Comments on: Virgin Atlantic: Where Your “Free” Mileage Award Ticket Costs $350

By: Rachel

Rachel — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 04:09:58 +0000

I can’t give away these miles. The last I checked in trying to book an upper class ticket from San Francisco to London would have accrued $1000+ in fees. Now that Continental is not partnered it seems, I have no possibility of using these miles domestically either. No other airline running similar routes have fees this high. I’ve got 172,000 miles over years of flying full fare tickets. Not much of a loyalty plan when people can’t wait to chuck their miles and never fly VA again.

By: Phil

Phil — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 18:32:46 +0000

Similar here – I have saved up nearly 100,000 miles with VA which I was hoping to use to get to the UK – as with all the others above, turns out 100,000 miles isn’t worth anything near what you’d expect it to be worth. Return journey JFK to LHR in economy is 29,000 miles plus fees of $600! The standard eocnomy ticket price for the SAME FLIGHT is $540 + $220 tax. The VA fule and security surcharge is more than the price of the economy ticket…. or in otherwords, my miles are almost worthless! I feel quite honesltly robbed of the value here…. anyone want to buy 100,000 VA miles?

By: Pete

Pete — Sat, 08 Jan 2011 16:19:26 +0000

Same issue here, traveling out of New York. Looking at using miles for return JFK-LHR. VA and AA offering roughly same “non-miles” prices: $602 and $607 respectively (incl. “taxes+fees”). VA offering same flight for 29,000 miles + $370, whereas AA offering for 40,000 miles + $160. What seems even more ludicrous is how this compares to the VA “miles+money” fare: 2,000 miles + $396. So for $26 more I can basically use close to zero miles for the same flight. This makes no sense. I tried speaking with the VA online chat help, and they said AA may be subsidizing the taxes whereas VA do not. Bollocks.

By: Paul Rubio

Paul Rubio — Wed, 29 Dec 2010 14:18:23 +0000

I was one of those passengers who was basically cooked alive on the Virgin flight last June, when we were stuck inside the plane for hours with 108 F temps (just google: paul rubio virgin atlantic). My compensation was a re-instatement of the award miles I had used for that hellish journey.

Well it was another nightmare trying to use those miles. I finally booked a trip to India for two of us for spring 2011. Our “free” tickets cost me $808.40 in taxes and fees. If I had used my Continental miles, the taxes and fees would have been $88.40 for two of us. Virgin collected a $720.00 fuel surcharge, which doesn’t even go to Continental. WHAT A JOKE! How does Virgin get away with this? I feel helpless as a consumer in this situation. Virgin lost a class action lawsuit for charging arbitrary and bogus fuel surcharges in the mid 2000s. How are they doing it again?

Taxes/Fees

U.S. Customs User Fee $11.00
U.S. APHIS User Fee $10.00
India Passenger Service Charge $26.80
U.S. Immigration User Fee $14.00
Fuel Surcharge $720.00
India Passenger Service Fee $11.40
U.S. Security Service Fee $15.00

Certain taxes/fees list above are included in the originally quoted price.

By: Randy Warren

Randy Warren — Wed, 06 Oct 2010 16:23:55 +0000

Karl, if you (or anyone) actually paid these fees and you are in California, please contact me to discuss the legal implications. I am a California attorney, and there is no cost to speak to me about this. I am looking to end this practice if possible. warren@warrenlawgroup.com, SBN248006.

By: karl

karl — Tue, 05 Oct 2010 17:34:44 +0000

I was looking for others who had their ariline miles expire without notification form the ariline. I have been unable to get VA to return my miles so I have chosen to begin using BA. Here is the mileage and fee breakdown for an upcoming flight in June 2011. If a class aciton suit comes up I’d like to be considered as 2,158 for 3 “free” seems high. I understand if a surgharge or other fee applied like others the fees seem to increase based on the ticket class.

Fees on a upcoming BA flight June 2011 –
Mileage debited: 310000
Payment Total USD: 2158.14

Contact me as

By: Gino

Gino — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 22:10:24 +0000

I have just been shocked at the magnitude of these fees. They toatal over $1,000 for a “free” preium economy ticket from LA to London. that’s more than paying for one economy ticket. I investigated the fees, and there was indeed a substantial “fuel surcharge” and “insurance” fee
that is not added to regular fares.

I am a CA attorney and would welcome exploring whether such practices might be cause for a class action.

By: jonathan boocock

jonathan boocock — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 14:54:19 +0000

here is one for u . If i use Continetal miles on a virgin codeshare flight meaning i actually fly on a virgin flight but use continental miles because they share planes the fees are around $100 from washington to london, if i use Continental miles on a continetal ticket the fees are around $100 , But if i use virgin miles on a virgin plane its $350 .

So if i am on a virgin flight across the Atlantic why is Continental not charging me the extra $250

hope this makes sense

By: Randy Warren

Randy Warren — Sun, 04 Jul 2010 17:20:29 +0000

If someone has been victimized by Virgin’s “Free ticket” program and forced to pay money to the airline that does not in turn get paid to the government (or other such agency), I think this could be worth a class action lawsuit. I am an attorney and would welcome hearing from someone IN CALIFORNIA who ended up paying for the fuel surcharge.

By: peter eberhardt

peter eberhardt — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 17:14:51 +0000

I was considering business class tickets on BA from Anchorage to London via Seattle using mileage (280,000 total miles) — guess how much I would have to pay in fees, taxes and fuel surcharges?

JUST UNDER $800 PER TICKET! AND THIS IS USING MILES

WHAT A JOKE