A few months ago, I purchased a mistake fare for a trip to South Africa. The route is rather circuitous, and with recent changes, I won’t bank many miles for the trip. I wasn’t sure if I’d keep it or cancel it, but I’m leaning towards going. According to my calculations, I’ll have 4 nights in Cape Town – a city I’ve always, always, always wanted to visit. I’d like to visit for longer, but 4 days still is something.
The airfare was a little under $400. On the way over, I fly overnight to Paris, spend a day in Paris, then fly overnight to Abu Dhabi, and then take a day flight to Johannesburg. I will arrange my own flights from Johannesburg to Cape Town. On the way back, I will fly overnight from Johannesburg to Abu Dhabi, and then non-stop from Abu Dhabi to New York JFK.
All of the flights, other than the initial flight to Paris, are on Etihad Airways. Each such leg can be upgraded to business for about 35,000 – 67,000 miles.
I was thinking of upgrading the longest leg – AUH-JFK to business class at a cost of approximately 67,000 miles.
I don’t have any Etihad miles, but Citibank is a transfer partner. Right now there is a bonus of 25%, when you convert Citibank Thank You points for Etihad miles.
This promotion ends tomorrow, May 15th, so I need to decide immediately.
The benefits would be a 14-hour ride in Etihad business, as well as use of the Etihad business lounge on my 3 hour layover in Abu Dhabi. This would be pretty cool to experience. On the negative side, even with the transfer bonus, this upgrade will cost more than 50,000 Thank You points, which could otherwise be used for other trips.
What do you think? Should I do it? Is it worth it? Have you flown business class on Etihad? What is it like? Should I upgrade one of the shorter (but overnight) legs of the trip instead?
Seriously, I would like your input, your advice, your experience.
A New York frequent flyer who elegantly combines her passions for worldwide travel, running a gazillion marathons all over the globe and staying fit ... without sacrificing her fancy for good wine and food.
Redeem miles for upgrade.. Replenishing so very easy for solo/couple travel. Enjoy the trip! I burned 640K Skymiles ATL-CPT for 4 pax xmas 2015 so interested in your CPT tips.
Tough call on upgrading long daytime flight vs shorter overnight flights. If at all possible I’d try to do both, though if forced to choose I’d probably prioritize the overnight flights so as to minimize jetlag upon arrival at destination – this seems like it would be especially important given the short duration of your stay in South Africa. I’ve not flown Etihad in business (plenty of trip reports online, important thing is flat beds and 100% direct aisle access on long-haul flights) but have done so several times in coach, and it’s definitely one of the better coach class products around – very decent food and service, excellent IFE. BTW, yes 4 days is too short but Cape Town is indeed magical, absolutely one of the world’s most beautiful cities (more because of the natural setting than architecture, though it has plenty of interesting architecture too). Add a nice climate, great food, and relatively low prices (particularly at current exchange rates) and it’s one of my absolute favorite destinations.
I recently travelled on a mistake fare from IAD to AUH, I will say that the flight itself was good in economy (decent food, service, and IFE). During the return, I was stuck in a middle seat with passengers on either side of me (my wife to the right). It was not a pleasant flight, and I really would have preferred to upgrade that particular segment. Having said that, I don’t know if I would spend so many thank you points for the upgrade. On the miles side, have you considered crediting AA given recent changes?
Just flew EY biz class from India –> AUH –> DFW for the first time a couple weeks ago. LOVED it! Each seat does have direct aisle access and lays flat. The service was spectacular. The only knock was that they ran out of the regular menu items with still a couple hours left in the long leg (16h 30m leg). The flight attendant told me that “everyone had 5 meals.” Oh well. I had my share of champagne (probably 2 1/2 bottles). 🙂 Do the upgrade. It’s worth it.
Pro tip on AUH: They’ll tell you that there’s a biz class lounge on the other side of US customs (yes, you can clear US customs in AUH). It’s true. But stop at the first one you reach to kill some time. Or kill some time in duty free. They won’t let you through customs until your checked bag clears as well. I had to sit in a holding area for 20-25 minutes waiting for my bag to clear customs.
I just returned from Manila/JFK, my first of two “mistake” fares. I upgraded to business Manila-AUH and was coach AUH to JFK. IFE is exact same in both and food is good and plentiful in coach. My recommendation to you would be to upgrade on your back to back overnight/day flights. Priority should be on the Paris-AUH and Joburg-AUH (you’ll be sleeping and now enjoying the business class benefits anyway). Points are fewer on those flights or you might want to utilize Etihad’s bidding for business class for these flights as competition will be less than the JFK flights. The above Etihad lounge info is important as the pre customs lounge is huge with capacity of 500 and many services but only 150 post customs. Immigration /customs in AUH is now fully up to speed and working very well.
thank you so much for your input Rik. Yes, my other thought was to upgrade either or both of the overnight nights. How does the bidding work – do you know how much the upgraded seats can go for? thanks.
Hi Kathy, My strategy for the “mistake” fare was to maximize distance but I found flying back to back long economy was a bit tough on my body. Etihad will send you an email about a week ahead of time which will give you the opportunity to upgrade all your flights with cash bids on your cc. There is a slider bar which will tell you the range that you can bid, for ex my Philippines flights ranged form $400 to $800 and AUH/JFK flights were $600 to $1200. You can submit any bid amount in that range. The flight to/from JFK will sell at fairly high prices so you may want to use points if you really want to upgrade. Whereas the non US flights will likely sell closer to the mid to low end of the bid range from my experience. This link explains it in a bit more detail: http://flashpackerfamily.com/bidding-for-business-class-how-to-get-an-upgrade/ Enjoy!