While it has been possible for a long time to convert Virgin America Elevate points to Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles (and a forced conversion took place at the beginning of the year), there wasn’t anything that could be done with Virgin America Travel Bank credits other than spending them on Virgin America flights. However, there have been fewer and fewer Virgin America flights to spend them on and I was hoping that Alaska would come up with a solution. This has finally happened.
If you log onto your Virgin America account, you can now convert your Travel Bank credits to Alaska. Just click the link:
You will be linked off to a special page where you can enter your account details:
Log in with your Virgin America account (not your Alaska account), and you’ll see the following screen:
All you will need to do then is agree to the terms, and Alaska will email you a credit certificate and PIN. These come in two separate emails, and I got mine almost immediately.
You can either buy a flight using the discount code on the check-out page, or you can add the certificate to “My Wallet” on your Alaska Airlines account (click Deposit a card or certificate). Note that the expiration date is carried over from your Virgin America account to your Alaska account. However, when you add a credit to “My Wallet,” Alaska applies expiring credits before non-expiring credits (such as those received from gift certificates), and by default, it spends them down in expiration order. Do note that if you buy a flight and then cancel it, you will lose the value of the credit.
With the Virgin America mileage program closing for good on February 8th, it’s a nice gesture that Alaska will allow this credit to be usable. It wasn’t clear whether these credits would expire along with Virgin America, and I’m glad that Alaska did the right thing here. That being said, I do recommend moving on this fast, because this opportunity may disappear along with the Virgin America Elevate program.
I’m surprised you’ve been able to get this to work. I’ve been trying daily for the last month and all I get is: Uh-oh. We’re having trouble connecting to Travel Bank right now. Do try again in a few minutes.
I’ve called Alaska (as the twitter team recommends), but they say they know the connectivity between the Travel Bank and Mileage Plan isn’t working.
I get the same message!! It is really irritating. How did you resolve this? I understand that Alaska is not keen on giving away free travel that Virgin gave out but this is a bummer.
I’m a little confused because Alaska automatically combined Virgin and Mileage Plan accounts some time ago. If you’re still having an issue, I recommend calling 1-800-ALASKAAIR for assistance.