Now through June 17, 2013, Virgin Atlantic is offering an award discount promotion where you can book economy award seats for 25% fewer miles than normal. Concurrently, the airline is also offering a buy/transfer/gift miles bonus of 15%.
A roundtrip flight from New York JFK or Newark will normally cost you 35,000 miles, but with this promo the mileage requirement is only 28,000 miles. Los Angeles or San Francisco to London – normally 47,500 miles – would only require 35,000 miles, pretty low for a roundtrip award travel between North American and Europe- especially during peak season (check out this post for more on offpeak awards). Reduced fares are also available from the Caribbean/Mexico, Dubai, Mumbai, Johannesburg, Shanghai, Tokyo and Hong Kong/Sydney.
You’ll also notice the “Taxes & Carrier-Imposed Fees” column in the table above which states that these charges on economy tickets run in the range of $700, but according to this special award chart just for the promo, it actually looks like taxes and fees will actually only run in the $450 range for economy tickets – and it looks like Virgin’s taxes/surcharges will remain around this lower level beyond the promotion period too (note, you must be logged into your account to view the new surcharges/fees). Hopefully British Airways will start to match and travel to/from London will start coming down in price! At least on award tickets.
http://thepointsguy.com/2013/06/virgin-atlantic-promo-25-discount-on-economy-awards-worth-it/
