Sweet Spot Sunday: How to fly to Israel in business class for just 55,250 points

Iberia is Spain’s leading airline and has an extremely valuable loyalty program called Iberia Plus.

One of the program’s best sweet spots is the ability to fly between the east coast and Israel for as little as possible:

• 28,000 Iberia Avios in Economy Class.
• 55,250 Iberia Avios in Business Class.

For guidance, here is what other airlines (usually) charge to reach Israel from the US:

• American Airlines: 40,000 miles in Economy Class, 70,000 miles in Business Class.
• Delta: From 37,500 miles in Economy Class and 130,000 miles in Business Class on partner airlines.
• United Airlines: 42,500 miles in Economy Class and 75,000 miles in Business Class.

Admittedly, Iberia doesn’t offer as many free award seats for these low prices compared to other airlines. But if you can plan your vacation around Iberia’s availability, you could easily save 30,000 miles round-trip.

Let’s take a look at this excellent offer.

Why it’s special

TPG reviews estimate that Avios are worth 1.5 cents on average. But when you book Iberia Business Class, you’re sure to get exponentially more value.

Here’s a quick look at the award price for a round-trip flight between New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) and Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport (TLV) in early March. As you can see, the flights cost 110,500 Avios and a pesky $366 in taxes and fees.

However, the exact same flights would cost $4,528 in cash. That means you’re getting value of more than 3.76 cents per point – 2.5 times the amount TPG estimated.

As you can see above, Iberia’s website allows you to split your payment between cash and Avios if you want to renew your awards. The more cash preferred with your payment, the more value you get back from your points. For example, with the above flight you can pay:

• 93,900 Avios, equivalent to 4.09 cents per point.
• 55,300 Avios, equivalent to 5.73 cents per point.
• 22,100 Avios, equivalent to 11.28 cents per point.

Related: Use Iberia Avios to create your own cheap business class fares to Europe

How to book this award

Step 1. Search for award flights

To search for award flights with Iberia, you must first log into your account. You can then enter your flight details and desired airports.

There are two pieces of information you need to know before you start searching:

1. These super low fares only apply to flights from the following East Coast cities:

• Boston’s Logan International Airport (BOS).
• New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK).
• Dulles International Airport (IAD) in Washington, DC.
• Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport (ORD).

1. These prices apply to off-peak days only. Here you can find Iberia’s low season (most of the year is low season).

Step 2. Find flights operated by Iberia

Iberia usually offers a pretty decent inventory of award flights, thanks to the airline’s partnerships with British Airways, American Airlines, Royal Jordanian, and other Oneworld airlines. However, you only get the lowest price if you fly the entire journey with Iberia. Be sure to find and book routes operated by Iberia.

Step 3. Choose your cabin

Again, you get the most for your Avios when you book Business Class. But 28,000 Avios in Economy Class to the Middle East is also a real bargain. If you decide to fly Economy, make sure you select Blue Class for all legs of your journey to get the best price.

Related: See how TPG flies all 3 Iberia cabins on the same flight

How to collect points for this award

There are a handful of ways to easily earn Iberia Avios points.

Perhaps the most obvious way is to open it Iberia Visa Signature® card. This card includes a sign-up bonus of up to 100,000 Avios:

• 75,000 Avios after spending $5,000 on purchases within the first three months of account opening.
• An additional 25,000 Avios after spending $20,000 in the first 12 months of account opening.

You can also transfer Avios from British Airways and Aer Lingus to Iberia. Each airline has its own Chase co-branded credit card with a similar offering to the Iberia Visa Signature Card.

In addition, Qatar Airways Privilege Club is a transfer partner of Citi ThankYou Points. The program also uses Avios as a loyalty currency. So if you have ThankYou points you can transfer them to Qatar and then on to Iberia.

You can even transfer Qatar Airways Avios to Iberia by transferring them to British Airways first. This will unlock the ability to convert Capital One miles into Iberia Avios as British Airways is a transfer partner of Capital One. In other words, you can open the following cards to quickly collect Iberia Avios:

Finally, Iberia is a transfer partner of American Express Membership Rewards (1:1) and Chase Ultimate Rewards (1:1). You can earn these points by opening:

Related: How (and why) you should earn transferrable points

bottom line

You can fly from the United States to Israel for just 28,000 Iberia Avios Economy Class and 55,250 Iberia Avios Business Class. That’s a lot of distance for relatively few points.

However, you must fly during off-peak hours from select East Coast cities. And to get the best price, you must also fly on Iberia-operated flights that connect via Madrid. If that’s not a big deal for you, this is an excellent deal.