From a beginner - when to buy Europe tickets and AMEX Platinum - is the money worth it?

[MdCM]

Hi there all
I am a newbie and although I am 56 I have just discovered the world of frequent flyer points and how to earn them and oh my gosh I am a little excited and a little addicted already. I don't fly frequently but next year I will be taking my parents to Spain for 3 months. I will be staying longer and probably travelling around the world for a year or more. I was hoping to get some advice on some things. My parents are elderly (85 and 91) so we will be going business class - lie flat seats. After a quick scan of airlines I think we will probably go Singapore airlines as they seem competitively priced and provide quality service but I am open to any quality airlines if the price is good. Love Qatar business but their cancellation policy only offered with the elite business which boosts the price up alot. I need to have the option of cancelling the flight for my parents in case they get sick etc. When I calculated roughly the krisflyer points from the tickets - we are looking at 85,000 points just from the flight miles. So I quickly worked out that I should be collecting points. I don't have any rewards credit cards and in fact I pay everything with a debit card (Silly of me I know! ). So I was wondering if you could help me with the following questions:
Q. Is now the time to buy tickets for flights for March 2024. Is it risky if I leave it any later (I still need to apply for a credit card). I'm getting very anxious about this as business class is a lot of money and I'm thinking if i make the right choices it could be thousands of dollars difference in price.
Q. Is Google flights alerts the best way to track cheap flights and are there people in Aus like Scotts Cheapest flights that I could sign up to. I signed onto Scott's site because I thought he had expanded to Aus but I couldn;t enter Sydney airport.
Q. Credit Cards - this is the big one for me at the moment that I need to get onto. After using the reviews on AFF I am thinking of getting the AMEX Platinum. I normally wouldn't even consider a credit card with a $1450 annual fee but the bonus of 150,000 points is pretty amazing, plus they are uncapped (which is best for me as I'll be making some big purchases on flight tickets in one go) and they give 1.125 ratio points for Krisflyer plus all of the perks. I am going to Nepal in December and stopping in Bangkok on the way back for two nights. By the time I add the points up I'll have one way business to or from europe and half a leg return flight. That is great value for $1450. They also give a $400 travel voucher that I can use. I figure I can redeem it for the two nights in Bangkok so that's part of the fee back. But it says on the anniversary of the first year so I'm not sure if that means I can only use the voucher after 12months. Am I missing something here guys or does it make sense?
Q. Is it worth getting a HSBC Star alliance just for the upgrade to gold status with Singapore?
Q. One other thing I noticed was when I was on a couple of airline sites, doing dummy purchase, a little box came up with red print saying 'note there is a non-refundable surcharge on credit card'. I looked up the surcharge and it's about 2%. That got me a little worried because that's $500 for a $20,000 spend on tickets.
Sooooo many questions haha.
Looking forward to hearing from your advice and input.

 

[Mwenenzi]

MdCM​

Welcome to AFF

Carefully consider travel ~ heath_medical insurance for your parents.
Frequent flyer miles/points/avios are given to passenger. Transferring (85,000) to another person depends on the ffp. Generally can be used by another person. subject to t&c's.

Q1. Business class fares have less fluctuation than economy fares.

Q3. What airlines to Nepal - Bangkok? SQ Singapore? Signed up with SQ Krisflyer?
Reward flights and/or upgrades with freq flyer miles/points/avios are far from guaranteed. More of a lottery.

 

[luxury-lizard]

Welcome to AFF MdCM.

I have a couple of things for you to consider in no particular order:-

• You mentioned you plan to apply for a credit card - from your travel plans it sounds like you may be retired (or self-employed) - I would do so ASAP as banks and AmEx can be "funny" about approving applications from retired people (even self-funded retirees). Also you may want a VISA or Mastercard in addition to AmEx as AmEx is not accepted everywhere. Also AmEx have recently announced a major devaluation of their points when to transfer to KrisFlyer (3:1 instead of 2:1).
• If you decide to fly SQ and join KrisFlyer - keep I mind they don't allow "family pooling" so you cannot credit points which your parents' flights earn to your account. Many other airlines do allow this.
• All airlines will charge a fee when you pay by credit card - varies by card type and airline.
• I agree with @Mwenenzi - business class flight prices are not as variable as economy - but "deals' do pop up from time to time.
• Also you really must ensure your parents are properly insured for overseas travel

 

[equus]

Also you really must ensure your parents are properly insured for overseas travel

That could be quite tricky (and expensive) for 86 and 91. Finding decent coverage for anyone over 80 is tricky, and will never be cheap. Pre-existing conditions are also likely to come into play.

 

[Daver6]

You mentioned the need to cancel if your parents get sick. That should be covered by your travel insurance. Ie, they can't travel due to illness. Again though, I'm not an expert so would need to ensure the policy covers your needs.

 

[funnybrus]

You mentioned the need to cancel if your parents get sick. That should be covered by your travel insurance. Ie, they can't travel due to illness. Again though, I'm not an expert so would need to ensure the policy covers your needs.

Usually an age exclusion on travel insurance policies.

 

[Forg]

Usually an age exclusion on travel insurance policies.

Might be worth checking the T’s & C’s when buying via the Amex mentioned in the thread title?

 

[equus]

Might be worth checking the T’s & C’s when buying via the Amex mentioned in the thread title?

The Platinum Charge Amex insurance is quite good - within its limits. You will need to read it very carefully. It does not provide coverage for existing medical conditions - of any sort. No automatically inclusions for common conditions associated with age, unlike other paid policies.

Many years ago it was great in that it covered all supplementary card holder - so just get the parents added for coverage, but that sadly is long gone, so it is not going to be able to cover he parents.

In any event. it will only cover for up to 80 years old, and there is a 90 year limit for Close Relative or Travelling companion (associated with you needing to cancel or change due to illness etc, of such relative).

Depending on what you need, it is possible to buy complimentary insurance. For a coming trip, I have bought another policy to cover pre-existing conditions, but have found a policy without cancellation cover, and with very little baggage or inconvenience cover - as the Amex policy is great for that. Keeps the cost of the other policy down.

Always read the PDS of all the policies very carefully - especially the exclusions.

 

[MdCM]

MdCM​

Welcome to AFF

Carefully consider travel ~ heath_medical insurance for your parents.
Frequent flyer miles/points/avios are given to passenger. Transferring (85,000) to another person depends on the ffp. Generally can be used by another person. subject to t&c's.

Q1. Business class fares have less fluctuation than economy fares.

Q3. What airlines to Nepal - Bangkok? SQ Singapore? Signed up with SQ Krisflyer?
Reward flights and/or upgrades with freq flyer miles/points/avios are far from guaranteed. More of a lottery.

Welcome to AFF MdCM.

I have a couple of things for you to consider in no particular order:-

• You mentioned you plan to apply for a credit card - from your travel plans it sounds like you may be retired (or self-employed) - I would do so ASAP as banks and AmEx can be "funny" about approving applications from retired people (even self-funded retirees). Also you may want a VISA or Mastercard in addition to AmEx as AmEx is not accepted everywhere. Also AmEx have recently announced a major devaluation of their points when to transfer to KrisFlyer (3:1 instead of 2:1).
• If you decide to fly SQ and join KrisFlyer - keep I mind they don't allow "family pooling" so you cannot credit points which your parents' flights earn to your account. Many other airlines do allow this.
• All airlines will charge a fee when you pay by credit card - varies by card type and airline.
• I agree with @Mwenenzi - business class flight prices are not as variable as economy - but "deals' do pop up from time to time.
• Also you really must ensure your parents are properly insured for overseas travel

Thanks so much for your advice @luxury-lizard, @equus, @Mwenenzi It was really valuable and helped me streamline some investigations. I ended up getting Japan Airlines business class because they do allow pooling between family members (at a price - but it was reasonable); listening to podcast on tope 10 business class airlines on AFF they also rated high for business class quality, have lie flat seats all the way and the price I was able to get was pretty good, plus the ticket is refundable for a fee of $400 which is a must for my elderly parents and given the return ticket price of $6861, it outweighed the option of flexi ticket. I decided not tow wait for a 'better deal' and the advice around business staying quite stable helped give me peace of mind with this. Thank you
I booked business to Paris and will buy a separate ticket economy (European local airlines) to get from Paris to Malaga, Spain which is just a couple of hours in the air. I've become a whole lot better at using Google flights (maps, filters, etc.) use of legroom extension app and Jack's compare flights app. Gosh it does take time but.
I ended up getting the Platinum American express and given my travel plans for the next year, the card will almost pay itself off just with the travel vouchers (not even including travel insurance). Yes AMEX does not cover people over 80 so I will need to look into travel insurance for them.
And yes now I need to get a credit card that will work for me where AMEX is not accepted and yes luxury-lizard (love that name! - got the sunbaking images going for me haha) absolutely am looking at retiring. Currently have taken leave until the end of next year but may not return. Actually definitely don't want to return so I def need to get all my credit cards sorted.
Thanks again guys - such a wealth of experience and knowledge. I am really grateful that I can be part of this community. Hopefully down the track I'll be able to give some tips in return

 

[Forg]

given the return ticket price of $6861

That's not a bad price! My wife's been talking about wanting to take me to Barcelona (where she previously saw about 3 week's worth of things she wanted to do in the 3 days she was there).

She's usually not keen on travel at all so I've been occasionally checking return prices around March next year, and that sort of money is what a lot of the airlines are selling Premium Economy for (which irks when the last time we went OS to the UK in 2018 was $3k return each in Business)!

 

[MdCM]

MdCM​

Welcome to AFF

Carefully consider travel ~ heath_medical insurance for your parents.
Frequent flyer miles/points/avios are given to passenger. Transferring (85,000) to another person depends on the ffp. Generally can be used by another person. subject to t&c's.

Q1. Business class fares have less fluctuation than economy fares.

Q3. What airlines to Nepal - Bangkok? SQ Singapore? Signed up with SQ Krisflyer?
Reward flights and/or upgrades with freq flyer miles/points/avios are far from guaranteed. More of a lottery.

Ps. I'm not looking at redeeming points yet. Only purchasing at this stage. But yes I'm realising that the challenge will be in finding/grabbing reward seats. That will be my next project. I'll be in Europe next year and will need a one-way return ticket for end of 2024/2025. The good thing is I am flexible with dates of flights. My understanding is that it's when airlines release their schedules for the year, that's when you need to get the reward seats. I'm flying Cathay to nepal and Phillipines Air return. I got those tickets before I learned about points but I will look into their points too.
Thanks again for your help!

 

[MdCM]

That's not a bad price! My wife's been talking about wanting to take me to Barcelona (where she previously saw about 3 week's worth of things she wanted to do in the 3 days she was there).

She's usually not keen on travel at all so I've been occasionally checking return prices around March next year, and that sort of money is what a lot of the airlines are selling Premium Economy for (which irks when the last time we went OS to the UK in 2018 was $3k return each in Business)!

It was a 15hour layover in tokyo outbound but not inbound. I didn't mind that as it arrives 5pm and we can have a walk around and sleep before the next leg which I think ends up less of a toll on the body on such a long trip especially for oldies.