The Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan program’s new simplified award charts are now in effect. This change has unfortunately removed some of the program’s previous best sweet spots, but it’s not all bad news!
In the past, Mileage Plan was a bit of a basket case. You could previously only redeem Alaskan miles on certain routes and partner airlines. You never really knew how many miles you’d need because it was different for each airline and Alaska Airlines stopped publishing charts for most partner awards in 2022.
At the same time, the previous version of the Mileage Plan program offered several niche redemptions that were incredibly good value. Cathay Pacific awards from Australia to Asia and Qantas premium cabin award tickets between Australia and North America were two examples.
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The loss of some niche “sweet spot” redemptions
Sadly, these kinds of redemptions are now much more expensive. But this is largely academic because it was very hard to find award availability on many of the best value routes anyway.
Here’s a comparison of the Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles you’d need now, compared to the old rates, to book a one-way Qantas flight from Sydney to Los Angeles:
| Cabin | Old pricing (until March 2024) | New pricing (from April 2024) |
|---|---|---|
| Economy | 42,500 miles | 42,500 miles |
| Premium Economy | 47,500 miles | 55,000 miles |
| Business | 55,000 miles | 85,000 miles |
| First | 70,000 miles | 130,000 miles |
As you can see, Economy awards on this route haven’t changed, while premium cabin awards have become more expensive. Though, you could say that this is a reasonable correction because the difference between the old Economy and premium cabin rates wasn’t much at all. (It’s not like Qantas makes tons of Business and First Class award seats available to Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan members, anyway.)
Redeem miles on more routes
The upshot is that you can now redeem Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles across the entire Oneworld alliance network – not just on specific routes. This is the first time that this has been possible since Alaska Airlines joined Oneworld in 2021.
For example, you can now use Alaska Airlines miles to book Qantas flights to New Zealand, Asia, South Africa and South America (assuming there is some award availability) for the first time.
You can also now book Korean Air flights from Australia to Asia – not just to North America.
The new Alaska Airlines award charts from April 2024
You can see all of the new award charts on the Alaska Airlines website.
Instead of region-based award charts, Mileage Plan now uses distance-based charts. But, like with Air Canada’s Aeroplan program, there are different distance-based charts depending on which continent/s your journey involves.
The chart that is probably of most interest to Australians is the “Asia Pacific” partner award chart:
It used to cost 12,500 Alaska Airlines miles to book any Qantas domestic flight in Economy or 20,000 miles for Business. Instead, the price now depends on the distance being flown.
Qantas domestic routes under 1,500 miles (e.g. Sydney-Cairns or Adelaide-Perth) now cost fewer miles. But longer domestic routes, such as Brisbane-Perth or Sydney-Darwin, are much more expensive.
Many short-haul awards becoming cheaper
With the shift from a region-based to a distance-based award chart, many other short-haul flights also now require fewer miles than before. This particularly applies to routes under 1,500 miles.
Unfortunately, though, longer flights in premium cabins are now generally more expensive.
Qantas trans-Tasman awards are great value
Under the new award chart, redeeming Alaska Airlines miles on most Qantas flights between Australia and New Zealand is excellent value.
On routes under 1,500 miles in distance, it costs just 7,500 Alaska Airlines miles for an Economy ticket or 15,000 miles for Business Class.
The following Qantas trans-Tasman routes under 1,500 miles:
- Sydney-Auckland
- Sydney-Wellington
- Sydney-Christchurch
- Sydney-Queenstown
- Brisbane-Auckland
- Brisbane-Queenstown
- Melbourne-Queenstown
You can even book a Premium Economy award seat on the Sydney-Auckland leg of QF3 for just 10,000 Alaska miles + taxes.
Other Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan changes
Alaska Airlines has also made the following changes to its loyalty program. Most of these are quite positive developments…
Global Getaways award sales
Alaska Airlines is now offering quarterly discounts of up to 50% off award bookings on selected routes. These Global Getaways deals are advertised on the Alaska Airlines website.
The first of these offers is already live. You can get 50% off on eligible routes when booking in April 2024, for travel between September-November 2024. However, this only applies to awards between eligible destinations and the United States.
Expansion of Premium Economy redemptions
Mileage Plan has introduced Premium Economy awards on American Airlines and Japan Airlines. These weren’t previously available.
Icelandair Saga Class redemptions has also switched from Business Class to Premium Economy pricing, better reflecting the nature of the product.
The ability to redeem points for Premium Economy is something that frequent flyer programs often lack.
All awards now use one-way pricing
In the past, Korean Air flights could only be booked as round-trip awards. If you booked a one-way flight, it was still priced at the round-trip level.
This has changed with Alaska Airlines moving to one-way pricing for all award tickets.
You can still add a free stopover of up to 14 days on eligible international award ticket itineraries.
Can’t enter another airline’s frequent flyer number on award tickets
Last month, Alaska Airlines quietly added a new condition to award bookings for travel on Alaska aircraft:
When redeeming miles for an award ticket from Alaska Mileage Plan account, customer cannot enter another airline’s frequent flyer number and is thus ineligible for benefits from another program.
That’s bad news for people who wish to use their frequent flyer benefits from Oneworld partner airlines.
Other changes promised for 2024
From late 2024, members will be able to combine two partner airlines (other than just Alaska Airlines and one other partner) onto a single award ticket.
Alaska Airlines also says:
We’ll open access to increased award inventory on 10% of partner routes covering more than 370 global destinations. This gives members the flexibility to use additional miles to fly when they want in the cabin they want.
I’m not entirely sure what to make of this promise, as it sounds like Alaska Airlines is hinting at introducing dynamic pricing on selected flights operated by partner airlines. My best guess here is that perhaps American Airlines flights might adopt dynamic pricing?
Given the prices on the Mileage Plan award chart are now “starting at”, this also hints that some awards will be priced higher than shown on the chart. This is slightly concerning.
In general I’d still expect most award flights that only include flights on partner airlines to be priced according to the relevant chart, but this isn’t always the case. Alaska Airlines has started to price some partner airline awards dynamically as well.
How to earn Mileage Plan miles in Australia
Despite the good value redemptions available, Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan remains a somewhat obscure frequent flyer program in Australia.
As Alaska Airlines is part of Oneworld, you can earn Mileage Plan miles when flying with Qantas. You can also transfer points into Mileage Plan from some hotel loyalty programs, including Marriott Bonvoy. (And if you have American Express Membership Rewards points, you can transfer those to Marriott Bonvoy.)
But many Australians simply buy Mileage Plan miles when there’s a sale on. Alaska Airlines sells its miles directly to the public, and you can often get generous bonuses or discounts. For example, you could have received up to 70% bonus miles on purchases made between 8-20 March 2024.
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