In what is hopefully a temporary glitch, Virgin Atlantic’s Flying Club program cannot currently access award seats operated by Air France or KLM in any class.
Previously, flights operated by these two SkyTeam partner airlines were a great use of Virgin points, with business-class flights to cross the Atlantic priced from as low as 47,500 miles without the eye-watering carrier-imposed surcharges the Flying Club program levies on flights operated by Virgin Atlantic and now Delta Air Lines.
Related: Private suites and high-tech touches: What it’s like flying Air France’s new business class
When viewing the Air France or KLM page on the Flying Club website, a warning banner shows a disclaimer that the seats are unavailable online and through the Flying Club call center.
Searching for cash flights operated by Air France or KLM on Virgin’s website returns an error, though codeshare flights operated by these airlines with “VS” flight numbers are available to book.
TPG spoke with Flying Club hoping to obtain further information about the reason for the outage and perhaps a specific date the seats are expected to return.
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Virgin Atlantic was only able to tell us the same as the disclaimer on the website:
Due to a system issue, customers are currently unable to book Air France/KLM seats with their Virgin Points. We’d like to sincerely apologise for any inconvenience caused and our teams are working hard to fix this issue. We expect bookings to be available again at the start of August.
Related: Is KLM premium economy worth it on the 787 Dreamliner?
We hope this restriction is temporary and the award seats will return in a few weeks, as the Flying Club program promised. We will keep you updated as and when the glitch is solved.
Luckily, if you want to book Air France-KLM flights, Flying Blue is a transfer partner of every major credit card rewards program, including American Express Membership Rewards, Bilt Rewards, Capital One, Chase Ultimate Rewards, Citi ThankYou Rewards and Wells Fargo Rewards. Plus, with Flying Blue’s monthly Promo Rewards deals, you can find economy flights from major U.S. cities to Europe for just 15,000 miles.
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Editorial disclaimer: Opinions expressed here are the author’s alone, not those of any bank, credit card issuer, airline or hotel chain, and have not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of these entities.
