Several weeks ago, Virgin Atlantic announced plans to “reinvent” its Flying Club loyalty program. At the time, we learned that the program would adopt dynamic award pricing, though not much was revealed beyond that.
Well, Flying Blue’s new dynamic award pricing has now been implemented, so we have all the details of the changes. While there are some negative developments, there’s also a lot to love here. So let’s dig right in…
Virgin Atlantic Flying Club award redemption changes
As of October 30, 2024, Virgin Atlantic Flying Club has changed how members can redeem points for award flights. It’s now possible for Flying Club members to redeem points for any seat onboard a Virgin Atlantic flight, though with dynamic pricing. In other words, the price of an award seat varies in line with demand, just as it does when paying cash for a ticket.
The good news is that Virgin Atlantic isn’t fully adopting revenue based pricing, which is to say that there are still ways to get outsized value. For that matter, there are ways to get more value than ever before.
Flying Club updates how saver awards work
Historically, Virgin Atlantic Flying Club had consistent award pricing. As long as there were saver awards available, the only variable was whether you were traveling during a peak or off-peak period (and if there weren’t saver awards available, you were out of luck).
The program is sort of maintaining the concept of saver awards. The catch is that:
- Flying Club will no longer have a saver award seat guarantee, whereby at least 12 seats per flight will be available as saver awards (two in business class, two in premium economy, and eight in economy)
- Flying Club won’t offer any saver awards on roughly 25% of flights; on the 75% of flights that do have saver awards, there’s no guarantee that there will be at least 12 seats, as was the case under the old policy
The good news is that for those situations where saver awards are available, pricing will be no more than it was under the old award chart. Below is the off-peak saver award chart, showing the most you’ll pay when saver awards are available.
Below is the peak saver award chart, showing the most you’ll pay when saver awards are available.
Here’s where the huge upside is, though. In many situations, pricing will be way below the maximum saver award rates that used to be required. Below is a chart showing the minimum costs you’ll find in Virgin Atlantic’s five most popular redemption markets.
Indeed, I’m seeing some New York to London awards starting at 6,000 points in economy, or 29,000 points in Upper Class, which is an exceptional deal.
It’s not just that the number of points required have been lowered, but…
Flying Club makes award fees variable
Virgin Atlantic Flying Club is known for historically charging outrageously high carrier imposed surcharges on awards, separate from the UK Air Passenger Duty. For a one-way transatlantic Upper Class award, you could expect to pay around $1,000 in taxes, fees, and surcharges.
Under the new program, award fees are also variable. The good news is that at least as of now, I’m not seeing any awards that cost more in fees than before, but I am seeing just about all awards costing less.
For example, in the above New York to London example, I see an Upper Class ticket for 29,000 points plus $254 in taxes and fees, around $750 less than before. It’s super exciting to see fees lowered in that way, since that was a major hurdle to getting value from the Flying Club program.
Flying Club now offers last seat award availability
Under Virgin Atlantic Flying Club’s old system, either there was saver award availability or there wasn’t, and if there wasn’t, there was no way to redeem points. With the new program, every seat can be booked with points. As you’d expect, though, for situations where there’s not saver award availability, prices can be steep. For example, I see one-way Upper Class awards that cost 350,000 points.
So while that’s a higher cost than we’ve ever seen from the program in the past, these are also seats you probably couldn’t have otherwise booked with points. So some people may appreciate the additional options.
Flying Club increases award change fees
To coincide with these changes, Virgin Atlantic has also increased the cost to change or cancel an award ticket for travel on Virgin Atlantic. While this previously cost £30 per ticket (or $50 for awards originating outside the UK), that fee has now been increased to £70 per ticket (or $100 for awards originating outside the UK).
That’s of course a very customer unfriendly change. I suppose the logic is that people may be rebooking tickets more often if the points requirements are constantly changing. So I guess the goal is to create a penalty so that people don’t constantly reprice tickets. I of course don’t like that, but…
Flying Club isn’t changing partner award pricing
Some of my favorite uses of Flying Club points are for travel on partner airlines. The good news is that this new dynamic award pricing applies to tickets on Virgin Atlantic, but not to tickets on partner airlines. So while we’ve seen some devaluations to partner award redemptions, there are still some good deals to be had.
My take on these Virgin Atlantic Flying Club changes
When Virgin Atlantic announced that Flying Club would adopt dynamic award pricing, I feared the worse. Virgin Atlantic is 49% owned by Delta, and we all know how Delta approaches its SkyMiles program, and I worried that was the direction that Virgin Atlantic was headed.
So I’m now breathing a sigh of relief, as these changes are much better than I was expecting, and I’d even perhaps consider them positive, on balance.
Of course it’s a loss that Virgin Atlantic will no longer consistently release a dozen saver award seats per flight, since that eliminates an aspect of the program that provided certainty. If you usually redeemed for tickets during the busiest periods the minute the schedule opened, then these changes will almost certainly be bad for you.
However, just about everything else is good news, if you ask me, especially for those of us who are willing to plan our travels around being able to get a deal:
- There are now many awards that are way cheaper than they ever were, making for some great redemptions (you can easily compare pricing with the Reward Seat Checker)
- Fees in many markets have been lowered considerably, which was one of the biggest annoyances people had with the program
- While I don’t personally want to redeem for non-saver awards, there are many people who value being able to redeem points for any seat on a flight
Anyway, my initial impression here is quite positive, and the implementation is better than I feared it could be. I want to of course caution that this is my impression based on the initial implementation. The thing about dynamic award pricing is that the cost of awards can change at any time, and there are few promises.
So let’s see how award pricing (in both cash and points), as well as award availability, evolves. But if it stays like it is now, then I’m a fan.
Bottom line
Virgin Atlantic Flying Club has implemented its new dynamic award pricing, and it’s better than expected. The bad news is that there’s no longer a saver award seat guarantee, though the good news is that some awards are cheaper than ever before, and many fees have also been lowered. Some people will also appreciate the ability to redeem points for any seat on a flight.
What do you make of these changes to Virgin Atlantic Flying Club?
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