LifeMiles is a popular Colombian frequent flyer program which is part of the Star Alliance network and allows users to buy points throughout the year. They also run some fantastic sales and right now you can score a 145% bonus on miles purchases over 41,000.
Since LifeMiles is a Star Alliance program, you can then use these miles to book ANY star alliance partner as a redemption flight. The 145% bonus is the highest we’ve seen this year.
The Australian dollar might be rather weak, but it can still make sense to buy miles for cheap business and first-class travel.
Why buy LifeMiles?
Even though you might have no intention of going to Colombia, LifeMiles can offer savvy users the opportunity to fly business and first-class at a fraction of the regular retail price.
The connection to Star Alliance opens up a range of opportunities for Australian frequent flyers looking to get a business or first-class flight via an outright redemption (forget about upgrades).
This is possible on a range of airlines such as Thai Airways, EVA Airways, Singapore Airlines, Air Canada, Air New Zealand, United or ANA, to name a few (that frequent Australia).
Up To 31% Extra Discount
Where things get even more interesting is with the business and first-class redemption sale LifeMiles is running simultaneously. This means you can get an extra 31% discount when you go to redeem your miles.
Of course, this is only on selected routes and most of them are between the US and Asia.
Here’s the full chart of available routes and discounts:
Current LifeMiles Promo
Right now and until October 2 (that should give us time until October 3 in Australia) you can buy LifeMiles with a bonus of up to 145%. I would only recommend buying at this level since most flights will set you back more than 40,000 points anyway.
The tiered bonus works like this:
- 1,000 – 12,000 + 115% bonus points
- 13,000 – 40,000 + 135% bonus points
- 41,000- 200,000 + 145% bonus points
What To Book With LifeMiles?
I’m working on an in-depth guide on LifeMiles and all its quirks but in the meantime, here are a few “use cases” of flights you can book using your LifeMiles from Australia.
Australia to Japan – ANA Business Class
ANA now operates flights from both Sydney and Perth to Tokyo and life miles is by far one of the best ways to snap up a business class seat. The price for a return ticket is only 80,000 LifeMiles. That works out to US$1077.55 for a return business class flight which usually costs around $3000+
Australia to Canada – Air Canada Business Class
Air Canada has flights from Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney to Canada and instead of paying for a full fare business class flight on Air Canada which goes for around AU$10,000 return, you could sit at the pointy end for just US$2155!
Sydney to Bangkok – Thai First Class
If you like flying and haven’t ticked off Thai Airways first class, it is a must! The Thai First Class experience is fantastic (especially the ground service!), and you can enjoy it for 75,000 miles each way. With the current promo price that would be a total of US$2020 return in first class.
If you want more “bang for buck” tag on an extra flight in first class to Paris instead, the total cost from Sydney to Paris is only 115,000 LifeMiles (one way).
LifeMiles In Conclusion
LifeMiles is an excellent program that can help you fly business and first-class for less. I would always recommend researching flight availability first (can be done online when you log into your LifeMiles account) before buying any miles. Hoarding miles is usually never a good idea because unlike most other assets, frequent flyer points only lose value over time.
You can buy LifeMiles here: https://www.lifemiles.com/miles/buy (pro tip: use a credit card that doesn’t incur foreign exchange fees such as this one. Otherwise you will be 3% worse off!
