Two bits of good news have come out of ANA in the past 24 hours. One is regarding any award bookings on ANA metal. The other is regarding their Mileage Club frequent flyer program. As a reminder, you can transfer points into ANA Mileage Club from American Express Membership Rewards points and your should know that transfers to ANA take about 2-3 days.
In this article
Most Award Surcharges (YQ) Have Been Removed
Spencer Howard posted on his Instagram about this the other day.
Essentially, the YQ (which is a line item on a list of flight cost components that used to mean “fuel surcharge” but eventually became just a “surcharge” once fuel prices dropped super low.
Spencer noticed that where the surcharges on a round trip First or Business class award on ANA metal used to run about $250 in total fees including YQ, they are now just around $60 round trip.
As we discuss here often, you can use Virgin Atlantic Flying Club miles to book a round trip to Japan on ANA for just 110,000 miles from the West Coast of the USA or 120,000 miles from the East Coast. Business Class is 75,000 from the West Coast and 90,000 from the East Coast. With about $200 less in fees now, the deal is even sweeter. One downside to using Virgin miles to book ANA is that you must book round trip.
If you need a one-way, you’ll pay nearly as much, using a program like Aeroplan or United.
Note that these reduced surcharges would also apply to using ANA’s Mileage Club to book an ANA round trip.
Notably, this comes just days after Emirates eliminated most of their award surcharges.
ANA Now Charges 10% of the Mileage Cost on Awards for Lap Infants
While this isn’t something I personally deal with at present, I know that many do. Aeroplan has long been known as a great program to use for lap infants with cost ranging from just $50 – $125 CAD. Yet other programs charge a percent of the cash fare, which can be obscene.
Nick at Frequent Miler reports that sometime in the last several months, ANA updated to a great policy on lap infants, with a charge of 10% of mileage cost of the seat.
Contrast with AA’s Advantage program which would charge the egregious 10% of the cash fare.
Great news all around with ANA today!
Is this good news for you?
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