Welcome Back!

Hope everyone is having a great week 😊

Summer already feels like its coming to and end, and I’m not sure how to feel about that… I don’t feel ready to start wearing hoodies and jackets again! But it is what it is, and some travel opportunities and destinations are simply gorgeous in fall and winter 🍂 

As schools start new semesters in late August and September, some destinations mark the beginning of their off-peak season. This sometimes leads to more award availability for coveted business class awards, which maybe you can grab now! After all, I write this to get you closer to your next trip, right? 🧳 

Anyways, there aren’t a ton of major stories this week, but there are definitely some deals to be had. I’ll lay them out for you below!

In today’s edition:

• 🪙 25% Off Some Flights ✈️ 

• 🏦 Transfer Bonuses ✈️

• ✈️ Some Current Sweet Spots 🍦 

• 📰 Other Stories & Deals 💰️

• 💳️ Best Card Signup Bonuses 💳️ 

🪙 25% Off Some Flights ✈️

To my delight, Singapore Airlines and Virgin Atlantic announced a deal for 25% off their award flights, so I’ll get right into it!

I’ll start with details of Singapore’s deal:

• 📆 This applies to flights operated by Singapore Airlines and booked from September 9 and September 22, 2024

• 📆This applies for travel between January 15 and May 29, 2025

• ⚫️ Select markets have some blackout dates, which can be found here

• 💺 This applies to all Singapore Airlines destinations in economy, and select destinations in other classes

• ⛽️ The discount is applied to the cost of miles, and not to the taxes and fees of the award flight

25% is not too bad! Especially for long-haul flights like JFK-SIN and EWR-SIN, that can be a pretty big cost savings, although those long flights only have the 25% discount for premium economy only. But with this deal, the JFK and EWR to SIN flights now cost 60,375 miles each way, as opposed to 80,500 miles originally.

Maybe some of you will remember that I actually redeemed Singapore Krisflyer miles for my Singapore trip during a previous discount, and enjoyed it! Getting to say I was on the longest flight in the world set me back about 60k of my hard earned points 😅 

Lots of the business redemptions that are eligible for this offer are intra-Asia flights, but if you have travel within Asia coming up, why not take advantage? 🧳

The real sweetener may be when Singapore on the 15th of the month release their monthly Spontaneous Escapes. Imagine getting to take advantage of the discounts on this deal, as well as Spontaneous Escapes? What a double dip! 🇸🇬 

And now for some details of Virgin’s deal:

• 📆 This applies to flights operated by Virgin Atlantic and booked from September 13 and September 17, 2024

• 📆This applies for travel until December 31, 2024

• 💺 This applies to all Virgin Atlantic destinations only in economy

• ⛽️ The discount is applied to the cost of miles, and not to the taxes and fees of the award flight

This deal isn’t as strong as Singapore’s deal due to discounts being only for economy class, but this is still definitely better than nothing! I will note, though, that this won’t take 25% off of Virgin’s fuel surcharges, but only the base price in miles.

One common way to use Virgin Atlantic miles for Virgin flights is the short hop across the pond from New York to London (and vice versa) for 10k points + ~$150 in taxes and fees. I’ve actually redeemed my miles this way as well to get to London using points! 

With this discount, that miles price would go to 7.5k points (from 10k) plus the same in taxes. Again, not bad, but isn’t as crazy as Singapore’s deal that also includes some business flights.

If you were planning travel to the UK or Singapore already, you might as well take advantage of these discounts while you can! Or maybe this is the push you needed to book that next trip of yours! Either way, hope this is helpful to get you all closer to your next trip on points! ✈️ 

🏦➡️✈️ Transfer Bonuses

✈️ Some Current Sweet Spots 🍦

I was thinking of stories to wrote, and couldn’t really come up with anything in particular. So I thought I’d just put down all of the ways I would redeem my points right now if I was planning travel. I particularly love to plan travel around transfer bonuses, and other discounts, so there are lots of deals!

I do want to note: the award seats may be limited for these uses, as I did not search award availability myself for these redemptions. But feel free to do the search, or have sites like PointsYeah and Seats.aero help you with that! Also all redemptions discussed here are one-way! 🗒️ 

SAS using Flying Blue

I’ll start with the fact that SAS has left Star Alliance and joined SkyTeam through an investment from Air France-KLM. Now that this has officially happened, SAS flights are now bookable through Flying Blue! 🇫🇷 

Flying Blue prices flights from the US to Europe generally at 20k each way plus taxes. But when it comes to SAS flights from the US to Europe, that seems to vary:

So that means there are some deals to be had here to get from the US to Europe for less than what Flying Blue usually charges, although not 100% of the time. Also remember that there is a 20% transfer bonus from Capital One, which will reduce the costs even more! 💰️ 

The deal gets even sweeter for SAS business class redemptions. Flying Blue redemption rates for business class on Air France and KLM start at 50k, but for SAS flights through Flying Blue, this also seems to vary:

41k for business class from the US to Europe is not bad at all! Factor in the 20% transfer bonus from Capital One, and that goes down to 35k Capital One miles! Some programs charge 35k to fly economy!! 🫢 

Iberia Business Class

Next, I’ll talk about flying Iberia business class - off-peak dates on their calendar have redemption rates set at 34k miles one-way for business class for cities on the east coast and Chicago. 34k to fly business class!

But again, Amex has a 30% transfer bonus to Iberia Avios! With that, these 34k rates go down to 27k Amex points. Imagine flying in Business Class from the US to Madrid for just 27k Amex Points!! The lowest signup bonus for the Amex Gold is 60k, and even that bonus gets you the roundtrip to and from Madrid in business class at current rates. The transfer bonus ends on 9/30, by the way!

Finnair Business Class

Finnair is also in the Avios family! Even though the Amex transfer bonus is only to British Airways, Iberia, and Aer Lingus, you can transfer your points from British Airways to Finnair at a 1:1 ratio, for no additional charge! Same with Qatar actually 😀 

Finnair redemption rates are set by zone. If you fly to Zone 1 though, regardless of a non-stop or an itinerary with layovers, you’ll pay the same amount. That means you can fly Finnair from the US (not LA) to various cities in Northern Europe and Poland for 62.5k in business class!

But the transfer bonus comes in clutch once again!! With this 30% bonus, that price goes down to 49k Amex points to fly Finnair business to Europe! Another sweet deal to maybe go hit the saunas in Finland, perhaps? 🧖 

There are likely many more deals, with or without transfer bonuses. But these are just some of the ones that crossed my mind when thinking about some solid redemptions right now! Hope that helps 👍️ 

📰 Other Stories & Deals 💰️ 

• 🛒 Get a Sam’s Club membership for $15, down from $50!

• 🚗 If you use the Uber credits from the Amex Gold and Amex Plat, you must now pay the remaining amount after the credit with the Amex card, starting from November. I’m not sure I am explaining this well, and surely Doctor of Credit does it better than me here!

💳️ Best Card Signup Bonuses 💳️ 

Again, the usual solid cards:

• Chase Sapphire Preferred^®/Reserve^®

• Chase Freedom Unlimited^®/Flex^®

• Amex Gold & Plat

• Capital One Venture X

• Capital One SavorOne

• Citi Strata Preferred^℠

Do search for public links for the above cards to compare signup bonuses to make sure you get the highest one (incognito mode, Resy, etc.).

For cards with elevated signup bonuses (targeted bonuses are not included), I’ve got:

📤️ Spread the Word! 📤️

Thank you so much for subscribing! This newsletter is committed to providing you all with helpful info and tips to maximize your points and rewards, at no direct cost to you! (appreciate you using any of my referral links, though!)

If you do find this newsletter informative, helpful, or entertaining, I’d greatly appreciate you spreading the word about it! If not, please do give me feedback on how I can improve your Sense per Point experience.

Also, if my newsletter helps you to book travel using points, let me know! It’ll make me so happy 😄 

Hope that all makes sense! That’s all for this week’s edition of Sense per Point.

It was a long one, but hopefully packed with some good deals and good info!

Wishing everyone a wonderful rest of your day and week, and a great Labor Day Weekend ❤️ 

- Sean Kim

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