As someone based on the east cost of the US, more than 3 hours by car from the closest airport served by Alaska Airlines, it might be tempting to think that the airline’s loyalty program, Mileage Plan, would be completely irrelevant for me. However, I’ve recently made a small a flurry of Alaska Mileage Plan award bookings for travel later this year. Revisiting some of Alaska’s newer sweet spots as I booked them for my own travel plans really has me falling in love with Alaska Mileage Plan all over again….and wondering if I should make another speculative transfer from Amex to Hawaiian Miles to indirectly replenish my Alaska stash.
Recent bookings I’ve made with Alaska Mileage Plan
Intra-European flights on Finnair for 7,500 miles one way in economy class
We’re in the midst of planning a trip to Europe for the late 2025 holiday period to visit some Christmas markets and make a return to the Santa Claus Village in Rovaniemi, Finland. Alaska Mileage Plan has been great for this purpose since they both offer the most service to/from Rovaniemi (home of Santa Claus Village) and they serve a bunch of areas in Europe known for good Christmas markets.
Alaska offers a distance-based award chart for partner awards to/from Europe, the Middle East, and Africa as follows:
At short end of the chart, you can see that covering a distance of less than 1,500 miles starts at 7,500 miles one way. While flights within Europe can often be found relatively cheaply, they are also sometimes surprisingly expensive (as was the case for some of our desired dates and flights!). Paying just 7,500 miles one-way can make for some really good deals.
For instance, if you wanted to fly from Vienna to Rovaniemi for the weekend before Christmas, cash prices are currently running $400-$500 one way.
Keep in mind that the prices above are for the cheapest fares. Take the last option above for example: the 11:40am-5:40pm itinerary above shows a cash price of $508 one-way. The cheapest fare does not include a checked bag, a full-size carry-on, or seat selection and it is both non-refundable and non-changeable. A “Flex” fare costs an additional 75 EUR.
The same itinerary is available through Alaska Mileage Plan for 7,500 miles and $68 — and it comes with a free carry-on, personal-item, checked bag, seat selection, and is fully refundable (which is to say that it is most comparable with the Flex fare above!).
Even when cash prices look cheap through Google Flights, it is worth keeping in mind that the initial economy class price shown at Google is the stripped-down “Economy Superlight” fare that you may not actually want to buy.
As a point of comparison, the same awards would cost 12,500 miles one-way via American Airlines AAdvantage or 12,000 Avios one-way through Finnair Plus. Alaska Mileage Plan offers a better value for these awards.
Finnair has a pretty good route network around Europe, so you can get between Helsinki and many places for just 7,500 miles one-way. This is just a partial view of Finnair’s route map (courtesy of FlightConnections.com) from Helsinki. All of the destinations shown here are within 1,500 miles of Helsinki (and would therefore cost 7,500 miles plus taxes). Options would actually extend as far south as Naples, Italy (not shown).
Interestingly, Alaska Mileage Plan has to some extent taken a page out of Virgin Atlantic’s playbook regarding the way they calculate distance on some intra-European itineraries (or maybe Alaska just isn’t great at calculating distance).
For instance, as you can see in the Great Circle Mapper map below, Rovaniemi to Helsinki to Dublin covers 1,695 miles of distance (which should increase the cost to 22,500 miles one-way according to the chart), whereas the nonstop distance from Rovaniemi to Dublin is only 1,410 miles.
Surprisingly, Rovaniemi to Helsinki to Dublin only costs 7,500 miles despite the total distance flown exceeding that first distance band.
However, that same trick mostly didn’t work when I tried connecting itineraries from nearby cities where both origin and destination were outside of Finland. For instance, Vienna to Helsinki to Dusseldorf rang in at 22,500 miles one-way (which is correct given a cumulative distance of 1,848 miles flown). However, I did find some pricing to/from Finland / Scandinavia that was better than expected.
For instance, Stockholm to Helsinki to Reykjavik covers a total distance of 1,773 miles. And according to Great Circle Mapper, even the flight from Helsinki to Reykjavik covers more than 1,500 miles flown.
However, the award price for that city pair still starts at 7,500 miles one way (and indeed it is the same price even if originating in Helsinki or elsewhere in Finland).
It seems like a connection between Helsinki and Norway, Sweden, or Scandinavia doesn’t add to the cumulative distance for pricing. So, for instance, Rome to Helsinki is only just under 1,500 miles flown, meaning that it squeaks under the wire for the 7,500-mile pricing band. However, connecting onward to cities in Finland, Sweden, or Norway doesn’t seem to bump an award to the next distance band, so Rome to Helsinki to Stockholm or Oslo or Rovaniemi, Finland all cost 7,500 miles one-way also despite covering more than 1,500 miles flown.
Again, that pricing won’t always be a deal, but it’s worth knowing that you can stretch beyond 1,500 miles flown in some cases.
I took advantage of this sweet spot to connect dots for Christmas markets, booking a ticket from one Christmas Market city to Rovaniemi (for Santa Claus Village) and then from Rovaniemi to another area where we want to see markets, paying 7,500 miles each way. Given the fact that we will surely need some carry-on and checked baggage allowance thanks to bringing some winter gear and shopping in the markets, I think we’ll really come to value the inclusions.
Frankfurt to New York (JFK) on Condor for 55,000 miles in business class
For the ride home from Europe, I was excited to find 5 seats on exactly the day I wanted to fly home from Europe on Condor in business class from Frankfurt to New York-JFK for 55,000 miles per passenger (plus about $192 in taxes & fees). I was very pleasantly surprised to find the 5 seats I needed on exactly the day I wanted and I am excited because Condor’s business class looks pretty nice, as shown above.
To pay for my five seats, I transferred points from Amex Membership Rewards to Hawaiian Airlines Hawaiian Miles. That’s because Hawaiian Miles can be converted to Alaska Mileage Plan miles at a 1:1 ratio. I gathered 275,000 miles on the Hawaiian side and then moved them to Alaska Mileage plan and booked. The entire process took minutes despite messaging saying that the transfer might take up to 72 hours.
Tahiti to the west coast for 60,000 miles one way
A reader tip came in over the weekend in our Frequent Miler Insiders Facebook group that Air Tahiti Nui had released some business class space to partners during January. I found a handful of dates with availability for 4 passengers in business class from Papeete, Tahiti to either Seattle or Los Angeles for 60,000 miles one way in business class. I then also found 5 consecutive nights of award availability at the St. Regis Bora Bora for 500,000 total Marriott Bonvoy points. We visited the St Regis Bora Bora a few years ago and loved it and had been dreaming of returning ever since. I booked both the St. Regis hotel, a couple of nights at the recently-renovated Westin Bora Bora and one of the flights from Tahiti to Seattle (this was actually the first of the bookings in this post, so I used miles I had previously transferred speculatively from Amex to Hawaiian and on to Alaska).
Unfortunately, I made those bookings before consulting Tim’s resource about the best times to visit every country in the world. Readers began commenting to note that January is in the wet season and not a great time to visit. I began reading about how rainy January can be in Bora Bora and I decided that it just didn’t make sense for us to visit at that time (much to my wife’s dismay). I thought I was going to have to cancel the trip to Bora Bora.
However, I later found a day with 4 seats in business class from Papeete to Seattle for the same 60,000 miles one-way that was outside of the rainy season. Corresponding availability at the St Regis was a little more expensive, but not a lot more (side note: since my new set of dates were in 2025, I was able to try applying my Marriott Nightly Upgrade awards to the booking, which are set to expire on 12/31/25. I’m not holding my breath for an upgrade, but I was happy to apply them and ask for the 2-bedroom overwater Royal Villa anyway). Luckily, I was able to simply change my itinerary from Papeete to Seattle to the new non-rainy-season date with no charge at all.
To be clear, I changed my rainy-season flight to a non-rainy-season flight. Making a change was the right play. Alaska Mileage Plan charges a nonrefundable $12.50 partner booking fee (per passenger) for itineraries booked on partners. If I cancelled my rainy-season award, I could cancel for free, but Alaska would have kept the partner booking fee (which came to a total of $62.50 for five passengers).
Instead, I simply changed dates with no fee at all since the award price was exactly the same for the flight.
I don’t yet have flights booked to get to Tahiti, but I have award alerts set and I have many months to figure that part out. One of my favorite things about award travel is its flexibility: if I can’t seem to find flights to get us to Tahiti, we can cancel this trip and only be out the $50 in Alaska partner booking fees ($12.50 per passenger) so long as I cancel ahead of the 30-day cancellation window at the St. Regis and Westin hotels. I will need to book domestic flights from Tahiti to Bora Bora at some point, but I’ll wait until I’ve found an award to get to Tahiti since those domestic flights within French Polynesia are operated by Air Tahiti (a different airline than Air Tahiti Nui) and can’t be booked as awards.
Finally, it’s worth mentioning that I could have booked this award as Papeete, Tahiti to Seattle and onward to New York. I didn’t do that because I couldn’t find corresponding business class award availability on the leg from Seattle to New York. I could have booked a mixed-cabin award with Papeete-to-Seattle in business class and Seattle-to-New York in economy class, but that wasn’t an attractive deal: While Alaska’s distance-based award chart provides a great price for the west coast to/from Tahiti at 60K miles one-way in business class, it would have cost 85,000 miles to end the award in New York. That would be reasonable enough if I could have found the Seattle-to-New York leg available in business class, but since that leg was only available in economy class, it didn’t make sense to me to book it as a single award. In essence, it would have cost me an additional 25,000 miles per passenger to fly from Seattle to New York in economy class. I’m confident that I can book that part of the trip separately for fewer miles (and cash prices from Seattle to my home airport of Albany start around $200, so I’d rather buy a ticket with cash than use so many miles).
Bottom line
Over the past few days, plans came together for a late 2025 holiday season trip to the Christmas markets of Europe and Santa Claus Village in Rovaniemi, Finland along with a surprise booking to Bora Bora that hadn’t been on my radar. Surprisingly, Alaska Mileage Plan quickly became the star of the show for most of the flight bookings for both trips thanks to some solid sweet spots. It’s worth noting that one of the best parts of these bookings is their flexibility: Alaska allows free award change or cancellation. That enables me to lock in a plan far in advance without being locked into the details. Further, it’s worth noting that while I’m excited about these uses of Alaska miles, I’m not actually maximizing these redemptions. Alaska allows a free stopover on an award ticket, which didn’t fit into any of these plans, but hopefully will on our next Alaska redemption.
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Hey Nick, I flew DUB-HEL and HEL-ARN last summer on Finnair and booked with Alaska miles and Qatar Avios. The carry on bag allowance for Finnair is really low so we just brought our backpacks onboard and checked our carryon bags for free. Take a look at the carryon bag weight allowances and plan accordingly.
We also flew Condor business class FRA-LAX. The flight was great, but if you are connecting from the “domestic-Europe” FRA terminal to the “intra-Europe” terminal, give yourself at least 2 hours. That was the most stressful part of the trip. You have to leave one terminal, take a bus to the other terminal, clear security and clear customs. Not very seamless.
When you say that the carry on bag allowance is really low, what do you mean? The ticket includes a carry-on and a personal item.
We flew them to and from Rovaniemi when we last took the kids to Rovaniemi and I flew them when I went to Rovaniemi in our 3 Cards 3 Continents challenge and I don’t recall a noticeable difference in carry-on allowance over what you get with other European airlines? I don’t recall having our carry-on bags weighed or anything?
Good tip on FRA. In our case, we’ll be arriving at FRA via train from another city, so that shouldn’t be an issue for us.
For the Economy Classic fare class, it says “Carry-on baggage (total 8kg)
1 x Small bag
Under the front seat
1x Carry-on bag
In the overhead bin”
I know my carryon bag and backpack weighed more than 8kg = 17.6 pounds, so I didn’t want to risk it. But, I don’t recall being asked to weigh my bags on either flight.
Lastly, I think Condor biz class passengers can show their boarding passes to access the Lufthansa biz class lounges.
I don’t have experience with Finnair, but on an LIS to NYC TAP flight a year or two ago they had two teams at the gate weighing your carry-on and personal item together for the maximum allowed combined weight limit and forcing people to check the carry-on.
Great post nick, just grabbed HEL-MXP for 7.5k. Had been looking at 13k avios. Cash price is $450 for the flight! How do you confirm the award includes bags?
On the booking confirmation page, Alaska shows you both the Alaska confirmation code and the Finnair code. It’s probably in the email also. I just used that confirmation code to bring it up on the thin Finnair website and it shows that it comes with a carry-on, a personal item, and a checked bag for each person.
@Nick Reyes “Alaska allows free award change or cancellation” – changes free but cancellations cost $12.50 per ticket per person on all partners.
Have you ever tried Alaska metal from BOS to the west cost?
Another note: AA seems to block awards for partners on routes that have multiple flights per day – blocking the most desirable flight time and leaving early morning/late eve times available for booking award on AS and other partners. Are they trying to give the best flight times to AA miles users this way? Seems so.
Technically, the cancellation is free, it’s just that the $12.50 partner booking fee is nonrefundable. I know that’s kind of a matter of semantics since it is money you lose either way. I did address the fact that cancelling would lose that $12.50.
Have I ever tried what with Alaska metal from Boston to the west coast? Not sure what you’re asking there. Have I flown that route? No.
To your point about award availability: that’s true with most programs. They’re going to sell the most desirable flight times for cash, so there’s no need to fill that inventory with partner award bookings…so they don’t make it available for award redemptions. The idea of offering award travel is for them to essentially move “spoiling inventory”. Think of it like a grocery store: nobody is offering eggs on sale right now because they know they’re going to sell them for full price. If they do offer a sale price on eggs, it’s because they don’t expect to sell all of their stock before it spoils, so they want to get something rather than nothing.
And there’s usually a sliding scale as to the inventory offered to their own members (wider) vs inventory offered to partner programs (narrower). That’s not really specific to the AA/Alaska relationship but rather a general award travel truth.
Laughed at technically free))) In reality, technically you pay non-refundable fee upfront and never get it back. So it’s a service charge, technically speaking)))
On AA awards availability – I know the gist as you explained, but it just looks as a new trend to me that they block saver-level US awards (12,500 miles OW) for specific flight times to partners, leaving other times on the table (4,500 AS miles i.e.) It goes against their own policy of saver-award availability. Just seems suspicious, but that what AA does a lot.
That’s really the way to describe it — a non-refundable fee. You lose that money from the get-go whether you fly or not. That’s why I think of it differently from a cancellation fee since a cancellation fee is usually a penalty that you only pay if you cancel, whereas this is a penalty you pay to fly a partner with your Alaska miles :-).
Don’t forget to credit your flights to Alaska to collect EQMs. Two 1,500 mile intra-Europe flights, plus FRA to JFK, will get you one third of the way to MVP status.
I’m working on (or at least considering) transitioning from AA Platinum Pro to MVP 75k on Alaska. A r/t in the US (already booked) and a potential r/t to Europe at the end of the month (if I can find it with AS miles), all on points, would net me around 10k EQMs.
Still waiting to see if I can double-dip benefits on American Airlines (using my AAdvantage number, then switching to my MileagePlan number after check-in) during the transition. I know it’s not permitted when flying Alaska metal, but hopefully still okay in this direction.
@LarryInNYC – Do award flights on partners count toward AS status?
They sure do!
I figure we’ll get more than halfway to the first level of elite status with these flights.
https://frequentmiler.com/alaska-mileage-plan-updates-earn-status-with-award-flights-credit-cards-shopping-portal-spend-more-other-changes/
Has anyone actually seen EQMs post from partner awards yet? I’ve taken 3 trips with AS miles so far this year (all on American). Zero EQMs.
Did you have your AS number on the reservation, or your AA number?
I put my AA number on the reservation since i earned Plat Pro last year (and one of my segments this week upgraded at the 72 hour window). But I assume I’ll need the AS number on the reservation when I actually fly in order for the flight to credit properly.
Also, I believe that AS said all AS partner award flights this year will receive EQMs, but the EQMs might not post until a little later in the year.
AS number on all. Good to know about the possible delayed posting, looking at their site it does indeed say “EQMs earned will post in the Spring.” I missed that.
Yes, it’s new this year.
Great post Nick! You’ll love Condor business class, very underrated. I’ve also done Air Tahiti Nui business class with a family of 4, keep an eye out for close-in award availability. Premium economy is also not bad, especially on the overnight return from Tahiti.
I was going to buy inter-Europe award tickets with Alaska, but then I realized I can save 7.5k, by making my flight a multi-city booking with a stopover instead. I’m taking my family to Ireland and Scotland for the price of just going to Ireland.
I’m so glad I took your advice and prospectively transferred a good chunk of MR to Hawaiian during the bonus period last August! It an amazing program for everyone, but especially for SEA based travelers like myself.
Are stopovers on AS free or cost 5,000 miles with 24hr+ connection?
One stopover in each direction is free with Alaska Mileage Plan.
Would be interesting to see how booking stopovers will work on multi-partner awards…
Nick, I posted a question in FMI about searching for Alaska stopovers. I was looking at segments US to DUB and DUB to elsewhere in Europe, about three days apart. The segments showed up as separate awards but not when I search multi-city. Is multi-city search the correct way to book Alaska awards with stopovers, or do you have to call (or search some other way)?
Not a killer in this case since the intra-Europe award was only 7,500 miles and I expect the entire award with the stopover would not price at the US to DUB price of 55,000 miles. But since I’m considering switching to AS from AA for oneWorld elite status and doing a significant percentage of the EQMs on awards, I need to figure this stuff out.
That is indeed the right way to self-service a stopover award booking. That said, I don’t think the tool is perfect. I’d call. Not speaking from personal experience here, but I’ve always heard anecdotal reports that you want to speak to an agent based in Boise as they tend to be the friendliest and most knowledgeable (so don’t be afraid to hang up and call again if you get someone based elsewhere who isn’t able to help — hope might not yet be lost).
Multi-city works for me when I confirm each leg separately first. But like Nick says, the phone agents are great to work with.
A few other good use cases:
Cancun – Santiago on LATAM in biz 35K, 6+ available seats on every flight including absolute peak season, that flight is Sunday only both directions.
JFK-LIM LATAM biz 35K, ATL – LIM same.
FRA – MIA on DE 55k biz, 4 seats at the opening of calendar
@GH, any good combos to GRU/GIG in biz?
JFK/MCO/MIA – GRU 50K biz, availability not guaranteed at opening of calendar