The ANA All Nippon Airways Mileage Club Round The World award ticket in Business Class is one of the most lucrative awards still available.
The ANA Mileage Club is a niche program that isunderappreciated outside of the Asia-Pacific Region but it has huge potential if one is able to accumulate ANA Miles steadily.
Awards have become more and more restrictive over the years, especially in regards to stopovers, which have always been a favorite feature of mine when putting award tickets together for one of my trips.
The ANA Mileage Club has the cheapest rate in the Star Alliance network for a Round the World ticket, which is one of the few frequent flyer programs that still allow stopovers.
The conditions of the Round The World award can be found in the ANA Mileage Club.
The award chart is structured by the total distance flown.
The 20,000 miles award is an absolute bargain and I usually redeem for it. You can get away with an award for 105,000 miles, but a Round The World with 18,000 miles total distance is a very difficult task and you would leave too many options behind.
Even though 180,000 miles for First Class would have been good, I don't think any of my long haul segments offer it.
American Express Membership rewards, the ANA Credit cards, and Marriott Bonvoy points are some of the sources of my ANA miles.
This is what I booked this time.
I would have liked to include a few more stops along the way, such as Taiwan and a long stop in Japan, but it's not possible for now.
The complete route is here.
Economy Class is the only way to get around, especially on Bangkok-Seoul. There are very few flights to Korea that have award availability. Too bad!
I ended up with 19,280 miles, which is a small discrepancy from my own calculation of 19,109. I'm not sure what ANA uses to calculate the distance. I added the non-flown segment to my itinerary as I will be taking a cruise up the coast. The surface sectors won't be counted towards the mileage total.
You can change this ticket for free, but you can't change the airline or route. I hope this isn't going to affect me during the trip, in case I need to make a date change like I did last time.
ANA MC is expensive but not as brutal as other airlines.
I paid $754.37 for the entire ticket and a $25 call center fee.
The United flight from South Korea to San Francisco is one of the most significant fuel surcharges. I tried my best to avoid the expensive carriers, but it's not possible at the moment.
There are some questions on the ANA website.
- For Round the World itineraries, the required mileage is calculated according to the total basic sector mileage for the entire itinerary. (Calculations exclude ground transportation sectors.)
- Flights must be used to cross both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans once.
- The flight direction of the itinerary must be east-to-west or west-to-east. Backtracking is not permitted.
- Up to 8 stopovers are permitted between the departure point and the final return point. (Up to 3 stopovers are permitted within Europe and up to 4 stopovers are permitted within Japan.)
- The departure date of the final international flight to return to the country of departure must be at least 10 days after the departure of the first international flight on the itinerary.
Example: When departing Japan on October 1, it will be October 1 + 10 days = October 11. So the return flight to Japan has to be after October 11.
- In addition to a maximum of 12 flight sectors, the itinerary may also include a maximum of 4 ground transport sectors (including travel between different airports in the same city).
The experience of booking this ticket was pleasant and I had checked availability for the flights ahead of time, which was a factor in the pleasant experience.
You have to call and book the tickets. I called the U.S. reservation hotline of ANA and was on hold for an hour before getting through to an agent. I gave ANA permission to issue the ticket without calling back after they had calculated the taxes and fees. I put the charge on the Amex Platinum card since it's the only type of charge that makes sense because of the 5x earning.
I'm looking forward to going back to Korea after two and a half years, and finally getting on the road again next week.
Conclusion.
The Round The World Award is one of the most lucrative awards in the ANA Mileage Club system. The round trips in First and Business Class are great, but they don't allow international flights.
The ANA experience was pleasant and the taxes were not outrageous, but it was the second time I booked a RTW award with them. Let's see how the trip goes.
All Rights Reserved © 2024
