Hi! I just bought the 70000 miles package through the City Tour Pass promotion and the miles were posted into my account. However, when I called topbonus, they said that I can't use the miles for partner flight awards and the miles can only be used for Europe. To add, she also said that the miles will expire in at the end of Feb 2015. Has anyone been successful in trying to book a flight using partner airlines with miles bought during this promotion? Please advise. Thanks.

During the previous promo by Niki, you could use the miles whatever way you preferred. If you need to book something now, why wouldn't you just do it online?

Hi Jon O. I couldn't book online because I wanted to travel with Malaysia Airlines. The situation however, has changed. I managed to book 2 Business Class seats from Dubai to Kuala Lumpur using these miles. I hung up and called back an hour later to find a staff, speaking English in a heavy German accent, ever willing to assist me with my booking. There you go ... 2 Business Class tix with Malaysia Airlines :-)

Hi Simon, can you let us know, if it succeeded to book the award with a partner airlines using the 70K promotion miles in J class? Thanks in advance

I just bought 70000 miles and they posted a few minutes later. I will now book a one way in J to LAX for 55000miles from Paris and only 115$ in taxes. Great deal!

Were you successful?

I was successful in booking the flight in Y but I haven't called yet to upgrade. I found a flight from LAX to SCL for 35000 AB miles and only about 25 euros in taxes and I'm wondering if I should use the extra miles for that instead... Oh and the PAR-LAX flight cost me 30000 miles and 85 euros in taxes, on AA.

Was the PAR(CDG?)-LAX flight J or Y? How do you plan on upgrading the other flight or is it on AB metal?

In Y. You can't book J online so you have to call them for that. I will give them a call next week when I'm in Europe to see if I can upgrade by only paying with miles or if I have to pay more "taxes".

It's only possible to upgrade with points on purchased tickets and then only when flying on Air Berlin operated flights..

According to this you can upgrade award bookings but I'm not sure about AA flights. http://www.airberlin.com/en...

Worse case scenario I will fly in Y, still a good deal at about 625$ all-in for CDG-LAX and LAX-SCL...

Hi, John, I'm looking for an award ticket from Southeast Asia to Europe, but the fuel surcharge is so high, about 500 GBP. Is there anyway to avoid it?

I would be interested in looking at a one-way Australia-Far East award in J which comes in at a reasonable 80k, but I would be short 10k. I notice I can purchase up to 10k a year on the AB website -- I wonder whether this conflicts with the 70k offer?

You can buy the 10K or move from some partners such as SPG. You can buy Starpoints and then convert them to airline miles.

Thanks for the quick reply. Sounds good.

Can these be bought with a U.S. credit card? I doubt many of us have German (or Dutch or Austrian) cards.

There is nothing indicating that it would not be possible. The direct debit from bank account is available only in 3 countries listed above.

Maybe I interpreted it wrong, but in the original german version it is definitely stated that the miles must be flown by Feb. 28, 2015 and are only valid on AB routes within Europe. Have you bought this pass previously and used the package for other OneWorld flights?

The NIKI miles that were also supposed to be used for their European routes could be freely used for any award flights and outside of the period mentioned on their sale. Have a look at the following purchase confirmation as well. There is nothing there nor in the T&C's linked above that these would expire in February.

So when would Topbonus Miles normally expire?
This sounds well worthwhile to save up for a world tour in a year or two (when I persuade Mrs M!). But if they expire like Flying Blue miles it would be no use.

YQ on AB's own flights are pretty shocking. How about on partner airlines?

I would use matrix.itasoftware.com to find out the taxes and fuel surcharges associated with the partner awards.

John, are miles listed in the chart for one way or return flights?

On the partner award chart, they are listed as one-way. The Oneworld award chart is entirely distance based and there is no need to return to the origin.

Can I buy the miles more than once?

Only once per T&C's. No idea if this is enforced or not.