Splitting PE Upgrade voucher

Hi

I've earned 2 x PE upgrade vouchers with my credit card and have heard it may be possible to split these to use as 4 x one way PEs rather than 2 x PE returns. Please could you let me know if that's correct. I would prefer the 4 of us to travel out PE together and back E together if possible. Thanks. Also, the vouchers won't be added to my account until mid September. Can I book an economy reward now and add the PE upgrade later once they've been credited to my acc or does it need to be done at time of booking? Thanks so much for your help - I've never redeemed miles before so it's all new and I want to do if the most cost (and miles) effective way. We will be 4 travellers going LGW-MCO in the summer 2016 school hols.

[Neil]

Yes, this can be done.
There really is no point booking the economy seat first, there only has to be PE reward seats available so you gain nothing by booking early, unless there is a miles seat sale on and it is due to end.

Thanks for replying so quickly. I was just going to book the economy seats to a make sure we can get reward seats on the right date, even if it meant travelling economy and not using the PE upgrades in case there were no reward seats still available when the vouchers hit my account. Would you still not advise it?

[Neil]

It seldom if you are happy to a) fly economy if no PE seats available and b) are happy using miles for an economy seat.

For a) are you dates 100% set, if you can be flexible by even 1 day either way it might help and if you book now and PE seats are available for the day after would you be okay or annoyed by that?

For b) many on here, myself included would question the value of using miles for an economy seat. By the time you have paid all of the taxes and fees that you still have to pay, the saving over a cash fare can be sometimes be less than £100. When you take in to account you don't earn miles or TP's on reward fares it really gives a poor return in value for miles.

Neil

Thanks Neil. Yes I see what you mean. We are flexible by a couple of days either side so that wouldn't be a problem. Prices for economy at the moment are about £1000 each for the couple of days before (our exact dates aren't available yet but from past experience this is the sort of fare we've had to pay for an economy return). The taxes on an economy reward ticket are about £250 so for four of us that still a saving of about £750 each. I know what you mean about it not always being worth it on economy rewards but it's just unfortunate we want to do the most popular route! Gatwick to Orlando with two kids (now classed as adults) in July/Aug.

Also, as the PE vouchers are upgrades on economy redemptions I think that's what I have to do. I was thinking of booking PE one way for the four of us now as those are available, then booking the economy rewards to come back in august once those dates are released and using the 2 x PE upgrade vouchers to upgrade the four of us coming back to PE one way. Does that make sense??

Try doing it via Atlanta or JFK not direct I know but maybe more availability I have just done lhr -JFK- Mco and the same for return journey I paid for the flights but got the seats in an Easter sale done it in upper class Virgin to JFK and delta to mco in first class for about the same cost as gat wick to mco in premium

Thank you! I'll take a look at that

[Neil]

The prices are so high right now because they have literally just been released, give it a week or two and they will be a more normal level.

Yes, the PE vouchers upgrade an economy reward fare, but you don't have to actually book the econ reward seats first, in fact there doesn't even have to be economy reward seats available, just PE ones.