I just converted my Virgin points to Alaska points...

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Alaska's buyout of Virgin became official last year. The two airlines slowly merging operations and we've reached the point where you can transfer your Virgin points to Alaska points. Each Virgin point will get you 1.3 Alaska points. Make sure you have your logins for both programs and then head here.

Once I clicked Confirm, it took about 10 minutes for the transfer to complete. There's also some talk over at The Points Guy that some people are getting 10,000 point bonuses as part of the points plan merger (that's not happened for me yet, though).

They're also reporting that you can now redeem Alaska miles for Virgin America flights...

UPDATE: and there's now a page (log in to your Alaska account before you click) where you can link your Alaska account to your Virgin one so if you have Elite status on one, you'll have status on the other.



Comments

  1. CadeRageousJanuary 10, 2017 at 12:16 AM

    But what do you think about the point trade-in ratio for Alaska's flight options?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brian KuslerJanuary 10, 2017 at 9:41 AM

      That's a tough one... Virgin's was a fixed point system and Alaska's wasn't so it's a little bit like comparing apples to oranges. Most of the bloggers who invent all kinds of hokey math to value points said that Alaska points were worth around 1.8¢ and Virgins' around 2.2¢, meaning this was a pretty fair trade.

      But I've found that you really have to look at your own travel to know what they're worth. If you were mostly doing economy redemptions on Virgin America (which were usually more like 2.4¢ each) then you probably lost a little. But if you're looking for international Business or First partner redemptions, I'd say Alaska's vast partner list is way better than Virgin's. (Especially when you consider the sky-high fuel and landing surcharges on the sister Virgin brands' reward flights!)

      Delete
  2. CadeRageousJanuary 17, 2017 at 9:54 PM

    So mostly this is a loss to all Virgin America people (they only offered basic domestic and a couple international flights, but most don't redeem them for higher than coach. I have done some mid-cabin select for Puerto Vallarta, but that's all.

    ReplyDelete

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