Booking JetBlue via Qatar Avios is Pretty Finicky

Booking JetBlue via Qatar Airways can be a great value. In fact, it’s easy to forget that you can book JetBlue via Etihad (although their cancellation policy is TERRIBLE), Qatar Avios, and JAL’s Mileage Bank.

Yesterday, I was looking at a JetBlue flight from JFK to the Caribbean. The flight was a bit under 2,000 (distance) miles one way. JetBlue was/is charging over $800 in cash or over 60,000 points for it as it’s peak travel, but they dumped a bunch of economy seats for partner booking and I wanted to act fast.

I found it by tracking space on United which is now a partner, although United wanted 30,000 miles a person for economy. I knew I could do much better! But if United shows the flight, it’s available to partners. You could triple check on ExpertFlyer, sure, but this is a 99% indication you can find it on all partners.

I didn’t even search Etihad as I won’t use them, but I did want to compare JAL and Qatar. While JAL is probably always the winner for Mint, it’s not cut and dry with economy, especially for a one way booking as JAL discounts round trip awards.

My options in this case were JAL for 15,000 miles + $14 or 13,000 Qatar Avios + $14. 

Now while Bilt transfers 1:1 to JAL, I really hesitate (especially as Bilt Platinum) to use Bilt points for normal 1:1 transfers. Capital One is the only other major JAL transfer partner now, but with the partner launch transfer bonus behind us, that transfer is just 1:0.75. 

Further, there is an about-to-end 20% transfer bonus from Capital One to British Airways Avios (which transfers to Qatar Avios instantly inside your Qatar account).

This meant my options were really:

• Spend 60,000 Capital One Miles to get 45,000 JAL miles or,
• Spend 32,500 Capital One Miles to get 39,000 Avios.

I obviously liked the idea of saving 27,500 Capital One Miles!

The hitch was this:

I’ve figured out how to use JAL miles for a partner pretty well. It’s not ultra intuitive but once you figure out where to go, it actually kind of is?

But in the last several months since Qatar refreshed their user interface, I cannot see ANY JetBlue flights, ever. I just get this wonky message:

Now, I’ll warn you that I cannot get past this error. I had a bunch of MilesTalkers search for me and they couldn’t find it either. I knew the exact date with space, but we all got this same error.

Hesitant to call late at night and risk waking my sleeping son, I really wanted an online solution. Andrew from FlyTrippers send me a message that they have online chat. Eureka!

Or Eur-something, because this did take me about 90 minutes end to end, but here’s how I’d lay this out for someone else wanting to do the same:

1. Find the space on United. This, not so unlike searching for Star Alliance saver space, means that JetBlue has made the space available to partners. 
2. Check what JAL would charge if you have Bilt or Capital One. If you don’t you can skip this step!
3. Login to your Qatar Avios account, go to Contact Us, scroll down, and initiate a chat.
4. Ask very specifically if they can search for a JetBlue award flight on whatever date and time. They will most likely find it! (but maybe not..)
5. Once they find it, you can move the points either directly into your Qatar account from a transfer partner or, if there is a BA Transfer bonus on, into your BA account linked to your Qatar account (or link them if you haven’t before).
6. Make sure you have the points in your Qatar Avios account (move from BA if needed).
7. Try searching again! Online would be much easier. Then, probably get the same error message.
8. Ask agent to complete booking for you.
9. Spend a while feeding agent your information in EXACTLY the format they request. 
10. After a while, open your Qatar account in another window and change pages, just so your session doesn’t time out like mine did. If it does, log back in and start a new chat and it should go right back to the agent.
11. They will make the booking and it will be temporarily on hold while you make payment. Click the payment button and pay.
12. Ask the agent for your JetBlue PNR (record locator). They can do this even before you pay and you really can let them go after this although I asked mine to wait for completed payment.
13. Once you pay, go to JetBlue.com and attempt to add the booking to your account. If like me it says the birthdays are wrong (they aren’t, don’t worry), start a live chat and give them the PNR the agent gave you for JetBlue and ask them to put into your JetBlue TrueBlue account so you can manage seats, etc.
14. Marvel at how long this all took since you couldn’t just book the darn thing online. Let out a big sigh.
15. Think about how much you saved on the booking. In my case, United would have been 90k miles and I used 32,500 Capital One Miles instead…. (JetBlue wanted over 60,000 TrueBlue points PER PASSENGER!)
16. Curse MilesTalk for telling you how to do this, but then thank him 🙂

Capital One Venture X: LIMITED TIME OFFER: Earn 100,000 bonus Miles when you spend $10,000 within your first 6 months. Get This Offer

Questions?

Let me know below in the comments, on Twitter, or in the private MilesTalk Facebook group. And don't forget to follow me on Instagram for all sorts of tips on miles, points, credit cards, and travel.

If this post helped you, please consider sharing it!

You can find credit cards that best match your spending habits and bonus categories at Your Best Credit Cards. 

New to all of this? My “introduction to miles and points” book, MilesTalk: Live Your Wildest Travel Dreams Using Miles and Points is available on Amazon and at major booksellers.