Travel Talk with Danielle ~ Did you know? You can Book with points via Virgin Atlantic’s Flying Club for LESS!

by Danielle Garrett of PlanIt Travel Designs for The Aha! Connection

Delta and Virgin Atlantic are partners.  Sometimes that partnership serves up some great deals if booking with Virgin Atlantic points!  These flights are still available on Delta’s website, but some of the “operated by Virgin Atlantic” flights are available for much less if booking with points directly with Virgin.  This has nothing to do with your Delta SkyMiles account, as Delta SkyMiles mileage tickets are booked directly with Delta.  A big difference between Delta and Virgin is the cost of using their miles/points.  Delta’s mileage tickets have skyrocketed in recent years, especially in first class.  NOTE: there will still be a charge for taxes, fees, and carrier-imposed surcharges when booking a Virgin flight with points, but much less than the cost of a Delta revenue ticket!

I know what you are thinking!!  “But I don’t have any Virgin points to use”.  Not yet, but you can easily if you transfer points to a Virgin account.  First, you must have points on a Visa or regular American Express to transfer.  Second, you need to join Virgin’s loyalty program “Flying Club” to create an account.  Once you have this account you can transfer the points.

This is a great deal for anyone flying from Atlanta to London or Atlanta to Paris (other cities are available as well).  These deals are not available for all dates, so make sure to search “using points” on Virgin’s website to ensure your dates are available before going through the trouble of transferring the points.

Last year I was able to score round-trip tickets on Virgin for myself and 3 girlfriends to Paris for 24,000 points plus $220 each in the main cabin (and I still earned Delta SkyMiles)!  I just found a flight for a client this week from Atlanta to London round-trip for 95,000 points plus $2,200 in 1st class.

Air France also offers a similar deal booking directly on their website using points.  They don’t offer as many great deals, but there are some if your dates are flexible.