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Avianca's LifeMiles program is famous for selling miles at a significant discount, and this latest promotion is no exception. For a very limited time, LifeMiles is offering the public a chance to purchase LifeMiles with a 150% bonus through June 26, 2020.
However, you can register through a special link for One Mile at a Time readers to buy LifeMiles with a 155% bonus. With this bonus, you can buy LifeMiles for only 1.29¢ each—which is the best price the program has ever offered!
Note on Buying Miles
We recognize that it's not exactly the best time to be planning travel, and we typically don't recommend buying miles without a discount or a plan to use them. For most currencies, you're much better off building your stash for free through credit-card earnings and transfer partners.
There are a couple of exceptions, though. When you can buy miles at a deep discount, it can make sense to do so if you can book a lucrative award redemption instead of paying for an expensive cash ticket. Moreover, if you only need a few more miles to complete that next, great redemption you're eyeing, purchasing miles can be the quickest, simplest way. Just make sure you do the math ahead of time to ensure you're achieving a value you're comfortable with.
Key Terms
- Buy LifeMiles promotion valid through this Friday, June 26, 2020
- Public Offer: Buy between 1,000 – 200,000 LifeMiles and receive 150% bonus miles
- OMAAT Offer: Buy between 1,000 – 200,000 LifeMiles and receive 155% bonus miles
The maximum amount of miles you can purchase and qualify for the 155% bonus is 200,000 miles. This will set you back $6,600 for a total of 510,000 LifeMiles—1.29¢ per mile. However, this promotion isn't tiered. So, you can still get the same 1.29¢ rate even when purchasing as few as 1,000 miles:
When Does Buying Avianca LifeMiles Make Sense?
Thanks to a reasonable award chart and minimal fuel surcharges, LifeMiles is among our favorite airline currencies for premium-class redemptions across the globe. As the currency of Avianca, Colombia's flag carrier, LifeMiles can be used for award bookings on any of the airline's Star Alliance partners. That includes partners with fabulous premium products like Lufthansa, All Nippon Airways, and EVA.
Let's take a look at some of our favorite sweet spots of the program to demonstrate the kind of value possible when buying LifeMiles for 1.29¢ apiece.
Los Angeles — Tokyo in ANA First Class
- Mileage Rate: 90,000 LifeMiles each way ($5.60 taxes from LAX-HND, $49.80 taxes from HND-LAX)
- Typical Cash Price: $17,364 round-trip
- Redemption Rate: 9.6 cents per mile (based on a round-trip)
- Cost to Purchase Necessary Miles (at 1.29¢ each): $1,165 each way
Chicago — Zurich in Swiss Business Class
- Mileage Rate: 63,000 LifeMiles each way ($5.60 taxes from ORD-ZRH, $53.21 taxes from ZRH-ORD)
- Typical Cash Price: $3,202 round-trip
- Redemption Rate: 2.5 cents per mile (based on a round-trip)
- Cost to Purchase Necessary Miles (at 1.29¢ each): $815 each way
Washington D.C. — Dubai in Turkish Business Class
- Mileage Rate: 78,000 LifeMiles ($12.91 taxes from IAD-DXB, $55.04 taxes from DXB-IAD)
- Typical Cash Price: $3,762 round-trip
- Redemption Rate: 2.4 cents per mile (based on a round-trip)
- Cost to Purchase Necessary Miles (at 1.29¢ each): $1,009 each way
Maximize Your Purchase
One of the great things about purchasing LifeMiles is that Avianca processes the transaction directly. This means that point purchases will code as airfare, meaning that the purchase will be eligible for the travel category bonus on many credit cards. Some of the best cards to use would be:
- The Platinum Card® from American Express — 5X Membership Rewards Points (on flights booked directly with airlines)
- Citi Prestige® Card — 5X ThankYou Points
- Chase Sapphire Reserve® — 3X Ultimate Rewards Points
- Citi Premier℠ Card — 3X ThankYou Points
- American Express® Gold Card — 3X Membership Rewards Points (on flights booked directly with airlines)
- Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card — 2X Ultimate Rewards Points
- Earn 60,000 bonus points after you spend $4,000 on purchases in the first 3 months from account opening. That's $750 toward travel when you redeem through Chase Ultimate Rewards®
- 2X points on travel and dining at restaurants worldwide & 1 point per dollar spent on all other purchases.
- Get 25% more value when you redeem for airfare, hotels, car rentals and cruises through Chase Ultimate Rewards. For example, 60,000 points are worth $750 toward travel
- Get unlimited deliveries with a $0 delivery fee and reduced service fees on orders over $12 for a minimum of one year on qualifying food purchases with DashPass, DoorDash's subscription service. Activate by 12/31/21.
- Earn 5X points on Lyft rides through March 2022. That's 3X points in addition to the 2X points you already earn on travel.
- 2X points on travel and dining at restaurants worldwide
- 1X point per dollar spent on all other purchases
Other Ways to Earn Avianca LifeMiles
Perhaps an even cheaper way to grow your collection of LifeMiles is by converting flexible bank currencies. Avianca partners with four of the five major transferrable currencies:
- American Express Membership Rewards Points — 1:1 transfer ratio (transfers process immediately)
- Citi ThankYou Points — 1:1 transfer ratio (transfers process immediately)
- Capital One Miles — 4:3 transfer ratio (transfers process immediately)
- Marriott Bonvoy Points — 3:1 transfer ratio plus a 5,000-mile bonus for every 60,000 Bonvoy points transferred (transfers typically take 21 hours to process)
If you're a devoted Avianca frequent flyer or a hardcore LifeMiles fan, you could also consider applying for an Avianca co-branded credit card. Puerto Rico's Banco Popular offers two co-branded credit cards available to American citizens, and both are currently offering a standard sign-up bonus after completing only one transaction:
- Avianca Vuela Visa® Card — 40,000-mile welcome bonus after first purchase. The card has a $149 annual fee.
- Avianca Vida Visa® Card — 20,000-mile welcome bonus after first purchase. The card comes with a $59 annual fee.
- 40,000 Bonus LifeMiles after first card use
- Earn 3 LifeMiles per $1 spent on Avianca purchases
- Earn 2 LifeMiles per $1 spent at gas stations and grocery stores
- Earn 1 LifeMile per $1 spent on all other purchases
- No foreign transaction fees
- 15% discount on purchases of miles with Multiply Your Miles
- Free additional piece of baggage for travel between the United States and Central America
- A 50% discount on an award ticket redeemed for travel to Central America or Colombia from the United States after $12,000 spent each year
- An additional 50% discount on an award ticket redeemed for travel to Central America or Colombia from the United States after $24,000 spent each year
- 0% Introductory offer for 12 months on Balance Transfers
- You must be an Avianca LifeMiles member to apply
- If you are not already a LifeMiles member, create your account here: www.lifemiles.com
- Chip-enabled card provides added security
- Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver
- Travel Accident Insurance
- Protection against unauthorized charges
- Emergency Card Replacement
- Online Account Management
- Electronic Statements
- Auto-pay option
- 3X LifeMiles per $1 spent on Avianca purchases
- 2X LifeMiles per $1 spent on gas stations & grocery stores
- 1X LifeMile per $1 spent on all other purchases
Final Thoughts
Considering the massive wave of buy miles promotions that have been sweeping the award travel ecosystem lately (including Hyatt, Iberia, Alaska, Hilton, and United), we knew it was only a matter of time before LifeMiles held one too. Avianca has built a devoted following thanks in part to these frequent promotions, and the airline certainly delivered with this best-ever price.
Additionally, the airline has shared with One Mile at a Time that they have no intent to change award rates until at least January 2021. This should quell any reservations one might have that LifeMiles plans to pull a bait-and-switch—selling miles at an unprecedented discount and then quickly devaluing the program.
While it may not be the best time to plan travel, it might be a while before you get a better opportunity to buy LifeMiles at such a discount. If you've got a plan, now's the time to go for it.
Are you going to buy Avianca LifeMiles with a 155% bonus?
The comments on this page are not provided, reviewed, or otherwise approved by the bank advertiser. It is not the bank advertiser's responsibility to ensure all posts and/or questions are answered.
Why on earth are you showing the mileage rates for one-way but the cash price for round trip?
Don’t worry, we were comparing apples and apples! The mileage bookings can be booked as one-ways, so we wanted to show the one-way rates. For the cash fares, the round-trip prices are better than booking one-way. We based the redemption rate calculation off of the round-trip cash price and round-trip miles price. However, I clarified in the post to show how we got to these numbers.
Does it survive while avianca is bankrupt.
And how long does the pandemic will be lasting.
LM have communicated in writing that they will keep the award chart. So not just a promise to OMAAT.
It is too bad that you cannot redeem LH Group first class awards unless you are a top-tier M&M member nowadays.
This seems to be a good deal , my only issue is actually using LM award ticket.
Try booking couple of various flights such as JFK/NRT and you will NOT find a seat in business.
So what good is 150% bonus for?
Create a account and see if award flights are before you spend your money on this cash hungry and almost bankrupt airline.
Remember this is NOT a US carrier so your rights will not be the same as with any American carriers.
Be Smart !
Exactly. A member in the Iberia thread has revealed that he was forced to accept a useless voucher from Iberia that is only good for another 6 months.
As a general rule of thumb: If it’s an amazing deal but you don’t need it = it’s a bad deal.
But if you have an upcoming trip planned, this seems like an amazing deal! Their last promotion was for a 40% bonus ($0.01375 per mile), so this is 6% better than their previous deal!
There are quite a few routes that have good availability.
SFO-PVG Biz from 7/13 almost everyday.
YVR-FRA on LH many dates in July.
I have to agree though, it’s better finding the seat you need before buy the points.
One more thing to note is that some airlines will honor the award tickets even after the issuing airline folded.
I will not risk it, but thanks for sharing your observation.
Good point. Tons of issues with Air Canada lately which makes me not want to deal with foreign carriers.
After purchase, the Expiration date is not extended but still the same .
This is very very strange .
Has the issue been sorted out?
While a seemingly nice bonus at 155%, buying miles from an airline that has filed for bankruptcy seems like a risky move to me.
It is very risky to invest in LifeMiles, here in Brazil Avianca went bankrupt or we lost all points of the AMIGO program. Caution!
It could still be useful for short term redemptions, but do not but these for a long term redemption!
This has always been a program that can definitely be used to advantage but this is just not the right time for me.
Since the best value comes from redemptions for business class flights, the difficulty of finding those seats makes it not such a great deal as it initially seems.
It’s interesting to purchase miles when you don’t have enough from credit card usage and it’s cheaper to complement instead of dealing with the full price ticket. I may be do it when things get better.
I usually don’t buy miles, but I’ll see if it makes sense here!
Are we going to be able to travel soon?
Gracias por la información!
I have no present need for this so I will be passing on this deal.
it’s confirmed Expiration date Jun 30, 2021, 12 m after this purchase.
not bad to extend miles.
I’ve bought the minimum amount: 1000+1550 miles for 33 USD.
This also in order to extend the validity of the miles I have with Aviance LifeMiles.
This is an amazing deal. I can see why it might be a good idea to buy miles even if I’m not traveling. I’m curious on their strategy of the large bonus. Wondering if this will devalue their miles or not.
Avianca applied for bankruptcy.
Do keep in mind that LifeMiles is a separate entity from Avianca the airline. It’s certainly true that the loyalty program could be negatively impacted in the future. It’s probably wise to pass unless you can use the miles in the near future.
It was a good deal sadly I saw late the article… but be aware Avianca’s situation is not ok at all in Brazil and Peru they declared bankruptcy… despite the LifeMiles program is a separate business from the Avianca’s holding it could be drastically impacted in the future.