Emirates Cash + Miles Sale Provides a Novel Way To Use Miles on Emirates and Flydubai Flights

There’s an interesting offer for using your Emirates Skywards miles toward Emirates and Flydubai flights right now. Rather than searching for award space, you can use your miles like cash to pay for flights.

Even better, your miles are worth more toward business and first class bookings. Here are the details on this Emirates Cash + Miles sale so you can decide if it’s a good option for you.

Emirates Cash + Miles Promotion Details

This new promotion doesn’t require registration, but it only applies to flights on Emirates and Flydubai. Both programs use the Skywards loyalty program, so this makes sense.

That’s because this offer provides a way to redeem your Skywards miles like cash, and the redemption rate varies by which cabin you’re flying in. For those flying in economy or premium economy, you’ll redeem 2,000 Skywards miles for $20 worth of airfare (a redemption value of 1 cent per mile). In business or first class, you’ll redeem 10,000 miles for $200 of airfare (a redemption value of 2 cents per mile).

There are some important rules you need to know about with this Cash + Miles promotion:

• This promotion is open to all Skywards members.
• You must have at least 1 Skywards mile in your account to participate.
• You need to book by September 30, 2024, at 11:59 p.m. Dubai time.
• Valid for travel between September 9 and November 30, 2024.
• All flights in the Emirates and Flydubai network are eligible.
• Must book directly with Emirates or Flydubai using the Cash + Miles payment method.
• Eligible Emirates fares include first, business, premium economy, and these economy fares: Special, Saver, Flex, and Flex Plus.
• Eligible Flydubai fares include business plus these economy fares: Lite, Value, and Flex.

You will earn miles and tier miles for any portion of a ticket paid for with cash.

Is It Worth It?

Should you redeem Skywards miles this way? Let’s look at a redemption in practice.

Consider this flight from New York City (JFK) to Dubai (DXB) that costs $4,314 per person.

Alternatively, you could book that same flight as an award redemption for 138,000 miles plus $838.70 in taxes and fees.

If you use Cash + Miles for this flight, you’d need 215,000 miles to cover $4,300 of airfare, leaving you to pay $14 out of pocket. Alternatively, you could pay 138,000 miles plus $838.70.

Is it worth using 77,000 extra miles to cover the $824.70 difference in the cash portion of the payment? That’s a redemption value of 1.07 cents per mile when considering the difference in cash against the difference in miles required. We value Emirates miles at 1.1 cents apiece, so this isn’t a bad value. It will really come down to whether you’d prefer to pay the extra cash or extra miles.

If you need to boost your Skywards balance, there are several transfer partners you can use. You can transfer Amex Membership Rewards, Bilt Rewards, Brex Rewards, Capital One miles, Chase Ultimate Rewards, Citi ThankYou Points, and Marriott Bonvoy points to Emirates Skywards.

Final Thoughts

Rather than searching for award availability, you can book Emirates and Flydubai flights using Cash + Miles, redeeming your miles like cash against the cost of the ticket. And right now, you can do so at elevated values. The value is best for those flying in business or first class, though some of the value in this offer will come down to whether you’d prefer to pay extra cash (since Skywards tacks on heavy fees for award tickets) or extra miles using the current offer.

If this sounds interesting to you, make sure to book by September 30.