Last Chance: 40% Avios Transfer Bonus – Only 5,400 Amex Points for Short US Flights

A couple of months ago, Amex walked back what had been one of their more unpopular Membership Reward transfer devaluations – the MR to Avios ratio. They returned it to the 1:1 and also introduced a 40% transfer bonus to make it even sweeter! That transfer bonus ends this Sunday, September 17, 2017.

Last Chance for 40% Avios Transfer Bonus – Only 5,400 Amex Points for Short US Flights

Link: 40% Transfer Bonus from Amex to Avios

Transfer Bonus Details:

• Minimum transfer is 250 Membership Rewards points.
• Redeem for this exclusive offer from 12:00 a.m. MT on July 17, 2017 to 11:59 p.m. MT on September 17, 2017, to receive 40% additional Avios.
• Additional Avios will be awarded at the time of transfer
• Also works for transfers to Iberia

Good Deal?

Let’s put it in an easy way that many of us would use our Avios for (short-haul flights in the US): the short haul flights on partners like American Airlines cost 7,500 Avios. With this transfer bonus, you will only need 5,400 Membership Reward points. That is really not bad at all, especially considering that some of these short-haul flights can cost over $300!

For any non-stop flights on American Airlines or Alaska in North America, it costs 7,500 Avios (for flights up to 1,151 miles away). With this transfer bonus, it only costs 5,300 Membership Reward points. If you assign a value of 1.8 cents per point to Membership Reward points, that means the 5,400 points is worth about $100. Many (if not most) of those flights under 1,151 miles cost well more than that! So, this is a great way to secure award travel at a cheap rate. See this post for more about booking with Avios.

Booking the 4,500 Avios Awards

If you are traveling outside of North America, it continues to only cost 4,500 Avios (or 3,300 Membership Reward points with this transfer) for non stop flights up to 650 miles. With a large amount of routes like that around the world, this is a great chance to save big!

Takeaway

While there are a lot of things you can do with Membership Reward points, a transfer bonus like this is a good one to take advantage of, at least in some small quantity. I only use my British Airways Avios for short-haul and I love having enough in the account for that trip that pops up last minute since they do not have close-in booking fees and the value can be huge.

Just be careful about speculative transfers – transferring a couple short-haul tickets worth over is a good idea but don’t be caught with a large amount of Avios as “just because there is a bonus” as we never know when devaluations may occur.