The whole mileage redemption experience has changed for the worse since COVID, but if I had to pick the biggest change, it would have to be business/first class redemption.

I feel like there are very few miles seats left, not to mention the mileage deductions have gone through the roof. So,

• Using Korean Air miles to get seats on Korean Air as soon as they open up
• Using AA or Alaska miles to get JAL business/first class 2 weeks before departure

That's about the best we can do for now.

One alternative in this situation is the EVA Airlines mileage program, a Taiwanese airline. 

While there are downsides to using EVA's own miles, having to fly back and forth to Taiwan and Korea, and the fact that mileage seats are equally hard to come by during peak season, I think it's an option worth seriously considering if you're one of those "I must fly business" people.

In today's post, we'll give you a basic introduction to the EVA Mileage Program, including how to ticket online, what to look out for, and how to earn miles.

1. Brief Introduction to EVA Aviation

EVA is a Taiwanese airline, and I guess you could say it's the flag carrier of Taiwan.

EVA Airlines got off to a slower start than Taiwan's national carrier, China Airlines, but the airline is ahead of the curve in terms of number of flights, routes, and airline alliances.

If you're like me, you're going from the United States to Taiwan. Long-haul international flightsand in Asia Short-haul international flightsthree or four times, and my impression is that the seats, food, wine, etc. are much better than on Korean airlines.

Also important to the Magicians is EVA Airlines' U.S. mainland routesis significant. 

• East is New York (JFK) and Toronto (YYZ)
• Central is Chicago (ORD) and Houston (IAH)
• The West is served by LA (LAX), San Fran (SFO), Seattle (SEA), and Vancouver (YVR).

We are now flying on eight routes.

It doesn't compare to Korean Air's 12, but with eight routes, it's the same as ANA and one less than JAL. It's a lot more than ANA's four.

2. EVA Mileage Deduction

EVA is part of Star Alliance, so you can use miles from Star Alliance airlines like Asiana, Air Canada, United, ANA, Lifemiles, and more. In fact, in the past few years, they've released quite a bit of mileage space to their partners, even if it's not as plentiful, so I've been able to get a family business ticket for 4 people.

That changed dramatically during the pandemic.

At the moment, there are no seats released on partner airlines, so I'm guessing you're stuck with EVA's own miles.

So let's look at the EVA air deduction, shall we?

EVA has a mileage program called Infinity Mileagelands.

Below ChartsAs you can see, business seats on Asia routes to/from the West are only 7.5k each way, while Central/East are only 8k each way.

So, round-trip, it's 150,000 in the West and 160,000 in the Central/East.

If you look at the miles deduction alone, it's not an absolute bargain.

• ANA has a round-trip ticketing requirement, but it's still possible to ticket for 9.5k miles round-trip.
• Asiana has 60,000 one-way tickets.

Of course, it's not so bad that you can't use it at all,

• Air Canada requires 7.5k miles each way.
• For United, they start at a minimum of 100,000 miles, so I'm going to have to use the

EVA business one-way is now 80k, so I guess you could say it's the middle of the road in terms of deductions.

But perhaps most importantly, the seats are only available if you use EVA miles.

It doesn't matter how cheap the mileage credit is, if you don't have a seat, it's a wash.

3. How to earn EVA miles: Citi ThankYou + Capital One "miles 

So how do you earn EVA miles?

For those of you in the US, converting credit card points to EVA miles is the best way to go.

You have two options

1) Citi ThankYou Points, 1:1 conversion

First, Citi's own points, ThankYou Points, are 1:1 convertible.

Citi ThankYou isn't as easy to earn as it used to be, but the sign-up isn't as bad for the Citi Strata Premier card, so I think it's worth a shot.

2) Convert "miles" from Capital One, 2:1.5 ratio

The second option is to convert your Capital One "miles".

In this case, the ratio is that you get 750 miles of EVA for every 1,000 'miles' you spend, so the ratio itself puts you at a disadvantage compared to Citi.

However, Capital One "miles" have one big advantage: they're relatively easy to earn. 

A card that many magicians consider a lifetime card, the Venture X Cardin the list. Venture card with a relatively low annual feeis also possible.

Additionally, if you're a business owner with heavy card spend, you might want to consider the Business Venture X or Spark Cash Plus.

Here, the Venture X has Dorrance capabilities, so we can pass those "miles" directly to EVA.

Spark Cash Plus does not have a Dorrance feature, According to Tim's review, you can add cash to your own or someone else's Dorrance card. From there, you can transfer them to EVA miles. If you already have the Venture X, the Dorrance card, or the regular Venture card, this is probably cheaper from an annual fee perspective.

4. How to search for and redeem EVA miles

Next, we'll show you how to search and ticket mileage seats on the EVA site with pictures.

1) Already signed up for EVA's mileage programon the assumption that you have.

To search for Mile Seats, you'll need to click on Infinity MileageLands in the substantive menu and then select Mile Redemption from the new menu that pops up. Or you can click Yaw Link Tap to go directly to it.

2) On the changed screen, tap Award Ticket.

3) Press the Login button at the bottom of the changed screen.

4) Now, we're officially at the Mile Seat Search screen.

As we'll explain later, one-way and round-trip tickets do not differ in mileage deductions, but do differ in stopover availability.

I'm just going to look at one way, so I'm going to set it to One Way, and I'm going to type in Incheon to Chicago, business class.

5) On the same screen, I'm going to select a departure date of approximately March 20th. And then I'm going to do a search for traveling alone with no companion, which I'll explain later, because when you put in the companion information, you have to put in the member number, you have to put in the password, and it's complicated.

6) I do a search and luckily, it shows that seats are all available around March 20, so I'll pick my first itinerary and hit Confirm.

7) Here's an important warning: it says Available, but it doesn't mean 100% is available, it says we'll need to enter passenger information to know for sure. Click Confirm.

8) Mileage deduction = 80,000 business one-way miles, it says to check.

9) You are now on the screen to enter the passenger information. Please fill it in.

10) There's a fuel surcharge, but it's a very good deal, about $100. With taxes, it's about $180.

The miles are just over 80,000 miles for a one-way ticket.

11) At the bottom, click Reservation to confirm the reservation itself.

12) You know that reservation and ticketing are different, right? Reservation is to reserve a seat, and ticketing is to pay for the use of the seat. You said that you only reserve a seat, so you only reserve a seat, and you need to click Online Ticketing later.

13) Okay, so now you have a confirmed reservation, but it doesn't have a ticket attached to it, so you can't get on the plane with just this reservation.

14) The time between booking confirmation and ticketing seems to be (in my case) about 3 days. The image below is from the booking confirmation email.

15) For ticketing Award Ticket page You'll need to press the Online Ticketing button at the bottom.

16) The ticketing process itself is simple as all you need to do is enter your card number and you will receive your e-ticket number immediately.

17) But there's one thing to note here.

The card that pays the fees and taxes must be in your name.and

The problem is that you have to show that card when you check in at the airport.

Korean Air used to do this in the past, and it's the same way, so it's best to use the card you normally use and always carry with you.

18) I wanted to see what the cash purchase price would be, so I did a search on Google Flights and found about $2,500.

I got 80,000 Citi points + redemption + tax, which was worth about $2,500, so I think I got about 3 cents per point.

5. Precautions for EVA ticketing

There are a few more things to watch out for besides the credit card name.

1) Miles expire after 3 years

The biggest problem is that miles have a short expiration date.

US airline miles don't expire or automatically extend for a certain amount of time once you've earned/redeemed them, right?

EVAs have a similar policy to ANA airlines, with miles automatically expiring after 3 years and cannot be extended.

Therefore, you should only turn over miles if you're flying EVA.

2) $50 fee for changes, cancellations

A $50 fee is charged for date or itinerary changes, and for canceling a mileage ticket before boarding.

3) Stopovers are only available on round-trip itineraries

EVAs can be ticketed one-way at half the mileage credit required for a round-trip.

From that perspective, there seems to be no reason to ticket a round-trip.

However, there is one major difference. This is the availability of stop losses.

The rules say that you can't make a stopover on a one-way trip, but you can make one stopover per year on a round trip.

If you're traveling to South Korea and want to stop in Taiwan for a few days on the way, you'll need to buy a round-trip ticket.

4) Family ticketing is not easy

For Korean Air or Asiana, you have to register your family with a family relationship certificate and go through a lot of complicated processes to get a family ticket, right?

EVA is just as complex.

Information on Flyertalkfor example.

• Fill out the Online Service Form and email or fax it to the Service Center
• Sign up a family member of your choice as a nominee
• Transfer miles from your account to a desired family member's mile account (transfer)
• In a situation where everyone on the flight has their own miles, you can use the
• Log in to your account and enter your entire family's account information to search for and purchase tickets

It says you need to go through this process ;;

That's why I think the easiest way to make things work for a couple traveling together is to create separate accounts, convert the card company's points/miles to each of your accounts from scratch, and then ticket them.

5) It will take 2-3 days to convert your miles.

I switched to EVA from Citi.

It took me about three days to get over the mileage because it was a weekend.

I googled Flyertalk and found out that it's not automatic, it's manually checked and processed by someone at the Taiwan headquarters, so it can take longer if it's a weekend, and even if it's a weekday, it's at least two days.

So, it's probably a good idea to make sure you have enough seats available before you flip miles.

I know some of you might be thinking that you can just book a seat and then transfer miles, but I've tried it and you can't book a reservation at all without enough miles in your account ;);

Let's wrap up today's post.

Business, first class ticketing is the best way to get the most value out of your miles/points, but things aren't what they used to be.

It's a long way back to Taiwan, but I've heard that EVA tickets are sometimes available if you use EVA's own miles, so it's worth planning ahead if you need them.