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Given that this week is (almost definitely) the last ever chance to purchase discounted SPG Starpoints, I’ve been sharing some of my favourite redemptions, in order to explain why you might wish to take advantage of cheap Starpoints while you still can.

Remember, the sale ends on 31st May 2018, and when you purchase 5,000 or more and you will save 35% compared to the normal price.

Starpoints can be transferred to a large of airline partners at a generous 1:1 rate – with an additional 5,000 Miles bonus when you transfer in blocks of 20,000. For example, if you bought 20,000 Starpoints for ~£340, you could transfer them over to Alaska Mileage Plan and receive 25,000 Alaska Miles. In other words, your cost per Alaska Mile would be ~1.35p per Mile.

1.35p may be expensive for some types of miles like British Airways Avios, but is a good price for more ‘exotic’ airline currencies like Alaska Mileage Plan Miles.

The best value miles redemption in the world?

I love Alaska Miles and one of the key reasons why is that you can (usually) book a free stopover even on one way redemptions.

Alaska Mileage Plan places India and Japan into the same region on its JAL award chart. This means that you can fly between the USA and India one-way for 35,000/60,000/70,000 Miles respectively for Economy/Business Class/First Class.

Add these two things together (and take a look at the JAL route map here), and you can see that you can fly from Delhi to Tokyo, stopover as long as you like, and then fly all the way to the East Coast of the USA (or vice versa) for the number of Miles listed above.

That’s nearly 10,500 Miles of flying and some incredible destinations!

I should point out that if you choose to splash out on First Class, you’ll actually have to ‘slum’ it in Business Class on the Delhi – Tokyo leg, because there isn’t a First Class cabin. Tokyo-New York is still ~13 hours in First Class though and therefore well worth the extra 10,000 Miles in my view!

Using the approximate 1.35p per Alaska Mile cost of purchasing them indirectly via SPG, 70,000 would set you back ~£950. There are no surcharges when redeeming Alaska Miles on JAL, so taxes/fees shouldn’t be more than £50.

In other words, you’re looking at 21 hours of luxury flying for about £1,000.

You could easily turn your trip into a ’round the world’ adventure too, by using Avios, Virgin Flying Club or American AAMiles to (or from) Delhi, and tagging on a cheap Norwegian flight to (or from) the USA back to the UK for ~£100.

Bottom line

Is this the best value points/miles redemption in the world? It’s got to be right up there, but there are still a couple more I want to mention before the 35% SPG Starpoint discount finishes at the end of the month!

Get 11,000 Starpoints with the SPG American Express Card

If you prefer to earn your Miles through credit card sign-up bonuses rather than buying them, sign up to the SPG American Express credit card here and you’ll get a bonus of 11,000 Starpoints rather than the standard 10,000.

You need to spend £1,000 within 3 months to trigger the bonus once you get the card, but will earn an extra 1,000 Starpoints for that too, because the standard earning rate is 1 Starpoint per £1.

There’s an annual fee of £75 to bear in mind too, although you do get a pro rata refund if you cancel before the end of the year.