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The Flying Blue Promo Rewards for June have been announced and they’re offering 50% off award flights to Europe from Chicago (ORD) and 25% off award flights to Europe from San Francisco (SFO). If you’re looking to fly beyond Paris or Amsterdam though, keep an eye on how additional legs are pricing out.
The Deals
- 50% off economy award flights from Chicago (ORD) to Europe in Economy for travel from July 31, 2018 to September 29, 2018.
- 25% off economy award flights from San Francisco (SFO) to Europe in Economy for travel from July 31, 2018 to September 29, 2018.
Key Terms
- Book by June 29, 2018.
Quick Thoughts
These Promo Rewards have the potential to be a great deal if you’re happy flying in Economy to Europe. For example, a one way flight from Chicago to Paris in September would only cost 11,000 miles + $68.51 in fees.
However, things get a little screwy if you’re flying beyond Paris (on Air France) or Amsterdam (on KLM). Flying Blue recently instituted some changes to the scheme which appear to be messing with award pricing. For example, Lucky at OMAAT found flights from Chicago to Frankfurt were pricing out at 48,000 miles, so Flying Blue was trying to charge an additional 37,000 miles for the Paris to Frankfurt leg which is messed up.
Even worse, I found flights from Chicago to Brussels where the Economy awards were adding 66,000 miles for the Paris to Brussels leg. As a result, the Business Class price was significantly lower (albeit with higher taxes and fees).
However, in addition to the 77,000 mile options, there were other award flights being offered for just 13,000 miles, so only 2,000 miles was being added for the second leg.
A couple of things to note about these differences. In the first example with the higher pricing, those flights were via Paris and then on to ZYR. In the second instance with lower pricing, those flights were via Amsterdam and then on to BRU.
These differences may therefore be coming about based on whether you’d be flying with Air France or KLM, so bear that in mind when trying to piece together itineraries. It might prove to be less hassle – and fewer miles – to book these Promo Rewards with KLM. I haven’t done too much investigation though, so these award pricing issues might affect flights with both airlines equally depending on your destination.
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Air France seems to have dropped it’s award calendar search function on their website, meaning you have to try each flight day one by one, and if there are no flights one one of the legs it spits back an error. Super annoying.