While it’s probably not the world’s most aspirational business class product, TAP Air Portugal has just opened the floodgates for transatlantic business class award space for this upcoming winter and spring. Given how hard it can be to book transatlantic business class awards nowadays (especially in advance), I figure this is worth being aware of, as I just booked an award myself…
In this post:
TAP Air Portugal’s transatlantic award space
TAP Air Portugal has just opened a lot of award seats for travel between now and May 2024. Outside from peak holiday dates, I’m seeing business class award space on a majority of dates across routes. We’re not just talking about one or two seats, but rather I’m seeing four or more business class award seats per flight.
TAP primarily flies out of its Lisbon (LIS) hub, with destinations in the United States including Boston (BOS), Chicago (ORD), Miami (MIA), New York (JFK), Newark (EWR), San Francisco (SFO), and Washington (IAD).
TAP’s two most common aircraft for long haul routes are the Airbus A330-900neos and Airbus A321neos:
- A330-900neos feature fully flat staggered seats in business class, with direct aisle access; seats are in a 1-2-1 configuration
- A321neos feature fully flat staggered seats in business class, though not all seats have direct aisle access; seats alternate between being in a 1-1 and 2-2 layout
TAP has a solid hard product, though definitely manage your expectations when it comes to the soft product, which isn’t the best in the world (to put it mildly). But still, with one-stop routings between the United States and many points in Europe, this is a great opportunity for premium travel.
As far as award prices go, your best bets are Avianca LifeMiles (which charges 63,000 miles for a US to Europe business class award) or Air Canada Aeroplan (which charges 70,000 points for a US to Europe award covering a distance of 4,001-6,000 miles, and you can add a stopover to the award for 5,000 points).
I just used this opportunity to book a TAP award for travel late this winter, when I saw no other good award options across the Atlantic nonstop out of Miami. I’m excited I’ll finally have the chance to review the carrier’s A330-900neo, as I haven’t had the chance to fly it yet.
TAP Air Portugal is usually weird with award availability
TAP Air Portugal takes an unconventional approach with award space. When it comes to revenue fares, TAP is generally by far the cheapest Star Alliance carrier across the Atlantic. Often the carrier’s economy pricing is more in line with what you’d expect from a low cost carrier.
Yet at the same time, the airline is really stingy with transatlantic award space, even in situations where the cabin has lots of availability in the days leading up to departure. I’d be fascinated to know why the airline takes this approach.
Regardless, this is all the more reason to take advantage of this opportunity. I don’t remember the last time that I saw nonstop TAP business class award seats from Miami or San Francisco to Lisbon, while we’re currently seeing four or more seats on many flights.
Bottom line
TAP Air Portugal is being generous with award availability, for once. The airline has a lot of business class award space across the Atlantic for travel this winter and spring, so if you have any transatlantic travel plans you want to lock in, this is a great opportunity to do so.
Do you plan on booking any TAP award space?
After noticing 2 business class seats available on a JFK-LIS flight, I decided to book each seats separately(ANA and Lifemlies) since I didn't have enough miles to book them altogether. Strangely, after booking one with ANA, I noticed the other seat was no longer available to book. I tried another date which had 3 seats available. Samething happened. After booking one, the remaining 2 seats disappeared. I don't know what's going on. Can someone explain?
Did you ever figure out what happened? I just had the same problem trying to book two seats. I booked 1 seat via Lifemiles, then immediately canceled when the flight disappeared before I could book the second seat (despite showing more than 1 seat on LM and AC before booking). Same problem when trying to book via Air Canada. Weirdly, I was then able to book the 2 seats together via Lifemiles when I did...
Did you ever figure out what happened? I just had the same problem trying to book two seats. I booked 1 seat via Lifemiles, then immediately canceled when the flight disappeared before I could book the second seat (despite showing more than 1 seat on LM and AC before booking). Same problem when trying to book via Air Canada. Weirdly, I was then able to book the 2 seats together via Lifemiles when I did it as one reservation. I got the PNR and ticket numbers so I'm sure it worked.
I've found their narrow body business class seats comfortable, but we were quite disappointed to see the differences in catering. They'll have the same menu for, say, EWR-LIS, but many options simply won't be catered if it's operated by the smaller aircraft. For sure, I typically fly C for the hard product, but if given the choice, I would obviously pick the option with nicer food and wine.
To be honest, I‘m more concerned about the hard product, in particular on the A321. The 1-1 rows, while very private are also very narrow. I don‘t manage to go into lie flat while seated, because my legs block the mechanism …
yeah, but you are flying on TAP
I find the soft product in J on flights within the EU to be pretty good (by European airlines standards). You get a 3-course hot meal with each course plated and served separately (as opposed to the cardboard food box that KLM will toss in your general direction) and decent wines served at your seat from the bottle. Haven’t flown intercontinental on TAP so can’t comment on that experience.
I agree, the intra EU soft product is certainly one of the better ones on the market, perhaps slightly below TK and IB (both Do&Co catered) but above BA, AF/KL, and much better than LH/LX. Same on long haul.
I grabbed a one way earlier this year on TAP's nonstop LIS-CUN for 82500 UA miles + 78.29 USD. Got "the throne"
TAP Air Portugal’s soft product in business class really shouldn’t matter. Just have a great dinner and cocktails at the United Polaris lounge (to which you have access), then skip the on-flight meals and entertainment and sleep through the entire flight.
Heading to Marrakech from SFO and saw this availability. Almost pulled trigger but decided on routing through Zurich instead in paid premium economy for $389 + 20k
you paid 389 USD + 20k miles for SFO-ZRH-RAK ? on what mileage program? thanks!
Following…
Take back my comments on being a good price to buy tap miles. it used to be 718 euro for 144k miles , its now 899 euro and the price in miles of the trip I was looking at has gone from 50,000 to 60,000 miles. so almost 30% price increase and 20% miles devaluation makes it a lot less attractive.
After reading this I just hopped onto the TAP miles and go site to check the current club deal to buy miles and it is the highest at 150k I have seen since Lucky wrote 3yrs or so ago about a deal offering 12 months star gold. The usual highest is 144k miles and it generally been 120k + or - for the last yr or so.
It would be great if Ben brought...
After reading this I just hopped onto the TAP miles and go site to check the current club deal to buy miles and it is the highest at 150k I have seen since Lucky wrote 3yrs or so ago about a deal offering 12 months star gold. The usual highest is 144k miles and it generally been 120k + or - for the last yr or so.
It would be great if Ben brought some miles and then tried to book an Emirites Business class flight with them as it really good value if bookable.
https://www.flytap.com/en-pt/miles-and-go/club?plan=32aaed9c-7275-4347-a515-d24c51807da0&seg=table
Relax, from Most cities on the east coast it's not a long flight, it's a great seat for a short flight.
From Toronto they offer fly a A321, and obviously it's far superior to Air Canada.
Beware of TAP. A work colleague is based in Europe. She and others have had the following occur with TAP. Someone will book a flight with a low price. TAP will change the flight time. But, rather than simply change the time of the flight (same flight number), it will cancel the flight and add a new flight (with a different flight number) and rebook passengers from the old flight to the new flight. And,...
Beware of TAP. A work colleague is based in Europe. She and others have had the following occur with TAP. Someone will book a flight with a low price. TAP will change the flight time. But, rather than simply change the time of the flight (same flight number), it will cancel the flight and add a new flight (with a different flight number) and rebook passengers from the old flight to the new flight. And, the airfare on the new flight is significantly higher. And, without permission of the passenger, it simply charges the change in airfare to the passenger's original credit card. And, will then say the fare in non-refundable. Never would I fly TAP. Even on miles. Dirt bag organization.
Umm... no. That is not how it works. Old wives tale.
that makes no sense whatsoever. This is the EU. Airlines don't just charge credit cards because they feel like it and without the passenger knowing.
Bullshit. If someone does something like that it’s easy ground for every lawyer. Tap is not great in paying eu261. You always have to go to court and win but such things as you tell are nonesense
Are you sure it was a work colleague and not a work colleague's cousin's friend? Weird stuff like that happens to them all the time.
What mushrooms did you take?
One thing I will say about TAP is that pursuing EU261 compensation with them was very simple and they paid timely (at least with a delayed regional flight operated by Portugalia). The delay (5 hours) was not communicated well, however. No email, with the app and screens at the airport said the flight was on-time despite flight tracker and checkin agent saying otherwise. Service in flight was... below par.
But I'd give them a chance...
One thing I will say about TAP is that pursuing EU261 compensation with them was very simple and they paid timely (at least with a delayed regional flight operated by Portugalia). The delay (5 hours) was not communicated well, however. No email, with the app and screens at the airport said the flight was on-time despite flight tracker and checkin agent saying otherwise. Service in flight was... below par.
But I'd give them a chance again. I'm surprised that your experience is that TAP releases very little award space. My experience was that they are more generous with award space than LH Group, United, and Air Canada from North America to Europe. Almost as generous as LOT Polish.
Has anyone had luck obtaining seat assignments when booking TAP through LifeMiles awards? The Avianca PNR / ticket number doesn’t work with the online TAP reservation management.
@ JK -- Had exactly the same thing happen, which was weird. Managed to call TAP and assign seats, and the seat maps now reflect those seats as occupied, so that's good.
I appreciate your response! I’ll give that a try
Odd, just booked an had no issues other than I jacked up the phone number that TAP wants to send a verification code too... Was able to add my email address on Croatia airlines website, and then TAP gave me the option to send the code there... Was able to select seats no problem
Interestingly, I tried using the Croatia airlines website that you mentioned and the Aviance PNR not only pulled up additional details on my reservation, I was able to select seats too! I’ll need to verify they took, but this was exactly what I needed, thank you.
I learned everything I needed to know about TAP when, on at least three separate occasions, they managed to lose the luggage of three separate friends on nonstop IAD-LIS flights.
TAP or any other airline does not lose luggage. Ground services do. The responsibility ends up always being with the airline obviously for a business they don't ultimately control. Was LIS the final destination? if so, was their luggage even properly loaded to begin with?
I left my macbook once on board a Delta fight to JFK. Business class seat. I made an online complain. I kept receiving e-mails saying they were still looking...
TAP or any other airline does not lose luggage. Ground services do. The responsibility ends up always being with the airline obviously for a business they don't ultimately control. Was LIS the final destination? if so, was their luggage even properly loaded to begin with?
I left my macbook once on board a Delta fight to JFK. Business class seat. I made an online complain. I kept receiving e-mails saying they were still looking for it up to 4 months after I had already recovered. The last message I got was to apologise they hadn't found it despite their best efforts. I was lucky to find in a forum online about a DL desk in JFK where often left and found are left for a while. It was there. Airlines mess up sometimes. simple as that.
Just flew TAP across the Atlantic last week. I mean yes Air France and others are more polished but they are typically half the price for lie flat seats and the food is good. Totally great value! Lisbon is a breeze to transit through too.
Wouldn't ANA also be a good deal for 88,000 for r/t biz on TAP? I think only Amex is a transfer partner, though.
I ended up booking this with ANA miles since I've been sitting on a bunch of those ever since several Japan trips were cancelled due to covid. Since you have to book a round trip with ANA miles, the fact that there was so much availability made this one of the few times I could use hose miles.
I am not sure what's better about flying Delta or United or Lufthansa than TAP across the Atlantic. The only thing I could agree on is that business class service in the A339 is far better than on the A321 neos. Otherwise good wines, good catering, in flight entertainment could be improved.
Probably because they sell upgrades well leading up to the flight and cash on day of departure.
"...covering a distance of 4,001-6,000 points..."
Don't you mean miles?
@ TravelinWilly -- I do indeed, thanks! Updating now...