Reward seats, have I understood this correctly?

I’m about to purchase an upper-class reward seat and I want to ensure I’ve understood the best way to go about it.

I have 150,000 virgin points, and two vouchers (for either an upgrade or companion ticket).

I’ve used Virgin’s Beta Reward seat finder to find suitable days to and from Manchester/New York with both premium and upper-class reward seat availability.

My theory is to book over the phone to purchase a premium economy seat using 45,000 points and £504 for taxes and fees. I can then immediately use my upgrade voucher and presumably an additional £460 to upgrade to Upper Class.

This way I save having to use the full amount of points for UC, but the downside is I'm reliant on there being availability for both PE and UC.

Have I understood this correctly?

Many thanks!

Also, are reward seats refundable?

[mitchja]

When using a credit card upgrade voucher to upgrade a reward flight, there only needs to be availability in the cabin you want to upgrade to (in your case, Upper Class). There doesn’t need to be availability in Premium.

Ring VS and the agent will book it for you, adding the upgrade and request the Upper Class tax/fees all in one go. The booking simple ends up as an Upper class full reward booking but you will see a VS Credit Card Upgrade Redemption transaction and a points redemption transaction on your Flying Club account.

Whilst reward flights are not refundable, they can be changed for just £30 per person (this includes date and route changes). This £30 change fee is waived for Gold Flying Club members.

Thanks, James.

On the subject of reward seats, and rather than make a new thread, does anyone know the answer to the following?

1. If there was no reward seat available on the return, what would happen to the other half of the voucher?

2. If I were travelling with a companion, could I use an upgrade voucher to upgrade both of us one way (subject to availability)?

3. Is there Wi-Fi available in upper class, and is it free to Reward+ credit card holders through Boingo?

Cheers

[mitchja]

1) I think the voucher can be spilt and you can upgrade another one way flight at a later date.

2) You can only transfer credit card vouchers to other people if you are either Flying Club Silver or Gold. This option is not available to Flying Club Red members.

3) Depends on A/C. Whilst all A/C have WiFi, Boingo log-on is only available on the A350's and the B789's. It's not available on the A333's or the A339's (though the A339 does offer up to 2 x free 20min sessions if you watch an ad).

Thank you kindly!

1) I think the voucher can be spilt and you can upgrade another one way flight at a later date.

That’s correct. They can be split into two singles and effectively be used as halves.

Can also be a companion voucher or a clubhouse voucher, the latter being a total waste.

Also, I thought reward flights are fully refundable…?

Double post

Also, are reward seats refundable?

Unless something has changed, rewards seats are refundable up until 24 hours before the flight. They'll refund taxes and fees minus £30 cancellation fee.

You can find the terms on cancellation at 4.2.1 (second paragraph):

https://help.virginatlantic.com/gb/en/p ... -club.html

I thought you could use your credit card voucher for someone else providing you are both on the same flight regardless of status.
We have used ours to upgrade our son in the past.

I thought you could use your credit card voucher for someone else providing you are both on the same flight regardless of status.
We have used ours to upgrade our son in the past.

That would certainly make sense.

Also, surely I could use the voucher on any booking I make even if I’m not the person flying?

You can use the voucher to upgrade another person, but if you want to use it as a companion voucher you must be one of the people travelling is my understanding?

You can use the voucher to upgrade another person, but if you want to use it as a companion voucher you must be one of the people travelling is my understanding?

That’s my understanding too.

So I was just looking at the Ts and Cs regarding using a VA CC reward voucher as an upgrade and it says

The reward voucher can be used to upgrade one person on either two one-way flights or a return flight. The voucher cannot be used to upgrade two people one way.

Is this new? I'm sure I upgrade both myself and my wife from PE to UC one-way last year.

Does the above suggest that's no longer possible?

You can use the voucher to upgrade another person, but if you want to use it as a companion voucher you must be one of the people travelling is my understanding?

I’m lost as to how this works. When I booked our trip back at the beginning of the year, I had 2 vouchers to burn. The agent created 2 bookings, one for myself and the other half, and the other for the kids. One voucher was used as a companion voucher per booking. Tbh I’m not even sure how they worked out how many miles to charge us as none of what they did made sense.

Hi & Happy New Year!

Been trying to find T&C for virgin Credit card where it says
'The reward voucher can be used to upgrade one person on either two one-way flights or a return flight. The voucher cannot be used to upgrade two people one way'.
Are you able to post the link to it as I can't find any mention of it only being of use for one person - I usually split my upgrade voucher over 2 people in one direction so this is news to me. I know that Virgin are becoming sticklers for following T & C's to the letter and if I can't split my voucher anymore it may not be that useful. Many thanks

Hi & Happy New Year!

Been trying to find T&C for virgin Credit card where it says
'The reward voucher can be used to upgrade one person on either two one-way flights or a return flight. The voucher cannot be used to upgrade two people one way'.
Are you able to post the link to it as I can't find any mention of it only being of use for one person - I usually split my upgrade voucher over 2 people in one direction so this is news to me. I know that Virgin are becoming sticklers for following T & C's to the letter and if I can't split my voucher anymore it may not be that useful. Many thanks

Sure, the bit I'm quoting is from the Virgin Money app.

If you click on 'Virgin Atlantic Rewards Lounge' > 'Rewards vouchers guide' > 'How to use your voucher for flight upgrades'.

However, I've literally in the past few days been able to use my reward voucher as an upgrade voucher, and upgraded both myself and my wife to UC from PE, one way. So although it may say it can't be done, I've just done it!

However, I've literally in the past few days been able to use my reward voucher as an upgrade voucher, and upgraded both myself and my wife to UC from PE, one way. So although it may say it can't be done, I've just done it!

This is the age old, depends on the agent, situation.

If you get one of the long serving, very knowledgable UK based agents (which you definitely should via the Gold line or out of hours), they're a lot less likely to notice new changes and instead just do whats always been possible.

Plus, the actual usage of the vouchers inside VS is very manual. It all consists of making notes on the booking and account, so theres very little "computer says no" possibility. Or at least thats how it's been for a long time anyway.

Thank you for that.
If you look on Virgin Money website that has no mention of only being able to use voucher for one person but as you say the App is different. I'm glad you were successful with your booking.
I know getting the right person at FC can make all the difference but my experience of late is that they are becoming less flexible and are following procedures to the letter. Taking the joy out of booking reward trips as it often seems a bit of a battle.

First time post from a long-time follower of this site.

I hope my recent experience helps

I used 2 and a half virgin c/c vouchers last week to upgrade one way reward seats PE to upper class on our upcoming virgin holiday from Man to Mco for 5 people using vouchers my wife and daughter have.
This week I managed to obtain 2 upper class reward seats for the return using the remaining half from my daughter and using half from my wife's last voucher, guess who bagged the 2 seats.

Both agents were extremely helpful , even though for the last part she had to split the booking for the return flights

Hi,

Does anyone know how credit card vouchers work in relation to using it as a companion reward.

ie. Red FC member want to fly upper using miles but take son in PE? is this possible to mix cabins? what would be the miles needed?

Any thoughts?

thanks

1) I think the voucher can be spilt and you can upgrade another one way flight at a later date.

2) You can only transfer credit card vouchers to other people if you are either Flying Club Silver or Gold. This option is not available to Flying Club Red members.

3) Depends on A/C. Whilst all A/C have WiFi, Boingo log-on is only available on the A350's and the B789's. It's not available on the A333's or the A339's (though the A339 does offer up to 2 x free 20min sessions if you watch an ad).

Just updating that Boingo has been removed as a benefit as of end March 2024.

Whilst reward flights are not refundable

When did this change? LAst time I travelled - August last year reward flights were fully refundable aside from the £30 charge?

[mitchja]

Whilst reward flights are not refundable

When did this change? LAst time I travelled - August last year reward flights were fully refundable aside from the £30 charge?

Yes, sorry that was my fault, you are right; I was getting confused.

Whilst reward flights are not refundable

When did this change? LAst time I travelled - August last year reward flights were fully refundable aside from the £30 charge?

Yes, sorry that was my fault, you are right; I was getting confused.

If you use a reward voucher to upgrade, then cancel, do you get the voucher back?