points for miles but this promo has me thinking. Does anyone know whether BA points have an expiration limit and what their availility is like to use points? I stopped doing anything with NWA because I could never use my miles when I wanted to.

 

[DeniseM]

I don't have any experience with British Air, but the thread on flyertalk has a lot of info. about it. That would probably be a good place to ask, although I know there are Tuggers who have used this promo in the past, as well.

By partner airlines, do you mean BA's partners or SPG partners?

 

[DeniseM]

Denise, do you think this is a good deal? I read it earlier on FT myself. Ordinarily, I wouldn't transfer starwood points for miles but this promo has me thinking. Does anyone know whether BA points have an expiration limit and what their availility is like to use points? I stopped doing anything with NWA because I could never use my miles when I wanted to.

We use our Starpoints for free tix to Hawaii every summer, so I like using points for miles, but have no experience with BA. I would ask about the promo on flyertalk - lots of expertise there. Besides the 30% bonus, you also get the standard bonus from Starwood, (1 point = 1.25 miles) so it seems like a good deal if you fly BA.

 

[duke]

Here's the link to join BA FF program.
Link is from Flyertalk ViewFromTheWing.

http://www.britishairways.com/travel/dinersclubec/public/en_us

 

[TobyM]

I can give you my experience using British Airways miles. When I bought at Westin Mission Hills, the incentive to buy was 125,000 starpoints. Someone on Tug at the time posted that British Airways was giving a 100% bonus for transferring starpoints. But first you had to be a member of British Airways FF program. Typically, that meant that you had to have made a paid flight on BA to become a member. Because of that double promotion, we were able to turn 120,000 points into 300,000 miles. That was a good deal. I don't think I will use the 30% bonus this time. I found it to be a real challenge to get flights I wanted on British Airways and I found their policies regarding ticket changes much more restrictive than United. And to use the miles to upgrade a ticket, you had to purchase a fairly expensive ticket to qualify for the upgrade.

 

[skim118]

We also benefited from a TUG member's posting a few years ago when we converted 120,000 starpoints to 300,000 BA miles(sorry for not remembering who it was, but he posted in the Marriott forum first).

This current deal is not good for us since we still have lots of BA miles still(we use BA miles Visa also).

BA miles are good for travel to Europe(not just London) and they have great cash & points deals to Asia & amazing islands like Seychelles, Maldives,.. and the amazing Club World upgrades for BA miles.

BA miles are not good for travelling on it's partners like AA because you cannot change tickets once you book them(no way to redeposit even for a fee).

BA miles do not expire once there is activity every 3 years (BA visa or just a Avis car rental will do.

The hardest part of the BA program is to join them first; we had to call many numbers before they would even let us join them, because they want to you fly an Economy Plus ticket before they would let you join in !!