virgin miles & PE upgrade

[BrightlyBob]

Originally Posted by Frankie & gang

Sorry another question. Do I need PE MILES availability or just PE fare? I suspect miles which would I guess be harder but we'll have some flexibility with dates thankfully.

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The upgrade seats come from the reward availability so you need to find PE miles availability to use the upgrade cert. Once you find your dates online than call VS who will make the reservation charging Economy miles and PE fees...

[Frankie & gang]

Originally Posted by BrightlyBob

The upgrade seats come from the reward availability so you need to find PE miles availability to use the upgrade cert. Once you find your dates online than call VS who will make the reservation charging Economy miles and PE fees...

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Thanks Bob x

[skstorm]

my friend and I both saved up miles this time for reward flights her dates are 10/8/17 to 1/9/17 and I am oct 24 to Nov 14th.

On both occasions there was more availability in PE than economy (on some dates there was none in economy at all) my friend had 4 PE seats in August and had to change her date by an extra one coming back to get 4 PE seats on return. I think I had more problems with it in October.

As for accumulating the miles to be fair it was reasonably easy to do and there are lots of threads on the general chat page which help you to achieve that - Oliver123 (Ithink) had a good one and Mr Tom Morrow is really helpful. but be prepared to churn the credit cards a little and maybe use members of your family for example refer your other half and they refer someone else. If you do it at the right time the sign up bonus's can be big. If you need any further help on that PM me and I can give you info although no longer have the AMEX gold card if you need a referral, but could certainly give you some ideas on how to gain the points.

[redredshopper]

I booked for August 2017 on release days we fly 16/8 to 1/9 from Manchester and I agree with the above poster there was more PE flights than economy. The outbound flights were pretty easy to come by tbh it was the return that was a complete pain. But I do know they release more than a couple of reward seats as on our return flight I have 3 reward PE and another dibber as 4.

That being said VA have changed their policy with off/peak mileage so it remains to be seen if there are the same number of flights available this year.

Also I managed to amass circa 180k miles through various means - no business spend though.

[firsttimemouse]

Originally Posted by BrightlyBob

I'm sorry, I think you misunderstood me. The PE upgrade vouchers are return. You get one for every £5k you spend on your black AMEX, up to 2 each year. Each voucher can cover a return flight. I was pointing out the one way problem you face wanting to go to MCO using the vouchers in August, namely your (sensible) and oft-used plan here to redeem the outbound on day of launch as a one way and then the return on day of launch. Because you're only booking outbound on the day of launch that's all you can use the vouchers on that day. You *might* be able to upgrade both legs when you call up to book the return leg (you have to call VS to use the vouchers) but hopefully you can see the problem of doing so with 4 vouchers awarded over 2 years each having only one year validity...

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Thanks, I see what you mean.

I'm not sure I was very clear in my original post, I was only hoping to use two vouchers from one year, I don't think I'm clever enough to work out booking using upgrade vouchers from 2 years. There are four of us flying but would either pay full price for the other two or with any luck knock the price of those two seats down with the accumulated miles.

I think I'm just going to build up as many points as I can and ring as soon as released, hopefully we'll get something. Ages away yet but I don't want to bother saving up all these miles if they're worthless. Sounds like they do work for some though with careful planning.

[firsttimemouse]

Originally Posted by Alfiesmum

I booked 3 PE reward seats for August 2017 man-mco. I used one free upgrade from my Amex account. I booked the two legs seperately, as they were released. So it definitely can be done. Make sure you keep a close eye on when they initially release the dates you want.

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Well done! Will keep a close eye.

[firsttimemouse]

Originally Posted by skstorm

my friend and I both saved up miles this time for reward flights her dates are 10/8/17 to 1/9/17 and I am oct 24 to Nov 14th.

On both occasions there was more availability in PE than economy (on some dates there was none in economy at all) my friend had 4 PE seats in August and had to change her date by an extra one coming back to get 4 PE seats on return. I think I had more problems with it in October.

As for accumulating the miles to be fair it was reasonably easy to do and there are lots of threads on the general chat page which help you to achieve that - Oliver123 (Ithink) had a good one and Mr Tom Morrow is really helpful. but be prepared to churn the credit cards a little and maybe use members of your family for example refer your other half and they refer someone else. If you do it at the right time the sign up bonus's can be big. If you need any further help on that PM me and I can give you info although no longer have the AMEX gold card if you need a referral, but could certainly give you some ideas on how to gain the points.

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Thank you, very useful.

We'll probably fly back early September so we can just get back in time for start of term.

[KemlynUltra]

Can anyone confirm if it's possible to use the value of the upgrade voucher and then upgrade to upper using additional miles?

[alkel2730]

Originally Posted by Frankie & gang

Hi hope you don't mind me asking. I'm due to get my 1st upgrade voucher next month & later this year am hoping to use it on a rtn flight Boston.
My question - does there have to be a PE miles flight available to upgrade or do I just check the EC availability? Thanks x

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Sorry I've only just seen this. There was only PE flights available, no economy. I checked both.x

[alkel2730]

Originally Posted by BrightlyBob

My post was in reply to OP wanting to redeem in August (one of the peak school holiday times) to high-demand tourist destinations (MCO, MIA, LAS, LAX). If you want to fly out of peak times, or to non tourist destinations, it's a lot easier. I've just done a quick search for MCO today for March, yup, redemptions, April (Easter) none, May (half term) none, June, none, July, none, Aug, none, September 1st - bang, redeem at will! Literally 1st September there's outbound redemption availability! But that's no good to someone bound by school holiday dates, unless of course they're going to Orlando for the weekend!

September isn't slightly easier than August - it's a doddle! To get August you need to be reserving a year in advance, preferably release date. To get September with a little flexibility on your dates, just like searching for a cheap fare, and you're there! Huge August demand means full planes and few redemption seats. That's the problem OP has - August is School holidays.

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I understood what you were saying, as I said it's harder in August. I was just clarifying that the thought process with PE upgrade vouchers was correct, should the flights be available. September wasn't a doddle either, there was only one return available for a period of 14 days. We just happened to drop lucky. 👍