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Historically, Air New Zealand has been very stingy with business class award space. That seems to have changed… a bit. Currently, we’re seeing a large amount of business class award space from North America to Auckland, New Zealand (and the other way too), but only through mid September. I’m wondering if Air New Zealand has begun a new pattern of widely opening award space within 1 to 2 months of departure…
Via Seats.Aero, I see many dates with Air New Zealand business class award space for at least 2 adults from North America to Auckland (and even more for the return). This includes nonstop flights to Auckland from Chicago, LA, Houston, and San Francisco, but the availability ends abruptly in early September:
United charges 110,000 points one-way for this business class flight, but you can get the same flight much cheaper through other programs:
- ANA: 120K round-trip (you cannot book one-way awards with ANA)
- Virgin Atlantic: 62,500 points one-way (must call to book)
- Air Canada: 75K one-way
- Avianca LifeMiles: 80K one-way
Here are the transferable points programs that transfer to each of the above:
| Rewards Program | Amex Transfer Ratio (and transfer time) | Chase Transfer Ratio (and transfer time) | Citi Transfer Ratio (and transfer time) | Capital One Transfer Ratio (and transfer time) | Bilt Transfer Ratio (and transfer time) | Wells Fargo Transfer Ratio (and transfer time) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Air Canada Aeroplan | 1 to 1 (Instant) | 1 to 1 (Instant) | 1 to 1 (Instant) | 1 to 1 (Instant) | ||
| ANA Mileage Club | 1 to 1 (~1 day) | |||||
| Avianca LifeMiles | 1 to 1 (Instant) | 1 to 1 (Instant) | 1 to 1 (Instant) | 1 to 1 (Instant) | 1 to 1 (Unknown) | |
| United MileagePlus | 1 to 1 (Instant) | 1 to 1 (Instant) | ||||
| Virgin Atlantic Flying Club | 1 to 1 (Instant) | 1 to 1 (Instant) | 1 to 1 (Instant) | 1 to 1 (Instant) | 1 to 1 (Instant) | 1 to 1 (Unkown) |
Is this an off-season thing or a close-in trend?
It’s currently winter in New Zealand and so it’s possible that Air New Zealand is simply making business class awards more available in the off-season. Maybe, but when I look at Air New Zealand’s cash rates for the same route, prices don’t suddenly shoot up in late September. In fact, October seems to have the lowest cash rates and yet I’m not seeing any business class award availability then.
My bet is that Air New Zealand is deliberately opening close-in awards. We saw a similar pattern in May when we reported that there was plenty of award space to New Zealand through mid-July.
If I’m right, it will be interesting to watch these routes to see if there is a pattern to when the award space is released. For example, does something magical happen once a week? Once a month? At random times? We’ll see!
Hat Tip: NK3
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Please
update us for patterns. Trying to book this for next summer for a family reunion, for a Fam of 5 ♀️
We will!
I am seeing a few dates with United Polaris seats available to/from San Francisco as well. Not world class business, but seemingly a big step up from Air New Zealand
Yep, I really enjoyed United Polaris to New Zealand.
[…] Historically, Air New Zealand has been one of the stingiest airlines in the world when it comes to releasing business class award space. There were often times where there wasn’t a single business class award seat for the entire schedule across the Pacific. There’s a positive update regarding that, as flagged by Frequent Miler. […]
Worst long-haul business class seats and layout in the world. Although not if you love looking at every other passengers nasty feet for 14 hours. AKL airport is also one of the worst Customs and Immigration in the world. I’ve had baggage claim there take ONE AND ONE HALF HOURS to get bags out.
I have zero interest in flying on their horrible business class. I would rather connect and use another airline.
Probably stating the obvious to those already more familiar with ANA program: just checked, ANA roundtrip for Air New Zealand from SFO to AKL roundtrip only amounted to $89 in fees, in addition to the miles. Considering ANA passes high fuel surcharges from many different airlines, this is pretty good news to me. Could be really useful for those planning the RTW trip through their program. With Virgin Atlantic frequently having transfer bonuses, and no need to book roundtrip, probably going with VA would frequently be better than ANA, but this is a good airline to consider with the ANA program.
So I booked this in late April, for travel in mid June. They were progressively releasing award space. It was a little irregular, but more day by day than a month at a time. I was looking at specific outbound date, and they first released LAX-AKL, and later SFO-AKL (which I booked). A few days later I booked seats for a return AKL-LAX flight.
It was pretty easy to book via Virgin. The whole call took 30 minutes to book tickets there and back, and I transferred Citi TYP instantly to complete the booking. For the outbound trip we booked SFO-AKL-BNE. The miles were charged by segment, but they were able to combine the segments into one reservation which lowered the fees versus booking them separately. The fees were the same as United.
It might also be competition. Before pandemic, Air New Zealand practically had a monopoly on flights from AKL to North America nonstop. Nowadays, American, Delta, United, and even Qantas flies from AKL to North America.
My crazy theory is that since the USA Women’s soccer team lost in the World Cup (held in AU and NZ), lots of people cancelled their award flights to and from NZ, so awards are plentiful now. Just a crazy theory.