Fly West Coast to India in Business on Qatar Airways for $42.

End of year (November, December) tends to be an extremely popular time for a lot of people to fly to India and I wanted to share a few examples of how one can go about booking the most sought after and popular QSuites for as low as $42 one way. So I’ll get right into it.

Finding Reward Availability

The biggest challenge with using points is actually finding award availability. Qatar Qsuites are the most sought after so the reward seats available are very limited. There are two types of fares: Saver and standard. You want to find and book saver fares as they cost the least points and fees.

American Airlines

Qatar Airways is a OneWorld member and so is AA. AA Also has the best quick scanner calendar tool which allows you to find reward space.

So head over to AA’s website and after logging in (create a free account if you already don’t have one) and enter your From/Two remembering to check the “Redeem Miles” option.

Following that, you will start seeing results for all OneWorld airlines like BA, Qatar. Avoid BA as that connects through London Heathrow and the taxes and fees are really high.

Using the Reward Calendar

Use the Calendar to filter on cabin type and you’ll see all the dates reward tickets are available. Go through them one by one until you find Qatar airways

Booking using AA miles

In this case, both business and economy seats are available on 29 Nov. You’ll notice the taxes and fees are constant and business is 30K more. You can then choose if you want a roundtrip economy for 80K points or one-way business for 70K.

If you have the required AA miles, you can book the flight from the website. This is a saver fare and the best rate you’re gonna get.

Qatar Airways

Now say if you don’t have AA miles but you do have American Express MR Points, Chase UR Points, Capital One Venture miles/points and/or any other credit card that has British Airways (or Qatar) as a transfer partner, you can book the flight directly from Qatar Airways.

Create British Airways Account

You will need to create a BA rewards account so you can use that to link to your Credit Card’s transfer page. Once you have done that, you can transfer a 1000 points to test the connection works. Generally the points are transferred instantly.

Link BA and Qatar Account

Create an account with Qatar and head to LINK to link the two accounts to combine points. You will be made to log into your BA account and complete the setup.

Finding Saver Fares

Using the AA Calendar, we determined which date offered the saver fare. Now, you search for the flight in the Qatar portal and you will see a bubble “Book using Avios”

Now you will see both economy and business class fares are available although costing more in points and taxes than when booking with AA miles. But if you don’t have AA miles, this is your best bet.

After confirming availability, you head back to Qatar//Privilege Club and initiate the transfer from BA to Qatar.

Points transfer instantly and once you have them in your account, you can book your tickets!

The Right Credit Cards

If you don’t have the necessary miles, check out the following cards to enough the points needed for this awesome redemption. Using these links really helps me put out more content like this!