TravelingForMiles.com may receive commission from card issuers. Some or all of the card offers that appear on TravelingForMiles.com are from advertisers and may impact how and where card products appear on the site. TravelingForMiles.com does not include all card companies or all available card offers.
Other links to products and travel providers on this website will earn Traveling For Miles a commission that helps contribute to the running of the site. Opinions, reviews, analyses & recommendations are the author’s alone and have not been reviewed, endorsed, or approved by any of these entities. Terms apply to all credit card welcome offers, earning rates and benefits and some credit card benefits will require enrollment. For more details please see the disclosures found at the bottom of every page.
Virgin Atlantic’s has brought back the best points sale that we see it run, and that means that for the next few weeks, Virgin Atlantic Flying Club members can buy points from 0.89 pence each (UK accounts) or from 1.48 cents each (US accounts).
Given, however, that Virgin Atlantic has now moved to a dynamic pricing system for reward flight bookings (meaning that the cost of an award booking is now linked to the cost of the cash fare), it’s now more important than ever for readers to check what awards are available and what they cost before deciding to buy points in this (or any other) Virgin Atlantic points sale.
The sale
There are 5 tiers to the latest Virgin Atlantic points sale and this is what they look like:
- Buy 1,000 – 4,000 points and get no bonus
- Buy 5,000 – 24,000 points and get a 20% bonus
- Buy 25,000 – 69,000 points and get a 40% bonus
- Buy 70,000 – 124,000 points and get a 60% bonus
- Buy 125,000 – 200,000 points and get a 70% bonus
This is a slightly improved set of tiers compared to the last Virgin Atlantic points sale (the last sale required a purchase of at least 125,000 points to access the 70% bonus).
Key terms
- Buy and Gift Virgin Points purchases made between 5th February and 23:59 GMT 7th March 2025 will be eligible to receive up to 70% bonus points..
- The bonus points will be credited at the point of purchase and will appear on the members account within 24 hours.
- A member can purchase or gift points in increments of 1,000, subject to an overall limit of 200,000 points in each calendar year.
- Bonus points do not count towards the annual cap.
- Members will have the right to cancel any purchases of points for up to 14 days after the date of purchase provided that none of the purchased points have been redeemed. If any of the purchased points have been redeemed, the member will not be entitled to a refund for any of the purchased points including those that have not been redeemed.
- Once the 14 day cooling off period has expired any points purchased and received by members are non-refundable and non-transferable, except as expressly permitted under the terms and conditions of Flying Club.
- Every purchase comes with a one-off £15 /$22 transaction fee. It costs £15/$25 for every 1,000 base points purchased. For example, if a member buys or gifts 1,000 base points they will pay £30/$47, if they buy or gift 5,000 base points they will pay £90/$147 and if they buy or gift 10,000 base points they will pay £165/$272.
- You won’t be able to buy, gift (or transfer) points if your points balance is zero.
Full terms and conditions can be found via this link.
The numbers
UK-based accounts
As far as UK Virgin Atlantic Flying Club accounts go this is what you’ll need to know:
Because Virgin Atlantic adds a £15 ‘handling fee’ to every transaction the cost per point will vary depending on the bonus on offer and the number of points that you’re buying, but the key thing here is that the cost/point when you buy 100,000 points is almost exactly the same as the cost/point when you buy the full 200,000 points so there’s no need to buy the maximum number of points on offer to get a great deal.
If you were to buy the maximum number of points this sale allows you to buy it would cost £3,015 and you would net 340,000 points:
340,000 points at a cost of £3,015 comes out to a cost/point of ~0.89 pence
US-based accounts
Based on what we have seen historically (my UK account doesn’t show US pricing), Flying Club members whose accounts are registered to a US address should be able to buy points from 1.48 cents each.
As you can see, buying Virgin points from a UK-based account is considerably cheaper than buying them from a US-based account (that’s why I keep my account based in the UK), but even at 1.48 cents/point, this sale still has the best pricing that we’ve seen Virgin Atlantic offer to US members.
Is it worth buying points in this sale?
If you don’t have a plan for how to use the points you shouldn’t be buying points at all and as mentioned earlier, with Virgin Atlantic now using dynamic award pricing, its especially important to do your due diligence before diving into the sale.
Personally, I don’t like using Virgin Atlantic points for travel on Virgin Atlantic because of the high surcharges that the airline chooses to add to award bookings (this continues to apply even though that some surcharges are now a little lower when cash fares are low), but I love using them for premium cabin awards on ANA when that’s actually possible.
ANA has a very popular Business Class product (the Room) and as far as I’m concerned, it’s the best Business Class seat in the world. Yes, it’s better than the Qatar Airways Qsuite.
So how do you use Virgin Atlantic points to book such a great product? It’s easy.
As things stand, the Virgin Atlantic ANA award chart is a region-based chart and looks like this:
The points costs shown are for round trip travel – divide by two for one-way pricing (open-jaw itineraries are permitted too).
These are the highlights in this award chart:
- Europe to Tokyo: 95,000 points/170,000 points (Business Class/First Class)
- New York to Tokyo: 95,000 points/170,000 points
- Los Angeles to Tokyo: 90,000 points/145,000 points
The current Virgin Atlantic sale allows you to buy enough points for any of these awards and this is how much they will cost, assuming you buy points in this sale at 0.89 pence each (UK) or $0.0148 (USA).
Business Class Fares (UK pricing/USA pricing)
- Europe to Tokyo: ~£846/$1,406 + taxes & fees
- New York to Tokyo: ~£846/$1,406 + taxes & fees
- Los Angeles to Tokyo: £801/$1,332 + taxes & fees
First Class Fares (UK pricing/USA pricing)
- Europe to Tokyo: £1,513/$2,515 + taxes & fees
- New York to Tokyo: £1,513/$2,516 + taxes & fees
- Los Angeles to Tokyo: £1,291/$2,146 + taxes & fees
If you’re buying Virgin Atlantic points in GBP, these Business Class fares are staggeringly good (even though the surcharges are higher now than they were a couple of years ago), and even if you’re forced to suffer the higher USD pricing, it’s hard to think of many better Business Class deals in the miles and points world.
Sadly, however, it’s not all good news.
Firstly, ANA Premium Cabin awards have gradually become a lot harder to find (especially if you can’t be flexible with dates or if you want more than one seat), so don’t buy any points before you’re 100% sure that the awards you’d like to book are actually available.
Secondly, there’s a downside to Virgin using a region-based award chart for ANA redemptions.
Per Virgin Atlantic:
What this means is that indirect routings now cost a lot more because two awards are required.
Take New York – Japan – South Korea in Business Class as an example. To book this with Virgin Flying Club points will take two award bookings:
First, you have to book the New York – Japan segments for 95,000 points and then you have to book the Japan – South Korea segments for a further 35,000 points.
The total round-trip cost is 130,000 points and that’s not such a great deal anymore. The best deals to be had are on non-stop routings.
Searching for & booking ANA awards
You can’t book or search for ANA awards via Virgin Atlantic’s website, so you have to look to other Star Alliance airline sites for help, but don’t buy any points until you’ve checked that awards are actually available for the dates you can fly.
I find ANA’s website a bit clunky, so my go-to sites are Aeroplan and United.com which are both easy to use and quite reliable when it comes to showing true award availability.
Once you’ve found an award you’d like to book you’ll have to call up your local Virgin Atlantic reservations line where the agents should be able to book your chosen itinerary.
Don’t forget
Virgin Atlantic sells its points through Points.com so there’s no scope to earn a travel/flight/airline bonus by using a credit card that offers bonus points for shopping in one of those categories.
What this means is that this is a good opportunity to use a credit card on which you’re working towards a welcome bonus or to use the excellent Chase Freedom Unlimited® card which will earn you 1.5% cash back (or 1.5 points/dollar).
Bottom line
Virgin Atlantic is now selling points with bonuses as high as 70%. This allows UK-based Flying Club accounts to buy points from 0.89 pence each and US-based Flying Club accounts to buy points from 1.48 cents each.
