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Updated 05.22.2023
In the past week or two, we've been getting a steady stream of reports of Korean Air seats going dry.
Please be careful not to rush to hand over your points first, as you may lose out.
================
Here's some good news, a ray of sunshine in a sea of devaluation.
- British Airways Virgin AtlanticThis
- On March 2, we became a full-fledged airline member of Skyteam, an airline alliance.
- Virgin Miles can now be used to book seats on Korean Air.
- Mileage deductions are very nice in Economy, and the
- There's even no fuel surcharge.
In today's post, we'll cover 1) an introduction to Virgin Airlines, 2) mileage deductions, 3) what to look out for when redeeming Virgin Airlines miles, and 4) how to earn Virgin miles.
Table of Contents
1. What is Virgin Atlantic?
Virgin Airways is a member of the Virgin Group, a multinational corporation, and is a major airline in the United Kingdom.
Richard Branson, known as an eccentric businessman, was one of the founding members. Today, Virgin Group owns 511 TP3T, with the remaining 491 TP3T held by Delta Air Lines in the US.
Virgin Airlines has a mileage program called Flying Club.
There are some overwhelming honey routes that make this a very popular program for magicians. For example,
- One of the best first-class seats in existence Ticketing ANA Airlines 1st Class with the lowest deductibleYou can.
- You can also book nonstop Delta business flights from the US to Europe for 50,000 miles each way (although seats are hard to come by).
- Itineraries on Virgin also allow you to get cheap economy tickets on US West to Europe routes.
In addition to this Now an official SkyTeam member, Korean Air will also be able to issue tickets on direct routesfor the first time.
2. mileage deduction
With Delta, the alpha dog of SkyTeam, holding a 491 TP3T stake, it was a foregone conclusion that Virgin would become a SkyTeam member at some point.
The question was, how would the mileage deduction be determined?
To be honest, I didn't have high expectations.
- The trend nowadays is for airlines to introduce variable price deductions and do away with mileage redemption charts altogether.
- For Virgin Previously, on New Year's Day 2021, delta deductions increased significantly and without warningso there was no reason to believe they would prioritize consumers.
With that in mind, today's bulletin korpop00 wroteWhat he told me was very flickering in a positive way.
Virgin Airlines used to have separate charts for each individual airline.
It appears that some of the newer SkyTeam airlines have adopted a common chart.
Korean Air, Vietnam Airlines, and Taiwan's China Airlines all seem to use the same distance chart.
Anyway, the important thing is that the subtraction is very nice.
Chart of distance-based deductions on Virgin's Korean Air pageis as follows
And here's how the MileCalc site charts Korean Air's distance to each destination, based on departures from Incheon
| Airport name | Airport code | Distance | Ikon one-way deductions | Biz one-way deduction |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Haneda | HND | 735 | 7,000 | 15,500 |
| Guam | GUM | 2001 | 11,500 | 35,000 |
| Bangkok | BKK | 2,277 | 15,500 | 40,000 |
| Bali | DPS | 3,262 | 20,500 | 60,000 |
| Honolulu | HNL | 4,576 | 25,500 | 75,000 |
| Vancouver | YVR | 5,108 | 31,000 | 85,000 |
| Seattle | SEA | 5,216 | 31,000 | 85,000 |
| San Francisco | SFO | 5,658 | 31,000 | 85,000 |
| LA | LAX | 5,994 | 31,000 | 85,000 |
| Las Vegas | LAS | 6,021 | ** 31,000 ** | 85,000 |
| Chicago | ORD | 6,551 | 37,000 | 100,000 |
| Toronto | YYZ | 6,612 | 37,000 | 100,000 |
| Boston | BOS | 6,828 | 37,000 | 100,000 |
| Dallas (Texas) | DFW | 6,841 | 37,000 | 100,000 |
| New York | JFK | 6,906 | 37,000 | 100,000 |
| Washington | IAD | 6,958 | 37,000 | 100,000 |
| Atlanta | ATL | 7,152 | 50,000 | 140,000 |
To summarize,
- Incheon - Ikon, Guam one-way for 11,500 miles less
- Incheon-Hawaii is 25,500 miles less Ikon one-way
- Western US from LA, San Fran to Ikon 31,000 miles one way (Las Vegas should be 3.7 but comes out to 3.1 due to distance)
- Central, Eastern U.S. less 37,000 miles one-way on Ikon
- Lastly, the longest leg is Atlanta to Ikon for 50,000 miles one way ㅠㅠ
Overall, with the exception of Atlanta, this is a very good mileage redemption.
From Incheon, 11,500 miles to Guam, 25,500 miles to Hawaii, and 31,000 miles to the West is a great deal.
3. What to watch out for when redeeming Virgin Miles
There are a few things to keep in mind when redeeming Virgin Miles for Korean Air tickets.
1) 3-way ticketing is possible without family registration, but family miles cannot be combined
The Virgin Miles program is basically the complete opposite of Korean Air.
In the case of Korean Air, you can combine miles between family members through family registration, and you can only issue miles to family members.
Virgin, like other U.S. airlines, doesn't allow families to combine miles, but they can ticket anyone without restriction without family registration.
As we'll explain below, Virgin Miles are so easy to earn that one person in your family might be able to collect them all and ticket the whole family.
2) If you don't have a spot, but it says you do
As you can see in the image above, Korean Air seats can be searched and booked directly on the Virgin site.
With ANA, you have to call and book through an agent, and I have to say that Korean Air search and ticketing is much easier in that regard.
The problem is that there seems to be a phenomenon of phantom availability (based on the cases posted on the boards so far) where it appears that there are seats available when there are none.
I've been experiencing phantom availability on the Delta site for Korean Air seats since last year and earlier this year, and it's only recently been fixed, but I'm seeing something similar on Virgin.
Now, to make sure it's a real seat or a phantom, you might want to check if you see Korean Air Mile seats on other SkyTeam members' sites, such as Air France.
If you rush to convert transferable points to Virgin without checking availability, you could end up with miles but not a seat.
Please note this.
The US number is 1-800-862-8621 if you'd like to call and check. If the US and UK are unavailable, Hong Kong has been the fastest to get through in my experience. The Hong Kong number is +852-2532-3000.
[Added 03.04.2023].We've posted additional instructions on the board on how to search by month.
https://www.milemoa.com/bbs/board/9934028
3) Maximum number of seats: 2 seats in economy, 1 seat in business as before?
The third part is about the maximum number of seats that can be ticketed.
Korean Air has historically allocated two economy and one business seat per flight across its partner airlines.
There have been exceptions to this from time to time (site error?), but this rule has been in place for almost a decade as far as I can remember.
Virgin just became a partner, so we'll have to see exactly how that works, and there are some examples on the message boards of people being able to get 3 seats, but for now, it's probably a good idea to plan on a maximum of 2 seats in economy and 1 seat in business on a flight.
This means that a family of four may need to split the date and ticket two people separately.
4) Not all seats you see on Korean Air's site are available for ticketing with Virgin Miles.
Releasing more mileage seats to their own customers is a fundamental part of how airlines operate.
Korean Air is no different in this regard.
5) Tickets are not available during Korean Air's peak season.
Korean Air has designated peak periods where they charge a 50% surcharge for redeeming their miles.
It's important to note that during Korean Air's peak season, you can't redeem Virgin miles because partner airline miles are not available for ticketing.
6) Miles are deducted for each leg if a connection is required
The redemption chart above basically shows you how many miles you need to fly one leg of a nonstop flight.
Therefore, the following scenarios are not possible
That is,
- LA - Incheon flight distance 5,994 miles
- Incheon - Bali distance (3,262 miles)
- Totaling up to 9,256 miles
- So, "From LA to Bali with a stopover in Incheon, 9,256 miles = 50,000 miles lol"
This means no.
If a trip from LA to Bali with a final destination of Incheon, each sector will be charged separately. ("If a journey requires a connecting flight or stopover to reach the destination, points are charged for each sector.")
Requirement The same is true for domestic US connections (which would be on Delta), so I think it's important to remember that.
7) Tickets are due 48 hours before the departure of the itinerary and cancellations are due 24 hours before departure.
Korean Air ticketing must be completed at least 48 hours prior to departure of the first itinerary.
No mileage refunds for cancellations within 24 hours of departureso be warned. It's a mile a minute.
"If for any reason a flight Reward is canceled by the Member outside 24 hours of the outbound flight, 100% of the Virgin Points will be re-credited to the Member's account."
In the past, if the total tax fee paid at the time of ticketing is $50 or less, you don't pay $50 and get the tax back, you just lose the money you paid, but I'll have to see if that's the case with Korean Air.
4. How to earn Virgin Miles
Virgin Miles is one of the few mileage programs where all four types of points are convertible.
- Chase Ultimate Rewards (UR)
- Amex Membership Rewards (MR)
- Citi ThankYou
- Capital One's own points, called "miles
This means that all four of these transferable points are essentially a 1:1 conversion (assuming you have a transferable card for Chase and Capital One).
That's why it's a good idea to save up these transformable points on a regular basis, so you can flip them over and use them whenever you want.
There's one important thing to note here.
There are 1-2 promotions per year to maximize your points conversion, and it's best to take advantage of them..
If you look at the past, Chase has never had a promotion.
Amex, Citi, and Capital One have been running 25-30% conversion bonus promotions about once a year for the past few years.
In fact, even at the time of this post (03.02.2023),
1) Transfer Citi ThankYou points to Virgin by March 18 to get the 30% bonus.
2) Capital One is also offering a 30% bonus when you transfer points through March 31st.
The image below may be confusing because it says Virgin Red, but it's really just a matter of signing up for Virgin Red and then using the existing Virgin Atlantic link from there, so you end up getting Virgin miles. We'll come back to this later.
If you've been hoarding ThankYou points but haven't found a use for them, or if you signed up for the Venture X card last year and weren't sure what to do with the miles you received as a sign-up bonus, now's your chance.
You can also hand over your Chase UR points, UR is versatile in its own right, so I'd recommend sticking to ThankYou, Capital One, and Amex MR whenever possible.
If you're looking to start earning points, here are a few cards to consider.
1) With Citi, the Premier card is pretty much your only option.
The current promotion is 60,000, but you can get 2 cards every 8 days, or 3 if you're feeling adventurous, so it's not hard to earn points.
| Citi Premier, 60,000 points | |
|---|---|
| Basic features | 60,000 ThankYou points when you spend $4,000 in 3 months |
| 60,000 points are redeemable for $600 worth of gift certificates (when redeemed on ThankYou.com) | |
| 1:1 conversion to miles from 15 airlines, including Virgin, Turkish Airlines, Lifemiles, Singapore, Flying Blue, and more | |
| Annual fee is $95 for the first year | |
| It says you can't get the sign-up bonus if you've received the same type of card sign-up bonus within the last 48 months. | |
| For more info | About page in English |
2) Capital One still has a popular Venture X. The regular Venture, with its relatively low annual fee, isn't a bad option for earning points.
| Sharp, Venture, and Venture X comparison | |
|---|---|
| Sharp cards | 60,000 UR points after spending $4,000 in 3 months |
| Card details (you can apply for this and other cards through our partner sites at the bottom of the page) | |
| Venture Card | 7.5K 'miles' sign-up bonus after spending $4K in 3 months |
| Detailed card information | |
| Venture X Card | 7.5K 'miles' sign-up bonus after spending $4K in 3 months |
| Detailed card information |
3) Chase has a personal card, the Sapphire Preferred, as well as business cards that earn UR points, which is a good option for those who qualify.
| Chase Ink Cards |
|---|
| Ink Business Preferred® Credit Card (Ink Preferred)Earn 90,000 UR points for spending $8,000 in 3 months. Annual fee is 95 dollars. |
| * With this card, you can transfer (convert) UR points to airline miles or hotel points |
| * You can apply through the partner site. |
| Ink Business Unlimited® Credit Card (Ink Unlimited)Earn 75,000 UR points worth $750 in cash after spending $6,000 in 3 months. No annual fee. |
| * Earn 1.5 points for every $1 spent |
| * You can apply through the partner site. |
| Ink Business Cash® Credit Card (Ink Cache): Earn UR 35,000 points worth $350 in cash after spending $3,000 in 3 months. Earn UR 40,000 points worth $400 in cash when you spend an additional $3,000 ($6,000 total) within the next 6 months. UR 75,000 points in total. No annual fee. |
| * Earn 5 points per $1 spent on office supply store, internet, cable, and phone (up to $25,000 in a year) |
| * You can apply through the partner site. |
4) Amex MR points are also available for 1:1 conversion.
Despite Amex's once-in-a-lifetime sign-up bonus policy, MR points are relatively easy to earn because there are so many cards that can earn MR points.
If you're just doing the personal card, you have the green, gold, and flat, and if you're doing the business card, you have the business gold and business flat, so you get the signup bonus for each.
Nowadays, the personal gold 6-month $40,000 offer is $90,000 with referral link, so if you save it up and then come back for the 25% or 30% promotion, you can transfer it to Virgin and get almost 130,000, 3-4 one-way tickets.
Refer a friend link: Amex Gold 90k + $200 offer
Let's wrap up today's post.
Korean Air is not easy to earn miles on, and fuel surcharges are expensive these days, so even if I had a mileage seat, I was hesitant to use them.
It's great to see that Virgin miles can now be redeemed for Korean Air.
I hope all of you Magicians can make good use of it.
English 
Korean
153 Comments. Leave new
Thanks for the cleanup. Looks like the boards were a hot mess today.
One thing you wrote in the text is that in the mileage redemption table, the ICN-HND Ikon/Biz redemption miles are incorrectly written as 5500/14500 based on 0-500 miles. I think it should be 7000/15500 based on the distance. Please confirm. I also booked GMP-HND one way today with 7000 miles.
Ah, right, thanks for letting us know, we fixed it right away. Thank you.
You've summarized this so quickly... Thank you. Two questions, when I went on Virgin today and searched for tickets from the US mainland to Korea, I searched with 3 people and almost all departures are showing tickets, is that correct for 2 icons? I haven't transferred miles yet so I haven't gotten to ticketing yet.
Secondly, can Virgin miles be redeemed for domestic flights in the US, so if you're planning on traveling domestically, would Virgin be a good option?
1. this was the case in the past, but it remains to be seen if this will be the case this time around.
2. it's still possible to book Delta domestic with Virgin miles, but I don't see the point because if a Delta domestic seat is released on Virgin, it can be booked cheaper with Delta miles (most of the time).
Wow, that's a quick capitalization, thanks!
Thank you for reading.
Thank you so much for the recap. I'll be able to utilize Capital One properly!!!
Yes. Capone value spikes.
There's also Bilt in transferable points, and if you switch to Virgin Red from Virgin Group, the parent company of Virgin Atlantic, you'll get a 1:1 transfer from Red to Virgin Atlantic Flying Club.
By the way, MR, TYP, and COM are hot with this change, so I feel like a lot of people who were disappointed with Hayat/UR are moving to Virgin with the Hayat category switching news.
Yes, that's right, and that's how you get a 3:1 conversion for Bonvoy.
However, these two programs are a bit lacking in terms of mass appeal, so I didn't add them.
This means that a family of four may need to split the date and ticket two people separately.
-Do you mean that the 2-digit icons and 1-digit business are reset by date?
There's no guarantee that you'll always get 2 digits off by date.
If the upper limit was 2 icons and 1 bead, as it has been in the past, this meant that we would have to think about splitting by date.
However, there are some cases where it's more than 3 digits, so we'll have to look into that a bit more.
Yes, thank you! I'm sure you'll be happy to give me a few digits.
I'd fly Delta and Virgin together if I had the space.
If you add a question to your answer...
Assuming that it is possible to make a reservation for 2 icons and 1 bead, is it possible to make a separate reservation for up to 3 family members with 2 icons and 1 bead?
This is a cavaque. Possible if all 3 people are adults.
This is not possible if there is even one child in the mix.
I believe children are not allowed to fly alone on Korean Air. They must be accompanied by a parent in the same class, i.e. parent on Baz and two kids on Ikon. Vice versa
Thanks for the recap. This gives me hope for short haul flights to and from Incheon.
There are so many great routes from Incheon.
I was recently looking at awardhacker for a trip to Europe with my family and was interested in Virgin because of the overwhelming redemption rate. Of course, most of Europe is via Paris to book on Virgin, but I'm really starting to like Virgin. It's a great airline to collect points and there are so many ways to redeem. I think it's an airline to focus on before they change. I was wondering how to book and what to look out for, so thanks for the info!
I'll have to work on the European side of things too, thanks for the comment.
I booked 2 seats on Dan Gong Biz yesterday, so I don't think it's impossible to book 2 seats.
I have a question, does anyone know if it is possible to cancel just one person (not the whole reservation) if you have a reservation for 2 people and only one person needs to cancel?
I was wondering if this is also possible for BA (British Airways)?
1. oh, so 2 digits are possible.
2. It is of course possible to cancel only one person, just split the PNR (reservation number) in two and cancel only one person.
I'm looking hard but I don't see any Dan Gong tickets...
See this article on the message board to find them on a monthly basis.
https://www.milemoa.com/bbs/board/9934028
I booked for May, I haven't looked at other times so I don't know, but from what I've seen, May seems to have quite a few spots available (but like you said, you'll have to search by month to find them)
This is a great way to utilize my Amex points, thank you.
Yes, Amex, Citi, Capitol One, all of them have seen their point values skyrocket.
Thank you so much for the information!!!
If you transfer Capital One miles to Virgin today
Will my points ever expire?
I thought 30% more was too good a deal to pass up.
I don't know when I'll use it, but I thought I'd move it ahead of time.
Starting in 2020, the points expiration date has been eliminated.
https://flywith.virginatlantic.com/us/en/flying-club/members/flying-club-news/exciting-changes-to-your-miles.html
Thanks for the info, is First no longer an option?
Yes. Virgin Miles cannot be used to book Korean Air First.
Thank you so much for the good news, I saw it right away thanks to the capitalization and paid with miles for my mom's flight from Korea in May -! I also flew Delta with Virgin in 2020, but this time I'm flying with Korean Air at a good price(?) Thank you so much MileMoa.
You've done a great job, congratulations.
If it doesn't come up, you don't have a ticket, right?
If I go from Washington to Beijing and it says no tickets and then says Incheon is available on the same day....
I don't know when you're looking at this, April Schedule on Korean Air GongHomeshows that Beijing is currently not flying at all.
Oh, I see. Thank you.
I'm looking at tickets from the eastern US and they all go through the UK, is this normal?
Are you searching during Korean Air's peak season? During Korean Air's peak season, you won't be able to use miles from partner airlines like Virgin.
If you're traveling from JFK, BOS, or IAD, which are Korean Air hubs, you'll see Korean Air seats if they're available. If they're not, you'll see European connections.
Wow this is great news, thank you so much for the detailed information!
I have a lot of MR, almost a million, and I have to spend it within a certain period of time, right?
I'm so happy to have one more way to get to Korea!
Virgin doesn't have an expiration date for miles, so it's not a good idea to move them ahead of time as there's always the potential for the mile program to devalue, but if MR has a Virgin conversion promotion, it's probably worth it to move miles that will be used for 1-2 years.
Oh, that's a good idea, I'd like to see a lot of seats released.
Thank you so much for taking the time to tell us all about it!
Yes, it's all about the seats.
It seems like Venture is the best option if I'm only going to pass it on to Virgin Airlines, is that correct?
I was going to open a credit card to pay my property taxes anyway.
Is it possible to transfer from Venture to Virgin in my name only?
For example, can I get a Venture card in my name and Virgin Airlines in my spouse's name?
And is there a transfer promotion every year?
Even if I applied and got the card now, I don't think I'd make it to March.
For Venture, if you only use it for a year and then terminate, there's no problem, right?
Of course, you'll need to give it away somewhere before you cancel so you don't lose points, right?
1. I can't promise it will always be the same time every year, it changes every time. See this site for past promotions.
https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/travel/capital-one-citi-chase-amex-transfer-bonus-history
2. you must transfer points before canceling the card. We recommend keeping all cards for at least two years because of the relationship you have with the card company.
1. Capital One's Venture, Venture X, and Citi's Premier are all good options.
See this article for the difference between Venture and Venture X.
https://www.milemoa.com/comparison-csp-venture-venture-x/
2. I understand that the conversion can only be in your name, but I don't think you need to match your name since Virgin is free to do 3-way ticketing anyway.
hello.
Thank you so much for this informative article.
I was looking for a way to convert my Chase points to Korean Air or Asiana miles.
Chase, I went in and there's a Virgin Atlantic Flying Club, is that right?
Thank you for your response.
Thank you.
Yes. That's right. I have a seat, please check it before you hand over your points.
Do you know about luggage regulations?
According to Virgin's rules, I'm only allowed one bag,
Is it right?
I've called Dan and he doesn't know;;;;
Since the flight is Korean Air, I'm guessing it will follow Korean Air rules, but 100% it's not a sure thing.
Wow...Fridayday news and when I looked it up a little... I saw a lot of 2 business seats, but ... I went back in after reading the article, but now I don't see any of them ㅠㅠ
Uh... bummer.
I was excited to see a ticket for just one seat, so I converted my Venturex points and bought it right away, but it kept bouncing from payment, so when I called, it said there was no seat... Is this phantom? The agent told me that the 'Korean Air' ticket was not in the system and the date was getting late.
Oops, sorry to hear that, hope you're back on track.
Thanks to your good information, I completed my booking on Virgin and changed my Danagong SkyMiles number. I can't see it in my booking history on Virgin (but it comes up when I search for booking), and I can't find it on Korean Air's website or app. Is there any way to call the main number in this case? I want to reserve my seat as soon as possible.
I read on a message board that if you put your Korean Air number in the booking information, the booking should show up on Korean Air's site almost immediately. You might want to double check that.
https://www.milemoa.com/bbs/board/9930039#comment_9942781
I was able to ticket with points, right? Is there no ticket at all now?
Not out, I'm going to go from the Americas to Korea, but I've been using Trespass as you pointed out.
When and where are you leaving from? Let me do a search for you.
If this is the case, can I call Virgin to get a standby ticket?
Waitlisting is not available. Standby is only available when using Korean Air miles.
I'm thinking of going after Virgin miles in the future, so I looked at the Venture X in item 2), but the linked card details show an annual fee of $95, which doesn't seem to match your statement that "the regular Venture with no annual fee is not bad for earning points." I'm wondering if the annual fee is waived for the first year, or if I'm misunderstanding something.
Oops, I was mistaken, sorry.
You're correct to correct it to "the annual fee is relatively low".
Again, we apologize.
Ah, I see, so I'll have to pay the annual fee after all. Thank you for your quick response. I'll take that into consideration.
We apologize for the confusion.
JFK > ICN September 3-4 seats available, but when I go to the final payment, it keeps giving me an error and when I call the agent, she just repeats that there are no seats available right now.
I guess the system is still unstable....
I also keep getting an error when I try to ticket JFK - ICN October. I tried removing my Korean Air SkyPass number, but it didn't work, and the agent said it must be temporary, so I told her to try the next day, but it's the same. I checked with Korean Air and there is a ticket for that date, but the system is still unstable.
I know, I can't wait for the system to get back to normal.
hello. I want to buy Virgin points to make a reservation, but since I'm new, I'm told that I need to make at least one Flying Club earning or spending transaction.
In the US, there are a lot of options for transformable points, so it's easy to just skip over them, but I don't know what the options are in Korea, sorry.
hello. I want to buy Virgin miles to book a flight, but when I first signed up, I was told that I need to earn and redeem Flying Club, is there any way I can do that???
Does Amex's once in a lifetime signup bonus policy mean that I can't get the Gold 90,000 mile bonus if I have an old Amex card? And how much can I get if I open it with a referral link? Thanks!
Amex's once-in-a-lifetime offer isn't a once-in-a-lifetime offer across all cards - it works for each individual card. So if you've never gotten an Amex Gold card before, the sign-up bonus is still possible in principle.
However, with Amex, it's worth noting that Amex may not offer signup bonuses at their discretion.
I applied, but I didn't get approved.
We know you're disappointed, and we've explained why we couldn't approve you in a letter you'll receive within 7-10 business days.
It says
I need to fill it with a spanning bar, but I'm worried.
Can I do this over the phone?
Capital One.
Yeah. I'll give you a call, but I think it's worth remembering that recons are not easy for CapOne.
I applied for Amex with a friend's referral link and was approved: ☺️
Thank you so much for always sharing good information with us~~!
Congratulations on the approval and thanks for using the link.
If I have VentureX but rarely use it, should I transfer my points to Virgin ahead of time and close VentureX before paying the annual fee? Is there any point in keeping it?
With 300 credits + 10,000 point rebate for VentureX, the annual fee is practically free, so why would you want to preemptively close it?
Oh... The website says New York-Seoul September-December, so I transferred 74,000 points from UR, but when I go to pay for it, it doesn't show up, what should I do?
I'm sorry to hear you got caught in the middle of all the phantom seats. Virgin says it will take a while for the system to stabilize, so it's best to check back daily for now.
Oh... I also transferred venture x 80,000 miles, but I'm confused because an error popped up at the last checkout window. In this case, how long should I expect it to stabilize? Well, I know there are cases where points were reversed due to the airline's fault in AMEX, but I wonder if Capone has such a case?
If you download the app and try it, there are stories of success. Let's give it a try.
Virgin customer service 1800 862 8621 is also not working at all, does anyone have any luck?
I also failed through customer service, so I cross-checked with Delta and Air France, then tried again and again on the web/app, and finally succeeded in ticketing with the app after numerous attempts. There seems to be no solution at the moment except to keep trying...
Is it possible to book Virgin Airlines using Korean Air miles in reverse and vice versa, same SkyTeam?
I haven't actually searched for it, but according to the Korean Air site announcement, it's possible.
https://www.koreanair.com/ae/ko/footer/customer-support/notice/2303-skyvs
I want to apply for Amex Gold, but it takes a yearly fee~ Do you mostly downgrade to Green after a year? Green also has a yearly fee... I can't downgrade to blue cash, and if I close Gold and reapply for blue cash, it is said that the impact is less, but can I ask a question about this? 250$ every year?
1. 1 year is required and we recommend 2 years if possible.
2. for Gold, it's annoying, but $10/month for Uber ($120/year) and $10/month for dining credit if available in your neighborhood pretty much pays for the annual fee overall ;);
When I go to Air France and search for ICN -> IAD with points on Virgin, I can't find any direct flights (in the form of cash purchase here), so is this a phantom? ㅠㅠ
I understand that you need to look at points seat availability, not cash purchases.
Sorry for the late thank you, I can't remember my nickname. I applied and got my Amex about 2 weeks ago from a friend's referral link. You've always been a great source of information for me. Thank you hehe
Congrats on the mermaid and thanks for the link.
hello
I'm enjoying reading your posts. Thanks for your help as always~!
Is it possible to ticket business as well as economy just by searching?
Oh, and I'll be going to ORD-ICH in mid/late July ~8th,
I'm looking into different routes for business ticketing, but it's not easy.
I have UR and Capital One points, is it because I have too little time to redeem my miles?
I was wondering if there is another way to do it. Thank you very much
The principle is probably right, but I've never read of any actual success stories. It's hard to get a seat on Korean Air these days, even with Korean Air miles, so I'll have to wait and see.
hello.
I'm enjoying your posts. Thank you for your help^^.
Namely, I'm looking for a way to ticket ORD-ICN business miles in mid-July to early August,
I can't see the seats because I'm so pressed for time.
If you look up upper class on the Virgin Airlines site and there are seats available, you'll see the
Is it possible to switch to UR->Virgin point for ticketing?
Or maybe there's another way to convert points to ticket miles?
Thank you^^ Thank you
I don't think it's going to be easy to fly nonstop, so you're probably better off going for a JAL or ANA one-stop, as JAL and ANA business first class has been known to release seats close to departure, and Chicago-Tokyo is one of the better seats compared to other regions.
Of course, in this case, you may need to buy a separate ticket between Tokyo and Seoul, so it's worth remembering that as well.
hello..
Really good read..thank you....
I just opened an Amex Platinum and...
But how do I hand it over to Virgin Atlantic?
Does Amex transfer? Or do I have to sign up at the Virgin Atlantic site first?
And when I put it in, it looks like it's really cheap...
74000 for $89 is $750 for $89 roundtrip to Korea.
This is awesome...
But there's a risk, so I tried to buy miles by signing up for Air France, but I didn't get any...
You can put dates here and there...
Does that mean it's not available for purchase?
I'm thinking about going to Korea this fall...
Should I just go all the way and buy it?
Or do I have to buy it over the phone?
Thank you so much in advance.
* You say there's a risk...
1. You'll need to sign up for Virgin Atlantic's mileage program first. The link is below.
https://www.virginatlantic.com/profile/enrolllanding.action
2. You can then register this number on the Amex site to convert your Amex MR points. If you're not in a hurry, you may want to wait for a promotion to pop up.
3. the only way to check seat availability is to keep checking, and even if you get an error on the Virgin website, you can download the app and get a ticket, so please try it.
Thank you for your response.
But when I go in and check like min above, Korean Air doesn't appear... even though I'm logged in.
So I checked, and Korean Air doesn't have direct flights...
I'm worried that it's a phantom, even though I ticketed without an error.
How do I check...
I'm going to Korea for a really good price if this works out.
I think we need to do some cleanup.
1. You mean I'm on the Air France site, logged in, searching, and I don't see any direct Korean Air seats?
2. do you mean that you've already ticketed without an error, or do you mean, in the subjunctive, that you're worried that if you ticketed Korean Air on Virgin without an error, they'll later tell you that the seat doesn't exist?
For Virgin, I understand that once you're ticketed, you don't have to worry about phantoms.
hello..
1. I logged into your Air France site and checked, but I don't see any direct seats to Daehan-Gok.
So I clicked on select airlines, and there's only klm and Air France... so I don't see Korean Air direct.
2. no, there is no error and I haven't ticketed yet...
I haven't converted the points yet, but as you wrote above as a cautionary note
I'm asking because I'm worried that if there is no actual seat, but it looks like there is a seat and it says it's purchased without an error, and the points are gone, it might not have been purchased.
Thank you~!
I don't know how to delete what I wrote....
I tried to edit the post above, but couldn't, so I'm writing again.
Now, when I go back and select airlines, I only see KLM and Air France.
I see a Korean flight with 1 stop instead of a direct flight.
So there are no direct flights on those dates, right?
Answer. If you don't see Korean Air, there are no Korean Air mileage seats available on that date.
After checking Korean Air's site for award space, I transferred a bunch of points from MR, and they were phantom award spaces. I tried the phone, tried the app, tried changing the date, tried changing the number of people, and even tried a domestic flight (delta booking) just in case, but it didn't work. The error code was "no more seats available" because I was trying to book phantom award spaces. The Virgin site says there are award seats available, but I can't seem to book them. I contacted Amex, explained the situation and asked if they could give me the points back (escalated to supervisor level), but they refused. I'm leaving the info just in case.
Oh man, that must be so frustrating.
The seats you see on Korean Air's site include seats that can only be booked with Korean Air miles. This is why you should search on partner sites like Air France and Delta, not on Korean Air's site, as they favor their own customers who use their own miles.
I've heard of people getting errors on Virgin and then suddenly being ticketed, so I'd keep trying unless it's during a peak period that Korean Air has designated.
Good luck.
Do you know how this is going these days?
I recently saw this article and signed up for Virgin, checked my seats, and then moved to Sapphire UR because I was told I had a ticket left, but it's a phantom ticket and payment is not working properly... ㅠㅠ
I'm looking at a SFO-ICN one way ticket for August 1, 2018... but no matter how many times I try, the payment doesn't go through,,,
It's probably best to try multiple times in the app.
Hi, I really enjoyed reading this post. I have one question. You mentioned that you recommend MR because UR is so versatile, so I'd like to know what are some examples of how to maximize the value of UR points rather than just booking a flight. I've only ever used UR for Hyatt hotel stays, but after reading this, I realized that booking a flight would be a much better value. Do you have any recommendations for UR uses other than Hyatt and Virgin miles? Thank you.
I'm curious about this, too: "You can transfer Chase UR points, but UR is very versatile in its own right, so I'd recommend sticking to ThankYou, Capital One, and Amex MR if possible."
I've only done basic things that I wouldn't call "magic" (signing up when there's a big sign-up bonus, using my Chase card diligently, etc.), but my wife and I have accumulated quite a few points over the years... When Korean Air stopped redeeming UR points a few years ago, we didn't know where else to use them...
Then I saw this post... UR points -> Virgin miles -> Korean Air miles/ticketing If you use this way, as a result, you can break the Korean Air ticket again with UR points, so I was very happy... But I was a little puzzled by the statement that "UR is highly utilized by itself". I have almost 600,000 points now, but I don't know where to spend them... ^^;
It would be great if you could also explain how to utilize UR points!
I often transfer UR points to Aeroplan and use them frequently. Aeroplan has a lot of partner airlines (Asiana, United, ANA, Etihad, Turkish, Singapore, etc.), so it's a great value and you can get a stopover for 5k miles.
I think you're better off with Hyatt for the hotel side, UA is fine, and as Sam said, Aeroplan is a good option.
However, it's still important to use them when you can, so if you feel like you have too many URs, you might want to start using them first.
Thank you both for your answers!
Depending on where you live, redeeming for United miles is one option.
We've written an article about this, which you can read here.
https://www.milemoa.com/ur-partners-ranking/
Thanks for the post. I have a direct ticket for Korean Air from Incheon to Hawaii on Virgin's website, but Air France says I can only connect via Air France. If this is a ghost, is there an error when I go through the payment process on Virgin's website and I can't pay, or is it canceled after I pay?
We know that the table is valid when the payment is made.
I'd recommend calling Virgin to confirm.
I'm confused about the peak season, if I fly from SFO to ICN from Dec 15th to Dec 28th, would that be considered peak season?
For Americas departures, 12.7-12.10 and 12.14-12.23 are peak periods. A departure on 12/15 is peak, and if 12/28 is ICN-SFO, I don't think that's the date.
See the Korean Air link below.
https://www.koreanair.com/nl/ko/apps/skypass/season-table
I found some economy seats in the western US (SEA, LAX) and Korea (ICN).
I rarely see the seats themselves, but when I do, the ones I do see have varying mileage redemptions of 35K, 51K, 57.5K, etc. I don't see the 31K redemption at all, so did something change in the interim?
I'm guessing it's because it's searching for connecting routes, not direct flights.
Mamo! Korean Air seats that were showing up well on aero.seats until a few days ago have completely disappeared!
I don't see any tickets to/from Incheon, not just North America, but Australia, Hawaii, etc...
I was wondering if you have any news on the Korean Airlines itself being unable to book with Virgin...
I'm not sure about this one.
Hello, even if I can see KE seat availability on AS, it may not be available on VA. I was wondering if the seat availability between Korea and the US is so bad that the seat availability between Korea and Northeast Asia or Guam is also bad.
I'm not sure about this one, because mileage seats are so hit or miss.
I was told that Korean air is a partner company and that I can book through virgin red, but there are no seats available for the two months of October and November, which is the low season. The only European flight that Virgin red offers is a 28 hour flight back to Austin TX, and they won't even let me put my 130,000 points back. I'm screwed with misinformation. I can fly out of California or any airport. If seats are so hard to come by, why do you make me transfer my reward points to virgin red and make them worthless. I don't understand. For your information, I am an American who can leave from Denver or California
Yeah, up until a month ago, I had no trouble finding Korean Air Economy Awards between the US and Korea, and I was able to book a round-trip ticket for next year's Lunar New Year.
I can't find a single ticket for the last few days either, I've been checking every day and there are no openings!
I'm a paid member of the site you mentioned, and I'm checking daily, and I'm currently on a flight from San Fran that started in July and ended on October 11, the date you were looking for!
I haven't tried ticketing, but I've seen it work for search.
In the calendar, look for the dates below.
2023-07-20 1 hour ago SFO ICN Economy Available
2023-08-03 7 hours ago SFO ICN Economy Available
2023-08-17 2 days ago SFO ICN Economy Available
2023-08-21 15 hours ago SFO ICN Economy Available Not Available Not Available
2023-08-22 15 hours ago SFO ICN Economy Available Not Available Not Available
2023-08-24 15 hours ago SFO ICN Economy Available Not Available Not Available
2023-08-29 15 hours ago SFO ICN Economy Available Not Available Not Available
2023-08-31 15 hours ago SFO ICN Economy Available Not Available Not Available
2023-09-05 15 hours ago SFO ICN Economy Available Not Available Not Available
2023-09-11 15 hours ago SFO ICN Economy Available Not Available Not Available
2023-09-12 15 hours ago SFO ICN Economy Available Not Available Not Available
2023-09-18 15 hours ago SFO ICN Economy Available Not Available Not Available
2023-09-19 2 days ago SFO ICN Economy Available Not Available Not Available
2023-09-21 2 days ago SFO ICN Economy Available Not Available Not Available
2023-10-19 15 hours ago SFO ICN Economy Available Not Available Not Available
2023-10-23 15 hours ago SFO ICN Economy Available Not Available Not Available
2023-10-26 15 hours ago SFO ICN Economy Available Not Available Not Available
2023-11-21 1 hour ago SFO ICN Economy Available Not Available Not Available
2023-11-28 1 hour ago SFO ICN Economy Available Not Available Not Available
Thanks for the information.
Which site?
https://seats.aero/lifemiles
I think you're talking about here.
It's unfortunate that Korean Air seats have dried up, but I think it's a bit of a stretch to say that providing "misinformation" makes points "worthless".
I've highlighted the caveat in red in the text, "If you rush to convert transferable points to Virgin without checking availability, you may end up with miles but not a seat, so please be careful."
There are some people on the message boards who have had success after repeated attempts, so I'd recommend taking your time and trying again.
I also had a lot of seats in September until 1 month ago, so I transferred all my points because there were a lot of seats, but now I can't even get a seat... It's really annoying. Korean Air ah really....미치겠네요 I can't even get back on track again. ㅠ
Judging from the atmosphere, I think Korean Air has blocked it, but I can only speculate because they don't publicly announce such information;
I'm also over the UR and trying to ticket, but the tickets are all gone and I can't... I tried to ticket by phone, but I was told that I shouldn't buy it even though I can see the ticket. I think I'll have to wait a little longer because they say the integration is in progress. For those who want to buy right away, please note.
What a mess ;;
I'm screwed. There's not even a ticket on the website, and I wasted my time calling.
What should I do with the 20 million points I moved...
Virgin has no expiration date, so I'm sure you'll be able to use it in the future.
Anyway, I think the website ghost tickets need to be fixed and Korean Air needs to release the tickets to resolve this issue.
I booked 2 one-way tickets from Incheon to Las Vegas yesterday for April 2024 on the Korean Air website. I booked it right after the flight for that date came up, so I think it worked out well. After selecting Korean Air miles for both of us, I put in each number, and it went directly to the Korean Air website, and I was able to select seats. Thanks for the information.
A few days ago I booked a single seat for another date in April, and I noticed that after I booked it, whether it was two seats or one seat, it said I could book another two seats for the same flight on the same day. I didn't actually pay for it, so I don't know if I'll be able to book the additional two seats.
I have a 4 seat SFO-ICN booking for the month of May 2024 and I'm not going to use Virgin just in case I can't book two seats and then another two seats, because as many people have said, once you transfer miles, you can't cancel.
So I'm planning to have four people fly on the same Asiana flight by paying for two seats on the United website and two seats separately on the LifeMiles website. But if I pay for two seats on United, for example, will it not show up in LifeMiles? Because on United, it looks like you can buy 4 seats at once with miles, but unlike Korean Air, Asiana seems to allow at least 4 seats to be paid for with miles.
1. Glad to hear you were able to get your Virgin ticketing to work. I was wondering if it was completely blocked, but it looks like it wasn't. Thanks for the great story.
2. For Asiana, there is no 2-digit limit, but I wonder if there is a possibility that the number of seats may fluctuate if you issue 2-digit tickets. If possible, it would be better to ticket at the same time.
Is there a phantom ticket phenomenon when booking delta instead of virgin miles? When I search for a direct flight from Atlanta to Incheon, a 200000 mile ticket is available on delta airhome for 90000 on virgin, but I'm worried it's phantom.
I haven't heard of the Delta seat phantom story, but I'd call Virgin to confirm with an agent to be sure before proceeding.
I'm new to miles and was excited about the 30% promotion when I was looking for a round-trip ticket to Korea. After seeing the ticket status, I quickly converted the miles and paid, but I kept getting an error at the last step, so I looked at this article in hindsight and found that it was just a Korean Air phantom seat. I thought I could buy it in time for the new seat to open, so I tried it today just in case, and I was lucky enough to succeed. I wonder if the canceled seats were updated. It was an ICN-JFK 2024 June ticket, but if you really need it, I leave it as a reference because there are cases like this when you try it from time to time.
We're so glad to hear you were successful.
Thanks for sharing your story.
Do you think there are any phantom seats these days? I'm seeing sfo->ICN one way in May on virgin and air france, but I don't have enough miles and I'd be in a bit of a bind if I transferred and it didn't work out.
I think the best way to find out is to give us a call.
It's more efficient to transfer MR at 30% Virgin than to use Delta miles for Japan, right? I can't believe there were better Korean Air miles than Delta.
Korean Air Ikon tickets or ANA Business/First Class tickets are really good value, assuming there are seats available.
Thanks for this informative article. I've been trying to contact Virgin customer service several times over the past few weeks to find out about May JFK-ICN flights, and the agent I spoke to today said that Korean Air may not have released May yet. Is this true? When I asked if they usually release them months in advance, she said that Korean Air is an unusual case and she wasn't sure. Do you know anything about this?
Seats are usually released 11 months in advance, so I think it's fair to say that any previously released seats are already gone.
Virgin Atlantic miles can be a great deal for those with flexible schedules.
My wife and I bought plane tickets to Korea + Vietnam for cheap with this + Alaska Airlines miles.
- 2 US-Korea Economy tickets each for 31000 Virgin miles*2 (convert 62000 capital one miles)+$28.50*2
While in Korea
- 2 Korea-Vietnam Economy tickets each for 11500 Virgin miles*2 (23000 capital one miles converted)+$12.8*2
- Vietnam - South Korea (1 Night) - United States: Alaska Airlines 37500 miles*2 + $59.5*2
(Korea to the US is 35000, but it was 37500 miles to the US via Vietnam and Korea (overnight, with luggage to bring to the US). * We had a home and in-laws in Korea, so we went through overnight, but it was possible to do it the same day.
The problem is that it's really hard to find tickets, we booked 7 months in advance.
We're glad to hear you're enjoying it.
It would be nice to loosen things up a bit, but it's not easy ;);