How to Travel Anywhere Within the US for $5.60
By learning about Turkish Airlines Miles & Smiles, you can have this terrific view out of a United plane for only 7,500 miles and $5.60! Photo by: Evan Berman
Hello everyone from Southern California! While Hurricane Hilary may be a problem tomorrow, let’s focus on the fun of today! I’d like to share arguably the single best use of points and miles around: flying anywhere within the US on United for just 7,500 miles and $5.60.
Introducing Turkish Miles & Smiles:
Turkish Airlines flies to more countries than any other airline in the world. Their business class will feature prominently in my Springtime in Eastern Europe 2023 trip as I had a wonderful time flying their Boeing 787-9 and Boeing 737 MAX 8 in Business Class as well as the experience that is visiting their Business Class Lounge in Istanbul, Turkïye.
As you might rightly assume, Turkish Miles & Smiles is the name of the frequent flier program that Turkish Airlines uses (similar to how American Airlines uses American Airlines uses the name AAdvantage or Delta uses SkyMiles). I will be upfront: the website is NOT user friendly! However, if you are willing to deal with headaches and persevere, the reward is terrific value in redeeming Turkish miles for flights.
How to Earn Turkish Miles:
There are 3 ways to earn Turkish miles:
- Flying Turkish or other Star Alliance members
- Buying miles
- Transferring points from Capital One or Citi
If you regularly fly Star Alliance airlines, such as United or Lufthansa, you can credit these flights to Turkish. In many cases, Turkish offers solid earnings on partner flights. However, that is not the only way to earn these miles.
Turkish offers miles for increments of 1,000 miles for $30. This is not good value and I recommend only doing this if you are truly desperate and need to get miles quickly for a very high value booking.
Finally, there is the option that is easiest and makes the most sense for most Americans– transferring points 1:1 from Capital One or Citi to Turkish. If you have a card that earns Capital One Miles such as the Venture, Venture X, or Spark for Business, you can transfer those miles to Turkish. Similarly, if you have the Citi Premier or Prestige Card, you may transfer your Citi ThankYou Points to Turkish.
Why are these miles so valuable?
The list of Turkish sweet spots is extensive. Today, I will focus on the best for domestic travel. Turkish considers the US 1 zone. Why is that noteworthy? In case you didn’t know, the US is massive! You could conceivably fly from Puerto Rico to Alaska for just 7,500 miles and $5.60 in economy, the same price as a short New York-Newark to Washington-Dulles flight!
Note: the price for Business Class is 15,000 and $5.60 on these flights. That being said, United rarely releases Business Class saver award space on flights, so this is a bit less practical.
Nevermind that extreme example, though. Do you want to visit Hawaii? I thought so! 😉 Though there are occasionally cheap cash deals to Hawaii, it is rare to find them from the Eastern US. Many assume that Hawaii has to be an expensive trip. It certainly can be! However, you can fly to Hawaii from anywhere in the US as long as there is saver award availability.
A Real-Life Example:
This brings us to my current trip. While I could have flown directly from Charleston to Hawaii via Denver, San Francisco, or Chicago– O’Hare, I opted instead to spend a few days in Southern California before heading onward to Hawaii. (Little did I know that there would be the first tropical storm in over 80 years threatening to hit the area!) The price was the same: 7,500 Turkish Miles and $5.60.
Finding Availability:
How do you book these flights? After all, if it was as simple as booking a flight on Google Flights, nobody would pay for a flight again!
The first step is to search on United. If you have a firm destination and date, you can just enter those details and press search with miles. There will either be Saver Availability or not. However, if you are flexible, United has a handy 30-day Calendar to search availability. Search for the lowest price award (the price varies depending on the route and other factors) and repeat the process of searching for award availability.
Searching on Turkish:
Once you find Saver Availability (listed as X and denoted with the words “Saver Availability” in Blue for Economy or listed as I for Business) on United, it is time to head to Turkish. Let’s get the bad news out of the way first: just because a flight has saver award availability on United does not mean that Turkish will show the award. 🙁 The partner award booking process on Turkish is surprisingly complicated. You must first do the following:
- Sign in
- Navigate to “Miles Transactions” under your name
- Select “Book Now” under Star Alliance Award Ticket
At this point, you can search for your preferred route and day. Note that if you do not do this and search through the main homepage, you will only see flights operated by Turkish. If you search for a route and see nothing but Turkish flights, ensure that you followed the above steps.
Tip: do this on a laptop or desktop computer if possible. If you must use your phone, know that after each search, you will need to return to the home screen and complete the above steps before searching for a different date or city pairing. On the computer, you can choose a different date or search for a different route on the same page.
If you’ve already searched on United and found award availability, you should be able to find the same flight on Turkish. However, if nothing appears eligible for booking, don’t fret. Simply choose a different date/city pairing that works on United and search again. Alternatively, you could call one of Turkish’s booking offices, but I avoid that if at all possible as their customer service is notoriously lacking in… customer service. 😉
Another unfortunately challenging experience is booking a flight for someone else. While I caveat this by noting that I have not done this myself, you are unable to book a flight for anybody other than yourself online– at least the first time. It is reported that once you have booked an award for yourself, you will then be able to book flights for others online as well, though you may still need to call in to book. While this is inconvenient to say the least, the upside is terrific value on redemptions. If I had to choose between ease of booking or terrific value, I’m picking clunky IT and bizarre rules all day! That’s why I have highlighted the wonderful Turkish program and not Delta’s! 🙂
Transferring Miles:
Once you find award space on the flight you want, unless you have enough miles to book, you’ll need to transfer points from Capital One or Citi. Thankfully, that process is simple. I do not have the Citi Premier or Prestige so my only option is Capital One Miles, which transfer instantly to Turkish. This time around, I had 45,000 miles in my account from a previously planned trip and did not need to transfer more.
Booking the Flight:
The miles have shown up in your account. Now it’s time to book! Repeat the process above by searching for the flight with availability that you found previously. This time, you’ll select the flight and pay the exorbitant 7,500 miles and $5.60 price. 😉 As this is a US domestic flight, unless you are booking business class or have elite status with a Star Alliance airline, you will need to pay the $30 for a checked bag if you plan on bringing one. As such, your total cost would be 7,500 miles and $40. That is still a tremendous deal!
The flight I booked was $184 for a non-Basic Economy fare and would have been much more had I not been searching for these flights 3-4 months in advance. Even at $184, that’s a terrific (184-5.60)/7,500=2.379 cents per mile!
Other Turkish Sweet Spots:
I will dedicate a full article to the beauty that is the Turkish Miles & Smiles program. However, here are some of the highlights:
From the US:
- 45,000 miles to fly Star Alliance Business Class to Europe (watch out for high fuel surcharges of $700 or more if flying Lufthansa Group airlines (Austrian, Swiss, or Lufthansa. Weirdly, fellow Lufthansa Group member Brussels Airlines’ fuel surcharges are much more reasonable at ~$300)
- 47,000 miles to fly Turkish Airlines to the Middle East
- 52,500 miles to fly Turkish AIrlines to Central Asia (including India)
- 60,000 miles to fly Turkish Airlines to North Africa
- Occasional promos to fly Turkish Airlines for even less– such as the 31,500 miles I spent to fly SEA-IST-BUD (Seattle, Washington to Budapest, Hungary via Istanbul, Turkïye)
Elsewhere:
- 17,500 miles to fly Turkish Business Class from the Middle East to Istanbul.
- 24,500 miles to fly Turkish Business Class from Western Europe to the Middle East.
- 15,000 miles to fly Business Class within Europe (includes Istanbul)
These are extraordinarily good mileage costs, significantly lower than almost every other mileage program offers. In short, Turkish is a force to be reckoned with and a program that you should know and take advantage of!
Recap:
Turkish Airlines allows you to fly anywhere in the US on United for just 7,500 miles and $5.60 in Economy or 15,000 and $5.60 in Business Class. While there are some hoops to jump through– from finding United saver award availability to replicating it on Turkish’s website… all that after going through the convoluted process to search for Partner Award Bookings on Turkish’s frustrating website– the reward is immense. Had you heard of Turkish Miles? Does this make you want to fly to Hawaii? Let me know in the comments below!
This is amazing!