Air Canada’s Aeroplan rewards program is adding a 38th airline partner with whom you can fly with your points: Virgin Australia. And we’ll soon publish our ultimate guide on the completely-redesigned Aeroplan program, one that will easily give you many free flights if you take the time to learn how it works!
Aeroplan is the most important rewards program for Canadian travelers since it’s so easy to earn many points for free. You can download our free cheat sheet with the 5 essential rewards programs for Canadian travelers.
But a lot of travelers don’t know that the best value for your Aeroplan points is most often to not fly with Air Canada, but rather fly on the many partner airlines (as the pricing system works differently for Air Canada vs. partners).
That upcoming guide will include many concrete examples, but just know that you can use your Aeroplan points on all airlines that are part of Star Alliance (and many other partners too).
Virgin Australia becomes an Aeroplan partner airline
Virgin Australia is the 2nd-largest airline in a very popular country for Canadian travelers.
You’ll now be able to use your Aeroplan points to move around the huge island, or even for niche routes to neighboring destinations (which can be a great value, as they are often expensive in cash… and the best use of variable-value airline rewards like Aeroplan is always for flights that are expensive in cash).
I’ll give you just one example, to once again illustrate how variable-value rewards can give outsized value and unlimited value.
If you are visiting every country in the world like me and you need to go to the beautiful Pacific island-nation of Vanuatu, flying there from Australia would cost at least C$650 roundtrip.
Now with Aeroplan points, you’ll get that same flight for just 25,000 points! After deducting taxes/fees, you’re saving $440 with 25,000 points!
That’s a value of 1.8¢/pt, which is 80% more value than the basic 1¢/pt you’ll get with fixed-value bank points (or worse, with cashback). That’s why variable-value airline rewards are so amazing: the potential for outsized value and unlimited value.
Aeroplan is really on a roll, having recently added many very cool and unique non-Star Alliance partners.
In recent months, they’ve added:
- Etihad (UAE)
- Azul (Brazil)
- Vistara (India)
- Air Serbia (Serbia)
And as Air Canada’s Vice-President of Loyalty Mark Nasr told me at the special Aeroplan presentation event in July, we should expect even more additions.
That’s great for us, as it gives us more possibilities to find great value with our Aeroplan points.
Want to learn more about maximizing Aeroplan points?
Summary
Virgin Australia has now become Aeroplan’s latest airline partner.
Have any questions about Aeroplan points? Ask us in the comments below.
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Featured image: Virgin Australia flight attendants and A320 (photo credit: Marriott)
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