The Alaska Airlines – Virgin America merger continues to progress.
Virgin America has just emailed folks telling them to convert their Virgin America points to Alaska Airlines miles before January 31, 2018, or they will do it automatically.
And if you let them do it for you, you won’t have access to your miles for 1 week!
Here are the details.
Virgin America Points Will Be Converted to Alaska Airlines Miles Soon
Link: Convert Your Virgin America Elevate Points to Alaska Airlines Miles
I told you that the Virgin America loyalty program will end on January 1, 2018. It’s already lost tons of partners. And now, Alaska Airlines is giving folks an ultimatum.
If you don’t transfer your Virgin America points to Alaska Airlines by January 31, 2018, Alaska Airlines will do it for you. And you will NOT have access to your miles from February 1 to February 7, 2018.
This might not be a big deal for you, but if you have no plans for your Virgin America points , you might as well convert now. I personally would rather make the transfer myself than leave it up to the Alaska Airlines tech team to handle my points. And that way, I won’t be without them for a week.
Either way, all Virgin America points will be Alaska Airlines miles by February 8, 2018. And the conversion rate (1 Virgin America point = 1.3 Alaska Airlines miles) is the same no matter what.
Bottom Line
If you don’t transfer your Virgin America points to Alaska Airlines by January 31, 2018, Alaska Airlines will! And you’ll be without your miles between February 1 and February 7, 2018.
If you want to avoid that week of punishment, you can transfer your Alaska Airlines miles now. The conversion ratio will be the same.
Thank you for this information. I travel frequently and have quite a few assignments lined up in Feb and March. So I think I would have probably made some flight bookings at that time and I prefer Alaska. So I’ll move my Virgin air credits to Alaska manually now. If you search Flight Travel Deals visit here :- https://www.myflightsearch.com/
My email came with an offer of 10k Alaskan miles if I transferred. I did not previously have an Alaskan account.
Miles showed up instantly, too.
Excellent data point! I didn’t receive that offer, but I’d love to hear if more folks received it. Did you just get this email recently?
It came yesterday evening. I’m surprised it is targeted, but feel quite lucky now 😀
Any reason you would want to keep them as Virgin America miles in the interim?
Virgin America and Alaska Airlines use different methods for pricing their award seats. Virgin America prices their award seats according to the cash price of the ticket. Alaska Airlines prices theirs according to zone. So it’s possible you might be able to find a better deal for your travel with Virgin America. Check out this post to help!
https://millionmilesecrets.com/2017/01/11/book-virgin-america-tickets-through-the-alaska-airlines-website/
Just keep in mind that you’ll get a 30% bonus when you transfer Virgin America points to Alaska Airlines!