Questions and Answers

Hi all! I’ll be in Australia/Asia for the holidays thanks to you guys at points pros (yay!) but have a second issue.

I have a friend that will try to meet/join me for a good chunk of the trip but she just started the whole points thing and doesn’t have too much to play with. I [I]think[/I] she has enough points on her spg card to transfer to Virgin America for use on Virgin Australia. I’m assuming she’d have to book that last minute but that actually works in her favor. The issue is on the way back.

Ideally, she’d be leaving from Cairns or Brisbane (Sydney if she has to) and ending up in LA. Looking on the KrisFlyer site, it shows 2 flights with a change in Singapore, and a layover in either Japan or Korea for 100,000 points. Given the point cost it seems almost too good to be true. She currently has 80,000+ chase points she can transfer, so this would be PERFECT.

The thinking is to have her pay cash for a stopover in Singapore (is it still 100 bucks?) so we can spend a week or so there. We’d pay cash for local puddle jumpers if we decide to go to Thailand/Malaysia. Once that was over have her continue on back home.

My 1 st question is does this sound possible?

My second question is, I can’t find a seating chart for that particular flight. Since it would be over 8 hours would it be worthwhile to fly out of Brisbane, or even Sydney in the hopes of getting a nicer hard product?

Thanks in advance!

[USER=1075]@ezikyle[/USER], 100k is correct for saver J and the stopover cash price is correct. With the online booking discount you should be paying 85k.

About the layout, have you tried looking at seatguru?

Hi [USER=1075]@ezikyle[/USER]!

Singapore to Thailand would require a flight as the are quite far. Malaysia is definitely possible by driving from Singapore. What class would you be flying? Assuming its economy the hard product on Singapore would not differ. However, if you fly business the hard product out of Sydney is the [URL=’http://onemileatatime.boardingarea.com/2014/08/21/singapore-airlines-a380-business-class-frankfurt-new-york/’]a380[/URL], while Brisbane is the [URL=’http://onemileatatime.boardingarea.com/2013/08/29/review-singapore-airlines-business-class-bangkok-to-singapore/’]a330[/URL].

Singapore can be quite expensive, especially hotels. It may be worth using some of the SPG points for the hotel and do cash+miles for the flight.

Not sure on how much it is for a stop over.

Hope the advice helps!

@Guarav, that’s fantastic to hear! Yes I checked seatguru and it says there’s no map. Is the 85,000 for business class?

[USER=1837]@tconway02[/USER], At worst premium economy for a flight that long. Preferably business. I Figured we’d have to fly to Thailand and I’m ok with that. It’s getting to Singapore that concerns me. I have plenty of points for hotels on my cards. It’s just her flight I’m trying to get sorted. Hmmm, I’ll run it by her and see where she prefers to fly out of.

Thanks everyone!

Correct. SQ discounts their prices by 15% when you book online. However, if you need to add a stopover, you will need to call in. Remind the agent to add the discount since the stopover is not bookable online.

Re: seat maps. seatguru does seem to have them. Here is the map for the 380

[URL]http://www.seatguru.com/airlines/Singapore_Air/Singapore_Air_Airbus_A380.php[/URL]

If you don’t like those you can always check the SQ site directly. Go to:

[URL]http://www.singaporeair.com/en_UK/us/flying-withus/our-story/our-fleet/[/URL]

Select the aircraft you want to look at and then click on the appropriate seat map.

Another alternative is to go UA Miles. It’s 80K from Australia to US and Singapore has lots of availability using UA miles in business. Plus no surcharges. To find SQ flights try ANA’s website or KVS tool. You have to build a multi-city itinerary call United to book but its easy to do. You won’t get a stopover (unless you booked a round trip) but you can get 24 hours in a city. For example, in a few weeks I’m going ORD-NRT (23 hour layover), NRT-BKK (20 hour layover), BKK-SIN-MEL. On ANA, Thai and Singapore. Could have done ANA direct to SIN. You have lots of options. Also by then Thai will be flying the A350 from MEL to BKK. Thai has incredible availability.