The "Buy LifeMiles" promos thread

[Notyourbag]

Any TK award availability showing for their Melbourne flights?

 

[WilsonM]

Any TK award availability showing for their Melbourne flights?

I haven't been able to find any, at this point. Can't see TK on SIN-IST either, although I can see availability through KF.

 

[flyerzz]

Just got an offer for 170% bonus. I did what I said I'd never do and bought just enough to top up for SYD-BKK J next month. Booking went through smoothly. Now, never again,

I just signed up to Lifemiles a few days ago and got 160% bonus offer rather than 170%.
How to get 170% offer?
I wonder if 170% only for people who purchased Lifemiles in the past only?

Anyway, the points were processed and available in my account about 31 hours after the transaction.. bit slow..

May I know why people not keen on using Lifemiles?
I managed to redeem the points for a flight online and seemed it was pretty hassle free.
This is my first time though and maybe I just got lucky?

Thanks

 

[MEL_Traveller]

I just signed up to Lifemiles a few days ago and got 160% bonus offer rather than 170%.
How to get 170% offer?
I wonder if 170% only for people who purchased Lifemiles in the past only?

Anyway, the points were processed and available in my account about 31 hours after the transaction.. bit slow..

May I know why people not keen on using Lifemiles?
I managed to redeem the points for a flight online and seemed it was pretty hassle free.
This is my first time though and maybe I just got lucky?

Thanks

Lifemiles is great! If you can find the availability.

The main problems with LM are:

• availability can be patchy, with airlines or routes withdrawn without notice. See a route wide open for months, but the. all of a sudden nothing. And that may be months or years before being rectified.
• single, point to point flights are sometimes ok, but anything involving two or more flights may be problematic. LM doesn’t like long connections, so even if you can see availability on every other star alliance booking engine, LM might not offer it
• there are hefty change and cancellation fees, USD150/200 respectively
• calling LM incan be problematic. The staff are extremely competent, no doubt. But you have to call when the ‘special department’ is open for many transactions. And get someone who speaks english. This can mean calls at really unsociable hours. Explaining over a very patchy VOIP line that the airline has changed their schedule and you need a new flight can be hard.
• with all of the above, it’s pretty easy to get stuck with LM you can’t use! For example there used to be lots of availability on Thai, then it dried up overnight, only recently brought back, but that was after a couple years. Bad luck if you wanted to use thai to get to europe, given LM doesn’t offer awards on Singapore airlines, and connections via Seoul or Tokyo might involve longer transits or changes of airport… neither of which LM likes.
• some people have problems with LM accepting their credit card, even if successfully used before. This can mean having to call, or worse, like happened to a friend, they had to go into a LM office to verify their identity. Lucky they just happened to be in the USA where this was possible.

The price of miles via Aeroplan is reasonably the same, but comes with none of the issues mentioned above.

 

[flyerzz]

The price of miles via Aeroplan is reasonably the same, but comes with none of the issues mentioned above.

Does Aeroplan have similar sale like Lifemiles 160% bonus?
I purchased points with 160% bonus points and redeemed 2 days later with no issue. Lucky with availability I guess.

What I like about Lifemiles is their calendar opens 355 days in advance like Krisflyer and ANA, unlike Velocity and United, which are 330 days in advance.
How many days in advance does Aeroplan calendar open?

Thanks for the write up about Lifemiles. Very insightful for a new player like me

Cheers

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Does Aeroplan have similar sale like Lifemiles 160% bonus?
I purchased points with 160% bonus points and redeemed 2 days later with no issue. Lucky with availability I guess.

What I like about Lifemiles is their calendar opens 355 days in advance like Krisflyer and ANA, unlike Velocity and United, which are 330 days in advance.
How many days in advance does Aeroplan calendar open?

Thanks for the write up about Lifemiles. Very insightful for a new player like me

Cheers

Not sure the exact date aeroplan opens. But it has availability when I need it, and i generally book around 6 months in advance for big trips. The thing with aeroplan is lots of availability, including gulf carriers.

Aeroplan has regular sales, 80-100% bonuses.

Seasoned players are pretty much avoiding LM. It’s a brave move to be buying miles, unless like you, you are purchasing and redeeming immediately.

But, another problem which ai didn’t mention above. You might see seats available on LM, and they might be similarly available on say UA or LH’s site. But then you come to book them on LM they return an error.

So purchasing points is very very risky, as there’s no guarantee even if the seats should be available, that you can get them!

 

[drron]

Well I managed to get 2 TG J awards SYD-BKK for December tonight. Hope this continues.

 

[flyerzz]

The thing with aeroplan is lots of availability, including gulf carriers.

If a partner flight (within star alliance) is available in Aeroplan, won't it also be available in Avianca LM booking portal (and other partners booking portal eg SQ, UA, Velocity) etc?

I recently redeemed LM points for an ANA flight. Before I redeemed in LM, I checked that the flight was shown on LM and SQ booking portal.
Right after I successfully booked the flight using LM, the flight also disappeared from SQ booking portal.
It suggests that these partner airlines booking portals are connected somehow, perhaps getting reward seats inventory from a common database (via common API call) ?

Trying to understand how partner's airlines availability work in general..

 

[MEL_Traveller]

If a partner flight (within star alliance) is available in Aeroplan, won't it also be available in Avianca LM booking portal (and other partners booking portal eg SQ, UA, Velocity) etc?

I recently redeemed LM points for an ANA flight. Before I redeemed in LM, I checked that the flight was shown on LM and SQ booking portal.
Right after I successfully booked the flight using LM, the flight also disappeared from SQ booking portal.
It suggests that these partner airlines booking portals are connected somehow, perhaps getting reward seats inventory from a common database (via common API call) ?

Trying to understand how partner's airlines availability work in general..

Well, that should be the case. But it’s not the way LM works. People have been caught before, buying or transferring points, but LM returns an error and can’t complete the booking. And the call centre, even though they can ‘see’ the flight on their system like we can, can’t ultimately book it either.

It’s a catch-22 with LM. The strong advice is to never transfer or buy LM for the purpose of redeeming a specific award (because it could fail), but if you never buy or transfer miles, you’ll never be able to try!

That leaves you with buying some lifemiles but having alternatives that you might use them for at some other time. So if your SYD-BKK can’t be booked, you might be able to use them for your trip ORD-FRA or whatever later in the year.

LM is a high risk program. And a risk that can be easily avoided through something like aeroplan, or united, etc.

 

[drron]

And now 2 TG J BKK SYD in early January 2025.

 

[hachoo]

tiered 140%+ bonus sale on at the moment. A few seats with TG, EVA and ANA around but not a bunch. Could be an alternative to Aeroplan if for some reason it doesn't work for you.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

tiered 140%+ bonus sale on at the moment. A few seats with TG, EVA and ANA around but not a bunch. Could be an alternative to Aeroplan if for some reason it doesn't work for you.

Apparently some of those TG seats, at least, are phantom

 

[hachoo]

Apparently some of those TG seats, at least, are phantom

That is disappointing. I feel with the UI on the website already and the possibility of phantom flights it might be worth skipping entirely.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

That is disappointing. I feel with the UI on the website already and the possibility of phantom flights it might be worth skipping entirely.

Ohhh yes! I haven’t bought LM for several years now. I’m trying to burn those I have left.

Intra europe proved good hunting, I got some good flights there. But 20k I had to spend on a hotel booking, just ‘cause I couldn’t use them anywhere else.

While it’s tempting to use them for say Asia, Aeroplan would be a better choice of program. And the cost is almost the same.