This is a fantastic video. We usually book a package with virgin, however for 2020 we are thinking of braving it and booking everything separately, so this video has been very helpful with helping me look into booking my flights. Thank you x
Thank you so so much. I'm so glad it's helpful. I wish I'd known all of this years ago : ) Do you use The Dibb for trip planning? If not, you'll find it really useful too. www.thedibb.co.uk/forums/index.php
thank you so much for sharing Lisa. we started saving air miles last year after watching your videos. was good to know i’m not the only one with short legs that dangle 😂 and gets anxious flying. we’ve actually cancelled a holiday as i couldn’t face the flight! looking forward to upgrading to premium soon.
I'm so glad it's been helpful. OMG! That's terrible. You must have it really bad. I'm so sorry. I feel silly. I worked for an airline for year before and it never bothered me. It's only been more recent. Ades worse than me. But I can't believe what a difference it's made traveling in Premium now. I hope you get your flights. Please keep me posted x
Not so bad nowadays but still get the ‘jitters’ as I call it. Love Florida theme parks so what can you do...has to be done. We were there in January and hoping to book for next year soon. Will let you know if it all works out.
Thankyou lisa.ive been waiting for this. I watched your money saving video when we decided to start saving for Florida for next may.took out the virgin rewards plus card and already have a return flight to Orlando for one person. Hoping to get the 241 voucher 😊😊
Just watching this and I’m soo with you on how you feel in the seat. I’m about the same height as you and I felt so closed in coming home from New York at the end of February. I couldn’t get my legs comfy at all. I was ok on the way out when we flew economy delight but the return was classic (and both delta flights not Virgin) and it was awful. It’s made me really keen to upgrade our Orlando flights for October but they quoted us £1950 each just to upgrade the flight back to delight! £2.5k to upgrade to premium! I can’t believe they’ve got the figures right!!
Are 2 people able to use 1 virgin credit card to earn points towards their separate flying accounts? We're a couple and have each signed up for flying club.
Hi. I know 2 people can use the same card. (and have 1 card each) I'm not sure about collecting miles though for 2 flying club accounts. You'd need to ask Virgin, Sorry x
Hi Lisa, fab video, definitely worth more investigation for us. We currently collect BA points as we have flown with them quite a bit over the last few years, but I am wondering about collecting these to as there are more ways to add miles. Could you tell what the spend threshold is on the credit card for the upgrade? And also it says about the points expiring after 3 years, is that only if you don’t either spend or add more? Or is it if you don’t use them during the 3 years? Thanks.
Thank you. I think it might be £10'000, but please don't quote me on that. It used to be that, but they've changed to Mastercard now, so please check. I'm not sure about points expiring. I know the upgrades have to be used within the year. It used to be that your miles you collect would expired if your account hadn't been used. So as lone as you are adding and using you are fine. But again, please don't quote me on that. They are always really helpful over the phone when you call up xx
Thank thank you Lisa, that’s really helpful, I was talking to hubby about and he’s not that keen at the moment, as he’s not sure we’ll save enough to make a difference. So we’ll see. I’ll give virgin miles a call and ask them my questions though.
This was so helpful! One question I have, when booking flights, you mentioned seat release dates. Do you only get the pick of a small number of dates to book flights using air miles? We would only be travelling in school holiday times and was wondering if we would be limited to dates etc?
Yes! Only a few are released. We watch them for a few weeks before to see if there's a pattern. With Orlando flights there have been in the past. 6 Premium seats released on the morning they go on sale. So we've always set the alarm to be ready when it's our day. We haven't flown in to Orlando for a couple of years though so I haven't seen those for a while. But it's worth looking. Something else we've done. Virgin will allow you to 'put a hold' on flights using miles too. You can do this for 3 days. So we usually grab a couple of days before the actual date we want and ask to 'put it on hold'. No payment is taken, then when we see the date we want we call and ask to change the date and book. That way if for some reason we couldn't get the exact date, we have the day before or the day before that. If that makes sense?!
Do you mind me asking, If I only make enough miles to buy one? Is it then ok to buy the rest of my seats separately for a family of 4? as im worries I wouldn't be abled to save enough miles for all of us x
You can just purchase one using miles. We both have a virgin credit card and it's surprising how quickly the miles build up, especially when you are booking holidays and over Christmas if you use 'Shops Away'. I even do things like pay my Next account using my virgin credit card. You can also transfer all your Tesco points to miles and you get lots extra for doing that. My husband does that. We only use Tesco for petrol and it's surprising how many miles he gets just for that x
Nice but I would have liked to have learned more about how to spend Virgin Atlantic points on future. I am a new customer of theirs and not sure how to spend points as of yet. Can one apply partial points on upcoming flights? Do points expire? What if I have only a few points, but not enough to cover the whole trip, can I still apply those points and pay the rest of the balance?
Just ordered a Virgin card to collect miles. We already have Amex card to collect BA miles but they have limited Airmiles flights but you do get a companion voucher yearly. We got premium on the way home this year but not on the way there
We have been using BA airmiles for years . You have to spend a lot on Amex card to get the companion voucher but like you we use it to pay cruises and BP and Waitrose accept it. We have been to Cape Town and Santorini and Edinburgh recently. We have also used them to upgrade our Orlando flights to premium before
Great informative video Lisa, thanks. My query is with the 241 voucher do you need enough miles for 2 tickets or only 1? Hope that makes sense. Return Orlando flights for us would be 50,000 miles in economy each (not sure how much premium would be?) so would I need 100,00 to book 2 using the voucher? Just ordered myself a credit card too as we are getting them on just 1 right now but makes sense to get 2 vouchers like you say as a family of 4. Do you get a free upgrade to premium too? Im still a little confused on that part ....Thanks in advance
Hiya. The upgrade is to Premium only. You can't do from Premium to Upper. There isn't a 241 voucher. You basically collect miles and you receive 2 free return upgrades per year if you have spent enough. This is using the higher rate credit card that you pay the annual fee on. You work the miles out based on the economy miles required. So you would need enough miles for the 4 of you traveling in economy. I hope that makes sense. Also be aware that you can only get the upgrade if the seats are showing available in Premium when you book x
@@LollipopBoxClub Just looking at the T's & C's and it says only one reward can be earned per year. How do you get 2 free upgrades per account? I'm confused... p.s GREAT video! :)
This was great thank you! When it comes to booking for 4, even though you collect points seperatly on 2 cards, can you combine your points and book all 4 at the same time or do you have to make 2 lots of bookings?
Thanks Lucy. When you make a booking you need to use the one account. Although you can book returns, we always booking as one way flights as we book the moment the seats are released. If we wait for the return flights to be released 3 weeks later, there's a good chance the outbound seats will have gone. So we use one account going out and the other account coming home x
Ah that's makes sense thank you! There's 3 of us so was worried one might be left without a seat, but we could pay for the upgrade for one and do the single flights :D Think we would spend the amount to get the free upgrade if we use one card for home and one for business :D Thank you so much for sharing! xx
i now have a virgin money card and confused on how to points work in terms of syncing online? If i purhcase in store randomly do i still get the points in my flying miles club thing? or can i only purchase through the virgin flying shop section to collect the points?
Hi. If you have a Virgin Credit Card you collect miles whenever you use it anywhere and then extra miles if you use it online via the Flying Club Shops Away. You now get an email confirming the Shops Away purchases telling you when the transaction is pending and then again when the transaction is complete and how many miles you've received. I hope this helps.
We are a family of four We are flying with virgin to orlando for 3 weeks Do I get the miles for the whole family (2 adults 2 children) or just for myself? Thanks
Hi. You each can collect the miles. Each of our kids have their own Flying Club miles accounts so they collect their miles each time they fly. I believe they may need their own email addresses as you can't use 1 email address for 2 accounts.
Can you use partial miles and partial cash for a trip. I’m booking for my family and I was planning to book 3 tickets which will earn close to getting 12k points. Can I use those 12k points to discount an additional ticket I need to book?
Hi, sorry for the late reply. You are best calling the Virgin Flying Club to ask. Things keep changing so I'm not sure. You always used to be able to put miles towards flights to reduce the cost, but this isn't something we've ever done, so I don't know much about it, sorry.
Hi. Virgin flights get released about 11 months before. We tend to start watching them a few weeks before and watch the pattern seeing how many miles flights there are each day.
I’ve just earned my first reward for meeting the spend threshold and it is only for one return upgrade to premium, or for two people one way. This is wha5 is says on my email and was confirmed when I spoke to flying club on the phone. Do you know how you are able to earn two each?
Lisa Does that mean then when you book your flights for your next trip you will only get one free upgrade each and have to pay for the other 2 or you’ll still get 2 each because you joined before a certain date?
@@joanneg8594 Hi Joanne, It means that it's one return each now. So that covers 4 flights. So if it were just the 2 of you travelling, you would get you round trip covered, but if like us there's 4. It means we only get the free upgrades one way now. We are going to have to use the miles to fly home in Premium next time we book. It works out an extra 40'000 miles (10'000 each) . I hope that makes sense.
Virgin Air Miles credit card is awful. For Summer 2021 to get me, the Wife and two kids from London to Orlando has cost me £2200, including baggage (economy), so £550 each. For 2022 I was thinking of using my Virgin air miles, which I need 45,000 miles per person. I think I will have around 90,000 miles by Spring 2022 so 2 free flights you might think, but no. Just looked, and firstly I cannot fly out at the weekend, and secondly each return "free" flight is 45,000 air miles ....... and £265. The word free obviously has a different meaning in my world to Richard Branson's. The flight is £285 cheaper than with no points at all. I've tried quite hard to build my points to get to the air miles I have so to get to the end and things aren't what they seem is disappointing. Should of known it was too good to be true when Richard Branson is involved!!!!
Hi. I filmed this video a few years ago. A lot had changed since then. They now have seasonal travel times which is why it’s so much more now to travel in the summer 😢
This is a fantastic video. We usually book a package with virgin, however for 2020 we are thinking of braving it and booking everything separately, so this video has been very helpful with helping me look into booking my flights. Thank you x
Thank you so so much. I'm so glad it's helpful. I wish I'd known all of this years ago : ) Do you use The Dibb for trip planning? If not, you'll find it really useful too. www.thedibb.co.uk/forums/index.php
I’ve flown economy and premium and there is no way I would ever fly economy again! It was the best flight ever, so much better, I love it! 😊
I know exactly what you mean : )
thank you so much for sharing Lisa. we started saving air miles last year after watching your videos. was good to know i’m not the only one with short legs that dangle 😂 and gets anxious flying. we’ve actually cancelled a holiday as i couldn’t face the flight! looking forward to upgrading to premium soon.
I'm so glad it's been helpful. OMG! That's terrible. You must have it really bad. I'm so sorry. I feel silly. I worked for an airline for year before and it never bothered me. It's only been more recent. Ades worse than me. But I can't believe what a difference it's made traveling in Premium now. I hope you get your flights. Please keep me posted x
Not so bad nowadays but still get the ‘jitters’ as I call it. Love Florida theme parks so what can you do...has to be done. We were there in January and hoping to book for next year soon. Will let you know if it all works out.
@@maggiecannon4317 Glad it's improved a little. Good luck with next years trip : )
Thankyou lisa.ive been waiting for this. I watched your money saving video when we decided to start saving for Florida for next may.took out the virgin rewards plus card and already have a return flight to Orlando for one person. Hoping to get the 241 voucher 😊😊
That's amazing!! I'm so pleased. The miles really build up don't they?! I hope this has helped too : )
Great information Lisa, I really need to look into this more. Thanks for this video xx
Thanks Julia. I hope it's helpful xx
@@LollipopBoxClub very helpful thanks Lisa xx
Just watching this and I’m soo with you on how you feel in the seat. I’m about the same height as you and I felt so closed in coming home from New York at the end of February. I couldn’t get my legs comfy at all. I was ok on the way out when we flew economy delight but the return was classic (and both delta flights not Virgin) and it was awful. It’s made me really keen to upgrade our Orlando flights for October but they quoted us £1950 each just to upgrade the flight back to delight! £2.5k to upgrade to premium! I can’t believe they’ve got the figures right!!
Wow that's a lot of money. Collecting miles has changed the way we travel now and it saves us so much. That's crazy what you were quoted!
Are 2 people able to use 1 virgin credit card to earn points towards their separate flying accounts? We're a couple and have each signed up for flying club.
Hi. I know 2 people can use the same card. (and have 1 card each) I'm not sure about collecting miles though for 2 flying club accounts. You'd need to ask Virgin, Sorry x
Hi Lisa, fab video, definitely worth more investigation for us. We currently collect BA points as we have flown with them quite a bit over the last few years, but I am wondering about collecting these to as there are more ways to add miles. Could you tell what the spend threshold is on the credit card for the upgrade? And also it says about the points expiring after 3 years, is that only if you don’t either spend or add more? Or is it if you don’t use them during the 3 years? Thanks.
Thank you. I think it might be £10'000, but please don't quote me on that. It used to be that, but they've changed to Mastercard now, so please check. I'm not sure about points expiring. I know the upgrades have to be used within the year. It used to be that your miles you collect would expired if your account hadn't been used. So as lone as you are adding and using you are fine. But again, please don't quote me on that. They are always really helpful over the phone when you call up xx
Thank thank you Lisa, that’s really helpful, I was talking to hubby about and he’s not that keen at the moment, as he’s not sure we’ll save enough to make a difference. So we’ll see. I’ll give virgin miles a call and ask them my questions though.
This was so helpful! One question I have, when booking flights, you mentioned seat release dates. Do you only get the pick of a small number of dates to book flights using air miles? We would only be travelling in school holiday times and was wondering if we would be limited to dates etc?
Yes! Only a few are released. We watch them for a few weeks before to see if there's a pattern. With Orlando flights there have been in the past. 6 Premium seats released on the morning they go on sale. So we've always set the alarm to be ready when it's our day. We haven't flown in to Orlando for a couple of years though so I haven't seen those for a while. But it's worth looking. Something else we've done. Virgin will allow you to 'put a hold' on flights using miles too. You can do this for 3 days. So we usually grab a couple of days before the actual date we want and ask to 'put it on hold'. No payment is taken, then when we see the date we want we call and ask to change the date and book. That way if for some reason we couldn't get the exact date, we have the day before or the day before that. If that makes sense?!
Do you mind me asking, If I only make enough miles to buy one? Is it then ok to buy the rest of my seats separately for a family of 4? as im worries I wouldn't be abled to save enough miles for all of us x
You can just purchase one using miles. We both have a virgin credit card and it's surprising how quickly the miles build up, especially when you are booking holidays and over Christmas if you use 'Shops Away'. I even do things like pay my Next account using my virgin credit card. You can also transfer all your Tesco points to miles and you get lots extra for doing that. My husband does that. We only use Tesco for petrol and it's surprising how many miles he gets just for that x
Nice but I would have liked to have learned more about how to spend Virgin Atlantic points on future. I am a new customer of theirs and not sure how to spend points as of yet. Can one apply partial points on upcoming flights? Do points expire? What if I have only a few points, but not enough to cover the whole trip, can I still apply those points and pay the rest of the balance?
Just ordered a Virgin card to collect miles. We already have Amex card to collect BA miles but they have limited Airmiles flights but you do get a companion voucher yearly. We got premium on the way home this year but not on the way there
We were wondering about the BA mileage programme as we've been moaning about virgin lately.
We have been using BA airmiles for years . You have to spend a lot on Amex card to get the companion voucher but like you we use it to pay cruises and BP and Waitrose accept it. We have been to Cape Town and Santorini and Edinburgh recently. We have also used them to upgrade our Orlando flights to premium before
Great informative video Lisa, thanks. My query is with the 241 voucher do you need enough miles for 2 tickets or only 1? Hope that makes sense. Return Orlando flights for us would be 50,000 miles in economy each (not sure how much premium would be?) so would I need 100,00 to book 2 using the voucher? Just ordered myself a credit card too as we are getting them on just 1 right now but makes sense to get 2 vouchers like you say as a family of 4. Do you get a free upgrade to premium too? Im still a little confused on that part ....Thanks in advance
Hiya. The upgrade is to Premium only. You can't do from Premium to Upper. There isn't a 241 voucher. You basically collect miles and you receive 2 free return upgrades per year if you have spent enough. This is using the higher rate credit card that you pay the annual fee on. You work the miles out based on the economy miles required. So you would need enough miles for the 4 of you traveling in economy. I hope that makes sense. Also be aware that you can only get the upgrade if the seats are showing available in Premium when you book x
Got it - makes sense, Thankyou 👍🏻
@@LollipopBoxClub Just looking at the T's & C's and it says only one reward can be earned
per year. How do you get 2 free upgrades per account? I'm confused...
p.s GREAT video! :)
@@organisehappy You'd need to call and ask. We've always had 2 each. We last booked September 2018 x
@@LollipopBoxClub Fab! That's good to know. There is so much to consider but its amazing what you can get for very little! :)
This was great thank you! When it comes to booking for 4, even though you collect points seperatly on 2 cards, can you combine your points and book all 4 at the same time or do you have to make 2 lots of bookings?
Thanks Lucy. When you make a booking you need to use the one account. Although you can book returns, we always booking as one way flights as we book the moment the seats are released. If we wait for the return flights to be released 3 weeks later, there's a good chance the outbound seats will have gone. So we use one account going out and the other account coming home x
Ah that's makes sense thank you! There's 3 of us so was worried one might be left without a seat, but we could pay for the upgrade for one and do the single flights :D Think we would spend the amount to get the free upgrade if we use one card for home and one for business :D Thank you so much for sharing! xx
@@lucyoflynn9983 Or rather than paying for the upgrade, you could possibly just use all miles in Premium for the third ticket? x
@@LollipopBoxClub that's a fab idea 💗
i now have a virgin money card and confused on how to points work in terms of syncing online? If i purhcase in store randomly do i still get the points in my flying miles club thing? or can i only purchase through the virgin flying shop section to collect the points?
Hi. If you have a Virgin Credit Card you collect miles whenever you use it anywhere and then extra miles if you use it online via the Flying Club Shops Away. You now get an email confirming the Shops Away purchases telling you when the transaction is pending and then again when the transaction is complete and how many miles you've received. I hope this helps.
We are a family of four
We are flying with virgin to orlando for 3 weeks
Do I get the miles for the whole family (2 adults 2 children) or just for myself? Thanks
Hi. You each can collect the miles. Each of our kids have their own Flying Club miles accounts so they collect their miles each time they fly. I believe they may need their own email addresses as you can't use 1 email address for 2 accounts.
I've just purchased American Express Gold because it's free for the year , starting to think I should of paid £160 for the Virgin MasterCard now lol
We've also used the American Express before : )
Can you use partial miles and partial cash for a trip. I’m booking for my family and I was planning to book 3 tickets which will earn close to getting 12k points. Can I use those 12k points to discount an additional ticket I need to book?
Hi, sorry for the late reply. You are best calling the Virgin Flying Club to ask. Things keep changing so I'm not sure. You always used to be able to put miles towards flights to reduce the cost, but this isn't something we've ever done, so I don't know much about it, sorry.
How do you know when they are released
Hi. Virgin flights get released about 11 months before. We tend to start watching them a few weeks before and watch the pattern seeing how many miles flights there are each day.
I always travel with virgin Atlantic to montegobay Jamaica how do i sign up for my air miles
Hi. If you go to the virgin Atlantic website, you can join their Flying Club for free.
I’ve just earned my first reward for meeting the spend threshold and it is only for one return upgrade to premium, or for two people one way. This is wha5 is says on my email and was confirmed when I spoke to flying club on the phone. Do you know how you are able to earn two each?
Hi. Yes, I've just had the email yesterday. They changed their policy sadly : (
Oh, that’s disappointing. Explains why mine was just one then.
Lisa Does that mean then when you book your flights for your next trip you will only get one free upgrade each and have to pay for the other 2 or you’ll still get 2 each because you joined before a certain date?
@@joanneg8594 Hi Joanne, It means that it's one return each now. So that covers 4 flights. So if it were just the 2 of you travelling, you would get you round trip covered, but if like us there's 4. It means we only get the free upgrades one way now. We are going to have to use the miles to fly home in Premium next time we book. It works out an extra 40'000 miles (10'000 each) . I hope that makes sense.
Thanks Lisa, can I ask how many miles is has cost you for your up coming trip? And how long it took you to save those?
Just found your channel ❣️ xxx
Hi!! Thank you and welcome xx
Virgin Air Miles credit card is awful. For Summer 2021 to get me, the Wife and two kids from London to Orlando has cost me £2200, including baggage (economy), so £550 each. For 2022 I was thinking of using my Virgin air miles, which I need 45,000 miles per person. I think I will have around 90,000 miles by Spring 2022 so 2 free flights you might think, but no. Just looked, and firstly I cannot fly out at the weekend, and secondly each return "free" flight is 45,000 air miles ....... and £265. The word free obviously has a different meaning in my world to Richard Branson's. The flight is £285 cheaper than with no points at all. I've tried quite hard to build my points to get to the air miles I have so to get to the end and things aren't what they seem is disappointing. Should of known it was too good to be true when Richard Branson is involved!!!!
Hi. I filmed this video a few years ago. A lot had changed since then. They now have seasonal travel times which is why it’s so much more now to travel in the summer 😢