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Virgin Atlantic adds a second daily Johannesburg flight

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Filling the gap left by South African Airways move to drop one of its two daily Jo’burg to Heathrow services from late April, Virgin Atlantic has announced that it is doubling its Johannesburg services from Winter 2018.

Launching on 28th October, the service will use a new Boeing 787-9, assuming Virgin Atlantic still has one that is working properly.

Flying daily, it will leave Heathrow at 16.45 and land in South Africa at 5.40.  This makes it the first Heathrow service of the day to arrive.  Unfortunately for Virgin, the $200m aircraft will then sit on the ground earning nothing for the next 17 hours as the return flight to Heathrow does not leave until 22.20.  It arrives back in Heathrow at 7.30am.

Seats will be bookable from 24th March.  Whilst Virgin does not guarantee to make a certain number of reward seats available per flight, you may have a decent chance of finding something for Christmas or New Year with your Flying Club miles if you jump in early.

To maximise your miles when paying, your best bet is one of the two Virgin Atlantic Reward credit cards.  These earn double miles (3 per £1 on the paid card or 1.5 per £1 on the free card) when you book at virginatlantic.com or via Virgin Holidays.  Another option is American Express Preferred Rewards Gold which offers double points – 2 per £1 – when you book flight tickets directly with an airline.

PS.   If you are wondering what has happened to the 2nd South African Airways landing slot, it has been leased to British Airways for five years.  It is not clear what BA will do with it, but you would imagine that a valuable early morning Heathrow landing slot would end up being used for a North American or Asian service.

How to earn Virgin Points from UK credit cards

How to earn Virgin Points from UK credit cards (April 2024)

As a reminder, there are various ways of earning Virgin Points from UK credit cards.  Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses.

You can choose from two official Virgin Atlantic credit cards (apply here, the Reward+ card has a bonus of 15,000 Virgin Points):

Virgin Atlantic Reward+ Mastercard

15,000 bonus points and 1.5 points for every £1 you spend Read our full review

Virgin Atlantic Reward Mastercard

A generous earning rate for a free card at 0.75 points per £1 Read our full review

You can also earn Virgin Points from various American Express cards – and these have sign-up bonuses too.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold is FREE for a year and comes with 20,000 Membership Rewards points, which convert into 20,000 Virgin Points.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 20,000 points, FREE for a year & four airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express comes with 40,000 Membership Rewards points, which convert into 40,000 Virgin Points.

The Platinum Card from American Express

40,000 bonus points and a huge range of valuable benefits – for a fee Read our full review

Small business owners should consider the two American Express Business cards. Points convert at 1:1 into Virgin Points.

American Express Business Platinum

40,000 points sign-up bonus and an annual £200 Amex Travel credit Read our full review

American Express Business Gold

20,000 points sign-up bonus and FREE for a year Read our full review

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which earn Virgin Points. 

(Want to earn more Virgin Points?  Click here to see our recent articles on Virgin Atlantic and Flying Club and click here for our home page with the latest news on earning and spending other airline and hotel points.)

Category

Virgin Atlantic and Flying Club

Comments (54)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Sam G says:
    16 Mar16 March 04:57

    Early departure from Heathrow is optimised for USA connections. Presumably they will have some heavier maintenance checks and work done there at low cost which will offset the cost somewhat.

    I believe BA had to return a slot to Qantas for their Singapore & Perth flights (as they are now both morning arrivals) so they need the early flight to maintain their current early AM arrivals

    Presumably they’ve now got an afternoon slot but that would be absorbed into their Euro schedule

  • Yuff says:
    16 Mar16 March 06:46

    OT: Anyway have any joy getting the bonus transferring MR points to Iberia. I did a small transfer Tuesday and point arrived in my account yesterday, no bonus showing yet …..

    • JamesB says:
      16 Mar16 March 06:59

      No joy according to several comments in bits yesterday.

      • Roger says:
        16 Mar16 March 07:15

        My transfer also arrived without bonus, but it may still land in another 6/7 days time according to some posts.

        here is hoping!

        • The Original Nick says:
          16 Mar16 March 07:19

          Give it 4-5 days after your transfer hit and you may find the bonus arrives. Rob may have a bit more information on it.

        • JamesB says:
          16 Mar16 March 07:35

          When does the transfer bonus promo end? I could force my PRG sign up bonus early if it is reported to work.

          • Rob says:
            16 Mar16 March 09:22

            31st. Still waiting to see if my test bonus works. Seems to be 5 day delay.

    • Luthar says:
      16 Mar16 March 09:38

      That was me. No problem, I’ve been helped many times by some OT comments in ‘Bits’.

      • Lumma says:
        16 Mar16 March 10:27

        Don’t you need not to be based in the UK for that to work?

      • Luthar says:
        16 Mar16 March 11:10

        I got it to work by changing my address on my Iberia account to a relative in Spain. It also works for addresses in US, Mexico and Argentina (not an exhaustive list).

      • xcalx says:
        16 Mar16 March 11:52

        Thanks again Luthar. Yes Bits sometimes highlights great offers great deals that Rob sometimes decides not to run with. Like the one you mentioned 25% Avios off the already low Iberia reward costs plus low taxes to the Americas and Asia. Too good a deal to pass up on.

        • Rob says:
          16 Mar16 March 12:18

          The problem with this one is the requirement to change your Iberia account address which a) is rule bending and b) if you can’t change it back – remember BA only allows country changes once every 6 months – could mess up your ability to use Combine My Avios or take advantage of other offers.

      • Luthar says:
        16 Mar16 March 12:31

        That makes sense. No comment on a) but for b) I actually had zero avios in my Iberia account and transferred the avios after changing my address so no problems there. Having said that, there might be issues if I tried to transfer them back to BAEC though.

      • xcalx says:
        16 Mar16 March 12:56

        Rob. Not a problem combining Avios from an IB account with a US address to a BA account with a UK address and visa versa I just sent the few hundred back from IB to BA that were left over after transferring from BA to IB to make the booking.

        I thought one had to change addresses for the IB Groupon offers you wrote articles on.

      • Genghis says:
        16 Mar16 March 13:17

        @xcalx even a BA HHA? I normally have to transfer avios to avios.com first and then onto BA so how would changing IB address to US impact this with the avios.com UK address requirement?

      • xcalx says:
        17 Mar17 March 08:10

        @Genghis sorry no idea, I have never had household accounts in any programme

    • Andreas says:
      17 Mar17 March 07:27

      I’m based in Spain so I do qualify for the offer and whenever there is one of these MR to IB+ bonuses, the Bonus payout lands in your IB+ account at the same time as the base Avios, albeit shown in a separate transaction. So if you haven’t seen them yet, there is little hope you will get them…

  • Tom says:
    16 Mar16 March 07:12

    Morning Rob, the aircraft day stop in JNB provides time for scheduled routine maintenance. It’s not a problem, it will be part of the planned maintenance cycle for the fleet.

  • Andrew says:
    16 Mar16 March 07:15

    Shame VS aren’t flying to Cape Town !

    • Ben says:
      16 Mar16 March 10:28

      I never understand why they dont. (im sure someone here may know)

      • Rob says:
        16 Mar16 March 10:38

        I am guessing it is yield – Jo’burg has a lot of business traffic and leisure carriers will (slightly unwillingly) go there and connect to CPT if the price is right. It doesn’t work the other way round.

        • Phill says:
          16 Mar16 March 12:11

          Would it not make sense for virgin to utilse the place and do a joburg to cpt hop and back whilst it is sitting idle! Win all round

          • Rob says:
            16 Mar16 March 12:13

            ‘Fifth freedom’ rules probably do not apply. South Africa probably does not allow foreign airlines to operate domestic services (in the same way the UK does not allow non-EU airlines to operate domestic services).

            It should, admittedly, be able to drop off in JNB and continue to CPT as long as they didn’t pick up any new passengers.

        • Michael Jennings says:
          16 Mar16 March 16:09

          To be pedandic, the fifth freedom gives an airline from country A the right to carry passengers between countries B and C. The right to fly domestic routes in a foreign country is cabotage – sometimes (unofficially) referred to as the eighth freedom.

  • Simon says:
    16 Mar16 March 08:54

    My experience with the Melia Rewards program is mixed, I managed to nominate BA Exec club as my preferred partner programme. However, when looking to transfer my current Melia Reward points into BA Avios, there is no option on the Melia Rewards Site to do so despite them saying you can do this – very frustrating. Have tried to contact them, but with zero success. Anyone else tried to do this?

    • FlyingChris says:
      16 Mar16 March 11:23

      I’ve also come across the same problem (can select as partner, but not to transfer) as keen to transfer mine across to BAEC. Their website is terrible. I’m just waiting to see if the option will eventually be patched in.

  • New Card says:
    16 Mar16 March 09:08

    Big EU261 news – Emirates refused permission to appeal to Supreme Court. Could open floodgates for a lot of claims for missed connections outside EU.

  • Chris says:
    16 Mar16 March 09:30

    I’ve always thought the UK-SA runs to be ripe for investment in a slightly quicker version of subsonic aircraft. Even just 5% more speed might allow immediate turnarounds on this route.

    • Alex says:
      16 Mar16 March 09:46

      Nothing stopping them doing immediate turn around now (KLM does).

      Rather a strong commercial preference from high yield passengers on the route for overnight in both directions. Quicker plane isn’t going to change this.

      • Rob says:
        16 Mar16 March 10:39

        It would benefit South Africa if they took a more relaxed view on open skies. I’m sure more airline would fly there if the aircraft could do a cheeky Jo’burg to Addis Ababa round trip during the day, or even stop in Jo’burg and then be able to sell seats for a Jo’burg to Cape Town tag.

        • Gavin says:
          16 Mar16 March 12:41

          Presumably there would be a need for additional crew resources which might complicate the matter.

  • Liz says:
    16 Mar16 March 09:56

    OT can someone confirm the most up to date Insurance booklet for Amex Platinum. I have one from last year dates May 17. We upgraded our Gold to Plat on 9/2 and despite several requests and promises we have not yet received the Platinum pack with the T&Cs and Insurance info. I can’t find the documents online either.

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