Frequent Miler's latest team challenge, Million Mile Madness, is almost done! The last two weeks Greg, Nick, and Stephen competed to earn 1 Million SAS miles by flying 15 airlines. But who completed the challenge with the most Speed, Affordability, and Style?
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Bank of America is back with its misleadingly advertised “90K” offer for the Virgin Atlantic Mastercard. While they claim it is worth “up to 90K miles” during the first year, the truth is that this is a 75K offer with the option to earn anniversary miles based on spend if you choose to keep the card in year 2 (See: An analysis of the Virgin Atlantic 90K offer for more). Still, it’s a great offer in the sense that the signup offer and spending requirement will give you enough miles to fly round trip in business class to Japan or nearly enough for round trip Delta One suites to Europe (if you can find availability).
The Deal
- Earn 75,000 bonus miles as per the following with a new Bank of America Virgin Atlantic Mastercard:
- Earn 20,000 bonus miles after 1st purchase
- Earn 50,000 bonus miles after you spend $12,000 on purchases in the first 6 months
- Earn 5,000 bonus miles when you add two authorized users
- Find more information and a directlink on our Virgin Atlantic World Elite Mastercard page.
Key Card Details
- Earn 3X on Virgin Atlantic
- Earn 1.5X everywhere else
- Earn 7,500 bonus points with $15K cardmember year spend + an additional 7,500 points with $25K cardmember year spend
- Earn 25 tier point towards elite status per $2,500 spend (max 50 tier points per month).
- $90 annual fee is not waived
Quick Thoughts
This is actually a really good offer in my opinion. As Greg has previously pointed out, it is possible to average 2.1 miles per dollar everywhere with this card not including the new cardmember bonus miles (See: Virgin Atlantic World Elite Mastercard Deep Dive: Maximize Earnings and Status). While you can sometimes do even better with other cards due to transfer bonuses, 2.1 miles per dollar is pretty stellar compared to the return on most airline credit cards. Virgin Atlantic miles are certainly more niche than most, but they have some terrific uses. For example, after completing the $12K spend required to earn this bonus, you would have a total of at least 93K miles (assuming you add two authorized users). That is enough points for round trip business class on ANA from the West Coast to Japan or almost enough from the East Coast (which requires 95K miles). If you have transferrable points to top off your account, you won’t need much more for First Class (110K round trip from the West Coast or 120K from the East Coast).
We’ve also noted that Delta availability can be easier to find via the Virgin Atlantic site (See: Finding Delta awards in calendar view (Air France is not the answer)), with Delta One Suites from Detroit to Amsterdam ringing in at 50K miles one-way or a route like Minneapolis to Tokyo in Delta One suites running 60K one-way.
Keep in mind that Virgin Atlantic has limited partnerships and availability on Delta can be hard to come by. ANA awards must be booked over the phone. Flying Club isn’t for everyone, and this offer comes around fairly often – but it’s a pretty strong offer if you value Virgin Atlantic miles.
H/T: Doctor of Credit
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[…] Virgin Atlantic “90K” (really 75K) offer is back […]
Virgin Atlantic will count each connection as a separate reward ticket. An example, a connecting economy flight on Delta to Europe will be 42.5k miles. This concept will take significant amount of mile value away making this a currency for specific limited uses.
[…] Hat Tip Frequent Miler […]
Um, you conveniently omitted this crucial fact: Virgin is going to start their own loyalty program for all Virgin brands, and by the time you complete the required spending for this deal, the Virgin Atlantic FF program as we know it (with the sweet spots you described) could easily be sunsetting. Seems like a sucker’s bet to rely on that at this point.
But, blogs still get their referral fees, so go ahead and flog it.
That’s a good point about the new program. We don’t know what will happen to the existing sweet spots, but you’re right that they could go away.
It’s not a good point about referral fees. We do not get anything when people sign up for this card.
This sounds like a great offer. However, BOA has gotten incredibly tight with approvals on seemingly any of their cards. Is there much recent data points on approvals of different BOA cards? I haven’t had a BOA card in over a year. I’m 10/24 and last month got denied on an Alaska card for the specific reason of exceeding 5 new credit cards in the past 24 months. For folks under the 5/24 radar these write ups are super helpful, but for those over, it really feels like we’re locked out.