How I earned and spent 90,000 avios

Iberia offered an incredible promotion during the month of June. That is to say, if you booked a flight during that time, you would receive 9,000 avios into your account. Customers were able to earn a maximum of 90,000 avios by booking 10 flights. The terms and conditions stated that these avios would be credited into your Iberia Plus account after approximately 10 days. Not to mention, the avios credits could be used any time before December 1st. I was in Asia during this time. When I scrolled through Instagram, I noticed many other travelers had booked 10 Iberia flights. It is very difficult to accumulate 90,000 avios in a few days for the low price of $340. With this in mind, I went online and booked 10 flights in order to earn the maximum amount of avios.

Looking for cheap flights

While searching for flights, I noticed there were many cheap flights such as Madrid to Palma de Mallorca or Madrid-Santander. I even noticed there were some people who booked 10 flights for only $180! I had to search for flights as fast as possible because all the flights were rapidly increasing in price! After some trial and error, I booked 5 round trip flights from Madrid to Santiago de Compostela for around $ 34 for each one-way flight. I think 90,000 avios for only $ 340 is an extremely good offer!

After booking the flights, all I needed to do was wait until the 90,000 were added to my account. After 2 weeks, I checked my account and I was delighted to see I had received the 90,000 avios!

Booking award flights

There are numerous ways to redeem the 90,000 avios. For instance, I could transfer them to British Airways Executive Club but it would result with a negative balance in my Iberia Plus account, which is not what I wanted. After awhile, I found out that accounts were disabled from transferring avios between these frequent flyer programs. Although, this is now possible again without getting a negative balance.

However, I decided to redeem them from my Iberia Plus account. Fortunately, there are no high fuel surcharges in Iberia Plus when redeeming avios on Iberia flights. And when flying business class in low season you can get great value for your avios. The number of avios you need is calculated based on the distance you will fly. In the chart below you can read how many avios you need for a certain distance.

I took a look at my world map and on Great Circle Mapper and noticed the distance between Madrid and Bogota, Colombia is 4,991 miles. I realized that I had not been there yet and the distance is below 5,500 miles. Then, I took a look in “band 6” to figure out how many avios were required. For a one- way business class ticket during low-season we need 42,500 avios. Thus, a round- trip ticket will cost 85,000 avios.

In this region, there are more places that are on my bucket list so I decided to look at my choices. I wanted to find an “open-jaw” (flying back from another airport) for a trip in January. I took a look at the distance between Quito and Madrid.

Finding award space

The distance of 5,429 miles is just under 5,500 miles! Now, I found a good way to maximize the value for my 85,000 avios. Then, I had to find award space by using the Iberia award booking tool. When searching for a flight from Madrid to Medellin on January 16 I saw the following results.

A one-way business class ticket from Madrid to Medellin costs 42,500 avios and $ 111.95 in taxes and fees. I was satisfied with the day and time of the flight. Then, I needed to search for the inbound flight. I wanted to visit both Colombia and Ecuador but flying back from Quito. The only option was Quito as it is the only airport in Ecuador that Iberia operates to.

I found award space for February 13 to fly back from Quito. Taxes and fees for this flight were a bit higher. Overall, I was very satisfied with what I found. Then, I decided to book the flights.

Cost calculation

To figure out the cost of the revenue ticket, I looked at the amount I spent on the flights and taxes. I spent a total of $340 on the 5 round-trip tickets from Madrid to Santiago de Compostela. For this amount, I received my 90,000 avios. The total cost for both the flights and the taxes was $ 641.66. During the booking process, I looked on Skyscanner to see the revenue cost for these flights.

A revenue business class ticket would have cost $ 2,804! That’s almost 5 times higher than what I would have paid for these flights. I received a good value out of my avios.  I transferred the remaining 5,000 avios to my British Airways Executive Club Account.

However, this flight will depart from Madrid so I had to book a positioning flight from Amsterdam. Recently, Air Europa flies with a Dreamliner between Amsterdam and Madrid with actual business class seats so this was the best choice.

Iberia Business Plus

Iberia has a solid staggered business class product on both the A330 and A340. I flew Iberia business class on a A340 a couple years ago between Madrid and Mexico-City. I noticed the seats were spacious and offer a lot of privacy.

Update: You can now read my review of Iberia Business Plus on the A330 to Medellín.

Bottom line

I think I received a great value out of my avios. I’m looking forward to making the trip to Colombia and Ecuador. I realized that it is better to redeem Iberia avios on flights with Iberia to save money on high fuel surcharges. Would you want to fly using another Oneworld partner? I suggest, it’s better to transfer your avios to British Airways Executive Club because this program offers low fuel surcharges on many partner flights.

Have you also participated in this promotion? Have you already redeemed your avios? Remember that you’ll have until December 1st to redeem them! Would you also redeem them to fly Iberia business class? Let me know below in the comments!