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Japan Airlines (JAL) has announced a devaluation to its JAL Mileage Bank award chart. The coming change will take effect on November 20, 2018; however, don’t wait until the last minute to make an award booking, since the exact deadline is 08:59 Japanese time on November 20, 2018—which is late afternoon/evening on November 19, 2018, in the US.
Key Changes
JAL published the changes to its award pricing in the chart below:
Some awards have gone up, some have stayed the same, and surprisingly some have gone down. The key changes are:
- Trips from 1 to 2,000 miles have been reduced across all fare classes
- Trips from 2,000 to 4,000 miles have increased in Economy but decreased for Premium Economy. Business and First awards have stayed the same
- Trips from 4,000 to 6,000 miles: award prices stay the same across all classes except Premium Economy which sees a reduction
- Trips from 6,000 to 10,000 miles: increases across all classes of travel
- Trips from 10,000 to 14,000 miles: increases across all classes of travel except Economy awards which remain unchanged
- Trips from 14,000 to 25,000 miles: increases across all classes of travel
- Trips from 25,000 to 50,000 miles: no change to award pricing
Effects Of The Changes
The band with the biggest percentage increase is the 6,000 to 8,000-mile range, which is the band for round-trip transatlantic trips with JAL's Oneworld and other partners. This increase will take some of the shine off great redemption options on Air France and American Airlines for trips to Europe.
Although there is a substantial decrease in the award cost for trips in the 1,000 to 2,000-mile range, they still do not represent great value or utility since the initial pre-devaluation cost was high and the distance is too short.
Our Take
It is always disappointing to see a devaluation, especially one that seems squarely aimed at taking away a sweet spot from an award chart. No matter how you look at this change it is disappointing and more negative than positive. Fortunately, JAL has given plenty of warning, so make sure to book before November 20, 2018.
Source: Frequent Miler
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Where does this upcoming devaluation leave us in terms of the best sweetspots for JAL?
its in our list of things to cover.
Sad. I would have expected JAL to be relatively immune to devaluations, considering they aren’t printing miles to shower on credit card holders, at least in North America and Europe.
I don’t have anything with JAL so I don’t have too much to worry about this right now. In the future it’ll probably be different too.
Is it sad that I am thrilled that they let us know? So many times companies do things without telling anyone and now I’m just happy if they let me know.
I should use up the AS miles to book the west coast US to Japan trip…
It just came to me, I do need a flight FRA-IAD in summer…would you think lifetimes is a good source to find award space not as expensive, as regular trips?
What do you mean by lifetimes?
Ouch, quite a hike, but still beats all other FFPs for me on my route.
May have to book an Emirates first class award before the change
This is long overdue unfortunately
This is unfortunate because I have been looking forward to exploring Asia and I had heard about the sweet spots on this Chart. I guess that I am not going to be able to take advantage of the great deals before they go away.
Well this sucks.
I had a plan to use my JL miles next year but now I’m a little screwed. 🙁
What credit cards are the transfer partners? How are the fuel surcharges with JAL?
SPG / Marriott are the only reasonable transfers. YQ is mixed, but in general, they’re not bad — just stay away from Emirates departing from the US.
Kind of a bummer, but at least JAL is giving plenty of notice on these changes. That’s becoming more of a rarity, these days.
Although, I don’t have JAL, this article keeps the fact that the point systems can be adjusted at any time in focus. I tend to use up my miles at a good clip so hopefully I will not be impacted too bad by this when it happens next time for American!
JAL has announced these changes quite in advance and this is very positive.
For the negative changes this is a current trend and I can say that these changes are not truly terrible even though without doubt decrease the value of the programme.
Thanks, this is unfortunate. Are these listed distances round-trip or one way? Are one way awards possible with Mileage Bank?
They’re based on total trip distance. One way, round-trip, or multi-stop.