One of TPG’s favorite points and miles’ best sweet spots just got harder to book. It appears that Virgin Atlantic Flying Club no longer has access to last-minute All Nippon Airways business- and first-class award seats.
Redeeming your Virgin Atlantic points for business- and first-class flights operated by Japanese carrier ANA has long been one of the best ways to use them. Virgin is a transfer partner of all major credit card programs (except Wells Fargo Rewards), making it easy to earn Virgin Points.
One-way ANA award redemptions made with Virgin Points can be booked as follows:
- Hawaii to Japan for 37,500 Virgin Points in Business Class or 57,500 Points in First Class
- Western US to Japan for 52,500 Virgin Points in Business Class or 72,500 points in First Class
- 60,000 Virgin Points in Business Class or 85,000 points in First Class from the Eastern US (as well as Europe) to Japan
While TPG found award redemptions available in 2025, last-minute award availability was non-existent.
RELATED: What First Class Feels Like: Flying ANA The Room Business Class from LA to Tokyo
Is ANA Limiting Premium Cabin Award Availability with Virgin Atlantic?
Availability on ANA through partner airline programs is always very limited, with some award seats released when the schedule opens up to 12 months in advance and last-minute seats usually being released reliably additional 14 days in advance.
While Virgin’s Flying Club website has never allowed you to book ANA awards online, you can book these tickets by phone if you find seats available. An easy way to check if a seat is available is through other partner airline programs, such as United MileagePlus, where you can also book ANA award seats, albeit at a much higher price than what Flying Club charges.
United’s online platform follows general ANA availability trends, with some premium seats available through the end of the schedule in 2025.
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There is also some availability for last minute flights in the next 14 days.
Virgin Atlantic generally has the same (or similar) access to United’s ANA award availability. TPG contacted Virgin Atlantic Flying Club to inquire about premium cabin ANA award booking availability as seen on United’s website.
Availability in multiple flight searches checked for us between North America and Japan by Flying Club returned similar results. While Virgin could view and book business- and first-class seats for flights departing in 2025, for flights departing in the next 14 days, only economy seats were available to book with Virgin Points. This is unusual because award availability to partner airlines is usually highest during this 14-day period.
Plus, business- and first-class seats are available on the same ANA flights through other partner airline programs like United (because here we found availability to ask Flying Club to check).
In each case, Flying Club was required to request the seats from ANA, which TPG believes is limiting award availability to Flying Club rather than blocking ANA Virgin Atlantic members from booking ANA seats.
TPG has reached out to Virgin Atlantic Flying Club for official comment about the ban.
“We can confirm that there has been no change in our ANA availability and premium seats are part of our offering,” the official said. “We are investigating the issue with our partners and will provide further details in due course.”
Despite some small depreciation of the ANA redemption rate through the Virgin Atlantic Flying Club program over the past 18 months, perhaps the rates are still too low to be sustainable. This may have led to overbooking of ANA seats by Flying Club members, resulting in ANA deciding to make fewer seats available to Flying Club members than other partner programs.
Hopefully, this is a temporary problem. TPG will update you as the situation unfolds.
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