The launch of Star Alliance Card heralds a new era of points and miles collection in Australia. A lot of points currency which were difficult to earn in the past is now within reach. I had written extensively on the card couple of weeks ago, since then though, a lot of new information has become available. Very briefly;

• The card earns 1 Star Alliance point per $1 on eligible spend of up to $3,000 per month, then 0.5 point per $1, uncapped.
• You can transfer Star Alliance Points to most transfer partners in the ratio of 1:0.80 (1 Star Alliance Point = 0.80 Airlines Points), the exception being Air New Zealand’s Airpoint where the conversion ratio is 125:1 (125 Star Alliance Points = 1 Airpoint dollar).
• The card carries a $450 annual fee which is waived in the 1st year.
• You can earn Star Alliance Gold Status for 1 year by spending $4,000 within 90 days of opening your account, to retain the status in subsequent years, you will be required to spend $60,000 on the card in each 12-month period.
• The status will be assigned in the program of the airline you nominate as Status Airline at the time of registration of your Star Alliance Rewards account. For example, if you nominate Air Canada, you will most likely be granted Aeroplan 50K status which maps to Star Alliance Gold.

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Star Alliance Rewards Transfer Partners

It’s a pity that only 7/26 Star Alliance member airlines are participating in the Program, this leaves some very lucrative Frequent Flyer Programs such as Avianca LifeMiles, ANA Mileage Club, etc out in the cold.

Transfer Star Alliance Points in the ratio of 1:0.80 to any partner airline

Note that even though you have to nominate a Status Airline during registration, you have the flexibility to convert your Star Alliance Points whenever you want into any of the participating member airlines, regardless of which one you selected as your Status Airline.

The part I have highlighted in Bold above wasn’t very clear when I first wrote about the card, but now that we know this, it greatly improves the value proposition of this card. It turns Star Alliance Points into a transferrable points currency, akin to American Express Membership Rewards Points, albeit at lower earning and transfer rates and fewer transfer partners.

In this post, I want to delve into South African Airways – SAA Voyager Program, one of the transfer partners of Star Alliance Rewards, and some of the lucrative redemption opportunity it offers on Star Alliance and other partner airlines.

Just to reiterate, you can convert Star Alliance Points into Voyager Miles in the ratio of 1,000:800 (1,000 Star Alliance Points = 800 Voyager Miles).

South African Airways – SAA Voyager

South African Airways – SAA Voyager, lets just call it Voyager, is the Frequent Flyer Program of South African Airways. Prior to being grounded by Covid and subsequently by bankruptcy proceedings, South African Airways offered non-stop flights between Johannesburg and Perth.

South African Airways flights to Perth are currently suspended

They are yet to resume flights to Australia, although they are now out of bankruptcy and in the process of rebuilding their network into Africa & Europe. Hopefully they will return to Australia at some point. Before I get into the redemptions, here are some important details about the Voyager Program ;

• Voyager awards cannot be booked online, this must be done over the phone. You can call Voyager on +27 11 978 1234 to make the bookings. Phone lines are open weekdays from 7am – 9pm and weekends from 8am – 2pm. All times are local South African times.
• You can only book round-trip awards, one-way bookings are not permissible.
• Voyager operates a zone-based award chart for redemptions on Star Alliance carriers. This kind of pricing inevitably gives birth to some juicy redemption opportunities, which I will get into a little later.
• Besides Star Alliance partners, you can also redeem Voyager Miles on other airlines such as Virgin Australia, Emirates and Virgin Atlantic.

Top Redemptions on Star Alliance Carriers

With all of the boring (but important) bits out of the way, lets dig into some high-value redemptions you can make with Voyager Miles. For reference, here is the Voyager Redemption Chart for Star Alliance Airlines. All Pricings are for round-trip redemptions.

SAA Voyager Redemption Chart for Star Alliance Airlines

And here are the countries included under various Zones, you will need to refer to the pricing chart and the Zones description both to accurately work out the redemption prices.

SAA Voyager Zones Descriptions

A couple more quick points on Zones before I talk about redemptions.

• Refer to Central Asia pricing for travel to countries included in Zones Near East, Middle East 1 and 2, Indian Sub 1 and 2.
• Refer to North & South Asia pricing for travel to countries included in Zones Far East and Japan.

Intra-Asia Business & First Class

North & South Asia is a massive region spanning from Japan in the North to Indonesia in the South. This opens up some extremely mouth-watering redemptions.

• You can fly ANA Business Class between Tokyo and Jakarta for 35,100 Miles.
• You can fly Thai Airways First Class between Bangkok and Osaka for a
  rather ridiculous 52,200 Miles.

• You can fly Asiana Business Class between Seoul and Singapore for 35,100 Miles.
• You can fly Ethiopian Business Class between Hong Kong and Bangkok for 35,100 Miles.
• When China opens for tourism, you can fly Singapore Airlines Business Class between Shanghai and Singapore for 35,100 Miles.

Redeem Voyager Miles to fly Singapore Airlines Business Class

Intra-Oceania Business Class for 76,100 Miles

Oceania is a collection of several far-flung countries. Besides Australia and NZ, it encompasses place such as Tahiti, Norfolk Island and Tonga, most of which are connected by Air New Zealand flights.

• You can fly Air New Zealand Business Class between anywhere in Australia and New Zealand for 76,100 Miles.
• You can fly Air New Zealand Business Class between Auckland and Papeete (Tahiti) for 76,100 Miles.

Oceania to North America in Business Class for 184,500 Miles

There are 3 Star Alliance carriers that fly this route, United, Air Canada and Air New Zealand. While redemption space is a little difficult to find it is not impossible, and the value you can extract makes it worth the effort.

• You can fly United Polaris Business Class between Sydney/Melbourne Brisbane and San Francisco for 184,500 Miles.
• You can fly United Polaris Business Class between Sydney and Houston for 184,500 Miles. As a reference, you will need to redeem 223,000 Velocity Points or 253,000 Qantas points (to fly Qantas to DFW) for the same trip making Voyager Miles the clear winner.
• You can fly Air Canada Business Class between Sydney and Vancouver for 184,500 Miles. Once again, redeeming Velocity points for this trip will set you back 208,000 points.

Redeem Voyager Miles to fly Air New Zealand Business Class

Intra-Central Asia Business Class for 53,400 Miles

The Central Asia Zone covers all of Middle East and Indian subcontinent. There are 2 Star Alliance carriers that primarily fly within this region, Air India and Egypt Air.

• You can fly Air India Business Class between Delhi and Riyadh for 53,400 Miles.
• You can fly Egypt Air Business Class between Dubai and Cairo for 53,400 Miles.
• You can fly Air India Business Class between Delhi and Tel Aviv for 53,400 Miles.

Admittedly, Business Class on Air India is a bit behind the times. But at those prices, the value proposition becomes irresistible.

Central Asia to Europe in Business Class for 106,400 Miles

You might not think much about flying between Europe and Central Asia and I almost missed it too. But then I dug a little deeper and came up with some absolute slam-dunk redemptions on this route.

• You can fly Air Canada Business Class between London and Mumbai for 106,400 Miles. This is a fifth freedom route which has only been in existence for a short time.
• You can fly Turkish Airlines Business Class between Istanbul and Male (Maldives) for 106,400 Miles. Flying to Maldives in Business Class can often be expensive and your wallet will thank you for redeeming Voyager Miles on this route rather than forking out cash.
• You can fly Lufthansa Business Class between Frankfurt and Bengaluru for 106,400 Miles.

Redeem Voyager Miles to fly Air Canada Business Class

Redemptions on Virgin Australia

Voyager redemptions on Virgin Australia are hardly the most exciting, in most instances you are better off redeeming Velocity points. However, since Velocity points are one of the major points currencies in Australia and very easy to earn, it’s worth casting an eye over it.

For reference, here is the Voyager redemption chart for Virgin Australia flights.

Voyager Redemption Chart for Virgin Australia

Based on the above chart, here are a few examples of the short of redemptions that you can make.

• You can fly Virgin Australia Business Class between Sydney and Apia (Samoa) for 70,000 Miles. Cash fares on this route are generally over $1,000 one-way, so the value on redeeming Voyager Miles isn’t the worst. As a comparison, Velocity charges 99,000 points for the same trip.
• You can fly Virgin Australia Business Class between Sydney and Nadi (Fiji) for 85,000 Miles. This is terrible value and I wouldn’t recommend you do it, as you can fly the same route for just 71,000 Velocity points.
• You can also fly Virgin Australia Business Class on domestic routes for 85,000 Miles. Again, this should be strictly avoided as Business Class redemptions with Velocity points start at just 31,000 points on many major domestic routes.

Voyager redemptions on Virgin Australia offer poor value

In Conclusion

SAA Voyager is quite an obscure program and does not get a tenth of publicity compared to many other popular Frequent Flyer Programs. Even those of us who spend a lot of time collecting and redeeming points are unaware of it. To be honest, I would never have looked at it if it wasn’t for the advent of Star Alliance Card in Australia.

The program is not going to resonate with everyone as the pricing is not uniformly attractive. It does not allow one-way redemptions and the bookings can’t be made online. Those issues by themselves are enough to put-off a lot of people from taking it up seriously. But on certain niche routes, such as intra-asia business class, it blows the competition out of the water.

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Are you familiar with SAA Voyager Program? Leave a comment below.