How to redeem Melboune to Athens in Business Class with Velocity points for a family of 4?

Flights & Airfares
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Hi everyone!

I have over 820k of Velocity points and a total newbie to redeeming internationally! I am a Platinum Velocity member. We want to go to Greece next year (June/July 2019). 2x Adults, 1x under 2, 1x 4 year old.

Would love to go business class for the family but have no idea what the best way to use the points. I have read that converting my points to Krisflyer and potentially flying Singapore Air (which I love). Or Etihad which Virgin have a partnership.

Would love to know if you had to do the same, how would you do it?

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Hi there. You could try:

  1. Flying VirginAustralia and VirginAtlantic through Hong Kong, but you may need another flight from London to Athens. This may be cheapest in terms of points (255k points return PP), but tax through London is expensive. Not sure about your chances of 4xBusiness reward seats on those routes though...although you do have the benefit of time in advance.
  2. Fly with Singapore using Velocity points. This would cost slightly more at 278k points PP, so you would just have enough (infant is free if on your lap), and taxes are likely to be less. Not sure about availability - generally I find Krisflyer have more availability available than Velocity.
  3. Fly with Krisflyer - transfer velocity points over to them at 1 vel point = 0.74 kris points. The cost in point is 210k kris points (283.5k vel points PP). Taxes are about 400 each way PP. Also, with Krisflyer, you'll need to pay a big fee (10% of cost of a Business Ticket) for the infant which you'd avoid by doing any of the other options. You may just have enough points to do this. And there may be more availability and earlier release of seats than Velocity (join up and run some dummy bookings to see availability)
  4. Fly etihad with velocity points. This will be 278k points PP by Etihad charge a massive $205USD fee per person, per sector for Business class redemptions. That's an extra 820USD PP!!! But they have a great business product on a380/dreamliner.
I reckon option 2 or 3 will be your best bet. Run some dummy bookings and see what comes back. Get in early though, because 3xseats in business will be hard to come by. On another note, have you done much travelling with kids before? I assume you have being Platinum, but travelling Business long haul with small kids can detract from the experience as you are busy the whole time entertaining them. It is, however, better than being stuck in economy! Good luck
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