Since Continental will be joining *A in a week I was wondering if anyone worked out any new starwood redemptions to get to Israel on CO? Obviously transfering *wood-CO is not worth it because of the 2-1 rate but what about any other airlines in the *A program that you can transfer 1-1 and have a good chart and availability for redeeming on partner/*A airlines?
UA I know to stay away from because of their starnet blocking, what about any other partners?
I started with ANA (*wood to ANA is 1-1) and as far as I can tell you need to use 2 or more *A to redeem a *A award but their chart looks very good. They go according to the total mileage flown on the award trip i.e. JFK-TLV-JFK = 11,355 mi so you go to their chart and see that the 11,001~14,000mi range would be
60,000pts for Economy, (50,000 *wood)
90,000pts for Business, (75,000 *wood)
140,000pts for First (115,000 *wood)
The problem is that since you need to use 2 or more *A members on a *A award you cant just redeem on CO EWR-TLV-EWR non stop on business for 90,000pts or 75,000 *wood points, you would need to use CO + another *A airline. One option would be to use CO non stop one way and the other way use Swiss air with a stop? Or maybe CO one way combined with US airways non stop to/from PHL on one of the legs (a little bit of a hassle to land at a different airport than departure)
Anyone else research this or have any info or comments on maximizing *A awards to TLV with CO esp utilizing *wood points?
(I hope I wasnt too confusing, I can clarify if anyone has any questions)