Air France/KLM to Istanbul from $1,750 with Amex Offer
Hello from Malaysia! It's my first visit to Southeast Asia since late 2019 and I couldn't be happier to be back. Of course, I'm still keeping an eye on fare deals and award space!
A great Amex Offer that offers a $300 credit on premium cabin bookings expires in two weeks, so I wanted to flag a solid business class fare deal to Istanbul.
The Amex Offer provides $300 back if you spend $1,000+ on a premium cabin flight booked via the Amex International Airline Program (IAP).
Now, let's get into it!
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Straight To The Points
Routes: DEN/IAD/IAH/ORD/SFO-IST
Operating airline: Air France, KLM
Class of service: Business class
Dates: July 2022 - April 2023
Seats available: 4+
Cabin layout: Varies
Book with (per person, round-trip from Chicago):
- Amex International Airline Program (IAP): From $2,050
- $300 off via Amex Offer (add the offer first!)
- Amex Business Platinum (35% rebate): From 133,261 points
- Chase Sapphire Reserve: From 141,558 points
- Delta:
- ORD: From $2,138
- IAD: From $2,140
- SFO/IAH: From $2,240
- DEN: From $2,150 (April 2023)
Google Flights Link
Don't forget to let me know if you book and how you did it!
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DISCLAIMER: Please be aware that the COVID-19 situation and the resulting travel restrictions could prevent you from traveling. Additionally, please make sure you understand the cancellation and change fees before booking.
Travel Restrictions and Requirements
With travel restrictions changing by the day, please take a look at the US embassy site for your destination. Here's a link to the Turkey to get you started.
Flight Experience
Personally, I love KLM but the cabin layout varies by aircraft. The best KLM experience will be on a Boeing 787-9 or 787-10. On Air France, the Airbus A350 and Boeing 777 both offer nice business class cabins.
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Best Ways To Book
The key to getting the fare down to $1,750 is the Amex Platinum or Business Platinum which both have access to the Amex International Airline Program (IAP) premium cabin discounts. Naturally, a Centurion card would work too.
Assuming you have one of the cards, make sure you've added the Amex Offer for $300 off $1,000+ spent on an Amex Travel IAP booking.
If you prefer to book with points, the Amex Business Platinum's 35% rebate will get the rate down to 133,261 points. With the Sapphire Reserve, you can book with 142,678 points.
For context, the best round-trip award rate on this route at the moment is 113,000 Flying Blue miles + ~$470 taxes/fees.
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Where To Credit The Flights
This fare is marketed by Delta and falls under the Z fare class You can use Where To Credit to check which options would earn the most redeemable miles or help you earn elite status.
For those who just want earn redeemable miles, I think your best options are Flying Blue or Virgin Atlantic as you can supplement with several transferable points programs.
Use GCMap to check the flight distance and calculate redeemable miles.
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Bottom Line
With the current state of cash tickets, this is a nice option to book business class to Istanbul. Even better, you'll earn some redeemable miles on the ticket.
Happy booking!
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