I believe (at least as of 2011) that if you redeem mileage it doesn’t include airport taxes and such, and they can be rather significant. So say if you fly to Amsterdam from TPE, your ticket price might be something like 20,000NT (for a round trip) but the airport taxes and such would balloon that to their normal ticket price of around 40,000NT or so.
So you think you’re getting a “deal” buying air miles to fly to Narita but you are still paying because you’d have to pay the airport fees for both TPE and NRT (this fee is paid for every transfer you make by the way), and it would be a fairly significant portion of the ticket price, so free flights using miles just means a significant discount, not free.
Tax
The award ticket holder is responsible for all taxes and surcharges. >(payable by credit card or cash only)
So yes, if you redeem air miles, you’re still responsible for taxes and surcharge. Those must be paid with money, and they can often be more expensive than the base fare.
Spent 17.5k EVA points for one-way economy but had to pay NT$1,500 in taxes and fees. Ended up being the same total price as if I had paid cash to begin with.
Best to use the miles for upgrades. Some countries have a larger tax % on business class compared to economy. Not sure if you still need to pay tax/fees in cash.
Yea, felt the miles to be useless and I can see why. Airlines basically have razor thin margin so they got every incentive to take your miles and still have you pay about the same as if you had paid cash.
Upgrades cost the company less because if they got a few unsold business class seats, well they can afford to give that for a few customers in exchange for miles while they can then sell the same economy seat to someone else.
depends, for economy class likely yes, best for upgrade, but for full business redemptions, like the flight to LHR lined up in May, paid 500 quid for a round trip in business class. Taxes out of the UK are crazy
redeemed on BR, so the TPEBKKLHR. It kinda sucks since old airplane with old J seat (777-300ER), but I do like the BKK refuelling and geezers pickup stop, always in the mood for a super quick mango sticky rice and coconut water stop at the lovely BR BKK lounge.