Questions and Answers

Hi Folks,
I am new to this and would like to start using my points, but do not know where to start. I have 101,000 Flying Blue points and want to use them to book a couple of flights to London this summer. I do not know where to begin! Thanks for any and all help!

VZZ

Welcome [USER=2945]@VZZ[/USER] – have you read the Beginner’s Guide? You’ll find it under the Start Here tab at the top of the page.

Yes, thanks–read the beginners guide, but I still can not figure out what my next step is if I want to try to book a couple of flights. I’m confused about the sky team alliance versus the flying blue frequent flyer program. Thanks!

Hi [USER=2945]@VZZ[/USER], and welcome!

Where are you hoping to travel to/from? For the most part you will use the Air France or KLM websites to search for award options, and it’s going to be tough for summer travel at this point, but we’d be happy to help you get started.

Great! Thanks! We could travel from IAD, Phila., or BWI. Going to London–Heathrow I’d assume if one is traveling to see London. I’ve been checking on the Flying Blue website to see what I can learn. Any and all help is appreciated.

The only SkyTeam partner that has non-stop service to LHR from any of those cities is Delta from PHL. Since you’re using partner miles that means you’d have to find saver-level (lowest) award space which is possible but I suspect unlikely.

If you’re willing to connect in either Paris or Amsterdam you could look on the Air France site for connections there flying on Air France or KLM as both use FB miles.

Or you could try looking for Delta space via Atlanta. Again, you’d want to use the FB site to search for available seats.

Thanks! I will look into all of these. Is Heathrow the best airport to fly into?

If you’re going to connect in Europe on AirFrance/KLM, also look at flying into Gatwick or London City. Your biggest hurdle will be finding space on the transatlantic leg though, so start by finding a flight first and then finding connecting legs at your start and end points. You may need to buy a separate positioning flight in some cases.

Thanks, That sounds complicated! I will start my search and see what I find.

Both AirFrance and KLM serve IAD, so see if you can find space for IAD-CDG (Paris) and IAD-AMS (Amsterdam), in addition to [USER=184]@MidSouth Skier[/USER]’s suggestion of PHL-LHR and ATL-LHR. Add in a search for ATL-CDG/AMS as well as JFK-CDG/AMS/LHR.

Also – Aeroflot is a decent choice. They fly out of JFK and IAD and you’d connect in Moscow.

OK–I will see what I can find. Thanks again for the tips. May be a while before I find what I am looking for!

[USER=2945]@VZZ[/USER] did you read [URL=’http://onemileatatime.boardingarea.com/2017/02/28/flyingblue-promo-awards-march-2017/’]Ben’s article on FlyingBlue’s Promo Awards?[/URL] Although they don’t depart from either PHL, IAD or BWI; there are flights from ORD-Europe and it may be worthwhile to see if the 25% award discount could fit your needs, even if the travel time is slightly longer.

Thanks for all the hints, folks. I managed to snag two seats, round trip, non-stop flights from Phila-London, end of July-beginning of August. 25,000 Flying Blue points each way per person. I am happy with that for my first try! We will have to drive 6 hrs to the airport, but we are 5 hrs from any airport of decent size anyway. The FlyingBlue promo award wouldn’t work too well since we are so far from any decent sized city. Thanks for the tip.