Virgin America Announces End Dates for Its Partnerships
Since the close of the Alaska Airlines-Virgin America merger last year, details about what the future will look like have slowly rolled out. But, we do know that Alaska will discontinue the Virgin America brand as of the beginning of 2018, and the two will become one entity. Now, we have details from Virgin about what it plans to do with its partners.
Today, Virgin America published a page on its site explaining when Elevate members can last earn points with partners, last redeem points with partners and the last day to travel on an award with its partners. Most notably, you'll no longer be able to earn or redeem points with its airline partners — Emirates, Hawaiian, Singapore and Virgin Australia — as of September 30, 2017. The last day to travel on an award with each of those partners comes at the beginning of next year, January 15, 2018.
It's worth noting that Emirates is also a partner of Alaska's Mileage Plan program, so Elevate members will still be able to redeem their points for travel on the Dubai-based airline when the two frequent flyer programs become one. However, the same can't be said for Hawaiian, Singapore and Virgin Australia, all of which aren't partners with Alaska.
Virgin America also announced that it's no longer going to be a transfer partner of Amex Membership Rewards after October 31, 2017. Currently, Virgin America is a 2:1 transfer partner of Amex MR points, which isn't the best of ratios. However, Alaska isn't a transfer partner of Membership Rewards points so that option will be closing altogether.
All of its hotel partnerships will be ending following September 30, 2017. However, Airbnb will be ending in just a couple of weeks — you only have through June 30, 2017 to earn Elevate points with Airbnb.
Keep in mind these partnerships and their end dates going forward if you have a stash of Elevate points and want to make a redemption before it's no longer available. As a reminder, you can transfer your Virgin America Elevate points to Alaska Mileage Plan miles with a 30% bonus.
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