The ultimate guide to searching for and booking award tickets with Air France and KLM

One of the questions I have been asked a lot lately is how to look for award tickets in the Flying Blue program, that is, using the points accumulated with Air France and KLM. A first step certainly is feasible through Seatspy, a tool that allows you to check seat availability for a number of airlines without having to log on to individual sites. Alternatively, it is possible to go directly to the Air France and KLM sites.

Things to know about the Flying Blue program

Air France and KLM are founding members of Skyteam, the aviation alliance that, together with Delta, Korean, Ita Airways and will also soon welcome Virgin Atlantic with open arms. This means that by using FB points you can book an award ticket with all these companies, and by flying for a fee in these companies you can Accumulate Fb points and XP points in the Flying Blue program.

One of the most interesting features of Flying Blue are the monthly offers to travel while spending less points on the two airlines' network. Offers come out every first of the month, and often there are real gems, such as the chance to fly in North America in business at 28k points o to the Caribbean with 34k. To date, the best proposal I can remember was the possibility of flying to Papeete, Polynesia, by only 44k points.

In addition to this the fact that in Italy it is possible to accumulate FB points using Mooncard credit cards and transferring points from American Express through the membership rewards program.

Aboard the world's most exclusive first-class cabin. My experience in Air France's La Premiere

What to know about Flying Blue award tickets

The first interesting thing is that the approach flight from Italy to Paris/Amsterdam is free of charge, that is, it does not affect the final price of the award ticket compared to the same booking from CDG or AMS. There will only be a slight difference in the cost of taxes and surcharges.

Speaking of surcharges to award tickets, Flying Blue is not among the cheapest, but neither is it among the most exorbitant programs. What you need to know is that the system does not use a fixed award table, but dynamic pricing. This means that you can find a ticket to JFK from Linate at 55k points, to Japan at 70k or the same ticket even at 700k thousand. The minimum cost in economy from Italy to New York is 11,250 points plus tax.

In addition, the program is very generous in terms of available award places and sometimes there are even more than 4 seats on the same flight. Award tickets are cancelable with a 50€ penalty fee. In this case the points are returned and you will have to pay precisely the penalty.

How to search for award tickets with Flying Blue

As mentioned, certainly SeatSpy is a help, otherwise just log into your account and search directly from the home page for the desired route.

Simply select the willingness to book with miles and enter the basic information: passengers, route, dates and class of travel. For La Premiere, that is first class, there are, however, restrictions related to the status possessed in the program.

If you are on the hunt for the best price you can set your travel dates and then scroll through the calendar day by day.

Or you can access the monthly calendar and browse month by month looking for the best price. To get access to the calendar, simply do the same search but without entering travel dates. Doing so will give you access to the summary screen that will show the best fare for each day in the calendar.

The new map for finding award tickets

Since a few days on the program website has been activated a new and useful map To hunt for prize tickets.

The table to know the minimum cost of award tickets

As we said FB has dynamic pricing for award tickets, now with a maximum transparency operation on the site is A series of tables has been published which summarize, for each class, the average cost of routes net of monthly promotions that discount the rates of even the 50%.

The family program

A program designed for families was also launched in early 2022. which allows for the 25% discount when booking an award ticket for a child, and most importantly, allows points to be accumulated between two adults and 6 children.

The gem of the program is that the points of minors enrolled in the program never expire until they turn 18, so perfect for giving the gift of a dream trip for an 18th birthday.

The offers to buy points

Often there are promotions that allow you to buy points bonus up to 120%, sometimes this strategy pays off:

1. Search for the award ticket, compare the cash price with the price using points
2. If it is convenient and buy the points to book the ticket.
3. Of course keep in mind that an award ticket does not accumulate either FB points let alone XP points for status.

In conclusion

FB is definitely one of the most interesting programs for Italian travelers, although to be perfect it would lack a personal credit card in addition to the Mooncard to accumulate points with daily spending. Maybe it will come sooner or later and we will tell about it.

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