Virgin Atlantic Flying Club is a useful frequent flyer program, especially with the airline now being in the SkyTeam alliance. Not only does Flying Club have useful niche redemption rates on airlines like All Nippon Airways and Air New Zealand, but the program also allows members to redeem points on all SkyTeam carriers.
Continue reading: Virgin Atlantic Flying Club Devalues Delta Awards (Again)
Share your questions, experiences, and thoughts below.
Heaven forbid something of value be offered to anyone for anything Delta.
All the more reason to avoid, avoid, avoid Delta at all costs.
It's just disgusting how routinely this stuff is devalued at no notice. But annual fees? Nah, those will always go only in one direction - UP!
It's all a racket, save for a few niche international redemptions on OneWorld, the points game is over.
What we are seeing is Delta had the right idea years ago to scrap award charts and inflate business class awards to hundreds of thousands of miles. Delta knew the points game was picking up steam in the middle class. Delta wanted to preserve the upper class prestige of its business class cabin. The way to do that is make it impossible to redeem points for a good value. You wanna fly Delta business class? That will be $10,000.
Business class must be the domain of the well heeled. People under 30 shouldn’t be able to afford it even if they are senior associates on the Cravath scale.
Make partner first. Then fly business. That’s how aviation should work and Delta has the right vision. My name isn’t Tim Dunn.
Prices go up, that's how inflation works. Air travel inflation is still only a drop in the bucket compared to housing, groceries, and other goods and services inflation in recent years.
Credit cards, obscene inflated amounts handed out to OPM flyers based on "spend".
Of course it's over. 1% rebate is all points will be worth (or less with Delta)
I m in my 30s.
Have no desire to work more than 20 weeks a year. And can easily fly business class anytime.
What I would like to see is business class be exclusive and not have some low level corporate peon whi makes 50k a year be up there because his corporate overlord is paying.
These comments are bizarre. Sure, you can't find amazing business class deals with Delta SkyMiles, but SM is still far from worthless. The redemption rate for regional flights is fantastic, for example.
Disappointing news but the consistency of point transfer bonuses for Flying Club still makes the program worthwhile imho.
Certainly not worth stockpiling points though. Also worth pointing out the big hassle that comes with changing/cancelling Flying Club itineraries... everything requires a phone call (or two), and anything involving Virgin's refunds department is painful.
Glad I burned my delta miles years ago and abandoned trying to fly their products. Simply not worth the hassle or the frustration they bring to reward redemptions on their flights, since they are constantly finding ways to bleed every last dollar out of customers.
I just looked at regional flights in the northeast for an upcoming trip and Delta redemptions lagged behind every other carrier. Either Deltas cost was higher (Jet Blue, American, Spirit - if booked through Chase travel), or they were cheaper but only if you flew basic economy (United). At this point the only "value" they seem to have is on their awards deals, which always restricts your options and essentially only covers economy. Unless you're flying Delta metal on work's dime or your locked to one of their hubs it makes little sense to earn their points
This is an all-timer comment. Thanks for making it to my screengrab memorialized Entitled & Privlidged Hall of Fame!
it's amazing how many people take obvious tongue in cheek posts at face value.
I wouldn't call it amazing but fair and consistent value if you're redeeming it towards economy class like cash, which is 1.3 cpp if you have a Delta CC (comes with annual fee though). Or 1.1 cpp if you don't.
Just don't think about using Delta SkyMiles for premium cabins. It's much more difficult to find a reasonable award pricing (with surge charges and fees) for Delta One it seems.
This would be a lot more relevant if there was actually any availability. You can put 5000 miles or 500,000 miles on the award chart, but it does not really matter when they have not had significant J award space in years.
Exactly. Ben talks about these 50k redemptions yet I never once saw one pop up on the award calendar. I would sometimes look through the entire year to no avail. Certainly not for SEA or SLC anyway.
N=1, but still…
Latam Pass has just devalued Delta awards as well. I guess this isn’t some crazy coincidence, as Delta also owns a stake in Latam.
It's obviously a troll comment.
People who actually fit that description is very rare, most if not all of them would be on Instagram not a credit card blog.
I'm thinking old @Anna is a mid 50s working minimum wage and despise fellow Spirit passengers.
The hate comes from the lack of retirement savings.
I agree the refunds process takes too long at a couple of weeks... but I've never had an issue getting it done. Similarly, never had an issue changing itineraries (incl recently canceling and rebooking to take advantage of the 40% redemption discount)
I don't redeem skypesos when I can get the same flights on Virgin or AF at half or less of the miles. So I still have a big balance despite wanting to get rid of them! I just need to bite the bullet and get rid of them
While Sir Richard owns a bare majority of Virgin Atlantic, the airline is controlled and run by Delta-imposed management. So, this isn't surprising.
I would complain but I have been looking for 2 J class from any east Coast city to any city in Europe fpr the past year and there has been zero availability,For those with Virgin points to burn there is good availability on Air France now but you must call in to book. Go ahead and book before they pull the inventory. I booked two tickets in J for 48,500 from MIA to NCE June 2025 .The other blogs have also been talking about the wide open award chart. Book now ,it will end soon.
Truth is I haven't been able to find any of those Delta flights in a long time anyway. They used to be great.
Thanks, can you clarify? You're calling Virgin to book flights on Air France? What kind of fuel surcharges?
@Sue check out today's Frequent Miler post about this deal. Fuel surcharges are marginally higher than booking direct through AF, but miles savings are significant.
Look - there was a post a few days ago about crowding at the D1 JFK lounge. This implies D1 to Europe is full. If that is so, why would Delta give away cheap seats to Virgin members? There is no business reason to do so. From a SkyMiles perspective, the “Flash Sales” I used in the past to book D1 to Europe somewhat reliably haven’t appeared in two years - I assume they are gone. It is what it is. You want D1 - pay for it. If you don’t want to pay - book elsewhere.
Fuel surcharge in business was $325 a ticket, not great but there is tons of availability. Also Air France in J is a much better product than Delta. The current availability will dry up. If you have any plans I would book now.You must call in to book but you can search the Virgin website to check availability.
Interesting. So your name isn't Tim Dunn. Is it Paul Weiss? Or Davis Polk? Or Biglawv10? Or all of the above? Why are you writing using the names of major NYC law firms? Also, why are you spewing nonsense? A very senior Cravath associate is good for $550k. He or she can't afford a $10k ticket? Also, junior partners can net less than senior associates due to buy-in requirements. Is trolling fun?
I’m shocked Ben hasn’t written about this topic yet. It’s brilliant and may very well be “fixed” (read: stopped) soon, so take advantage now.
Eh. Even with these prices, they haven't gone Full SkyTeam until they reach 7-digits for business redemptions to Europe on Delta.
That said, I'm done with VS. Between restrictions on when you can secure reservations and pricing changes, it's better for me to focus on AA (for JAL) and EVA to cross the Pacific Ocean.
Wow- you are even dumber than I thought. Wife, three kids and decades of practicing with the big boys. What’s next—posting as Simpson Thatcher? Fried Frank? Please add something useful to Ben’s blog or troll elsewhere. Please? Some of us respect our professions (if you are even in this profession, which I doubt because none of your posts make any sense).
"Virgin Atlantic remains committed to offering our loyal members the most competitive pricing for redemption flights across our partner airline network" well...they did just the oposite.