I thought I’d found an Upper Class sweet spot for Virgin Points, but I was wrong

As regular readers will know, the move to ‘dynamic pricing’ for Virgin Flying Club flight rewards seems to have been cover for slashing the number of reward seats available – if you use the definition of ‘available’ as ‘priced at a level you would want to pay’.

We published a lengthy analysis of dynamic pricing here.

Based on Heathrow departures, the ONLY routes where you have a fair chance of finding Upper Class Saver seats (ie sensibly priced ones) are New York, Washington, Bangalore, Boston, Mumbai and Riyadh.

Even then, the need to find a return date at Saver level which matches your outbound means that you still have no guarantee of being able to book.

The situation has actually got worse since we did our analysis. As of yesterday lunchtime, the number of days with Upper Class Saver seats to Las Vegas for the whole of 2025 is five, for example.

And, of course, even if you book one of those five outbound dates, the chance of finding an inbound seat is equally slim.

However, I thought I had found a sweet spot

A reader flagged that there is a huge amount of Upper Class Saver availability between Manchester and Atlanta.

We didn’t look at Manchester departures when doing our initial analysis – scraping the pricing data for the Heathrow routes took long enough – so this one slipped through.

The key thing about Atlanta is that it is the base of Delta Air Lines, Virgin Atlantic’s 49% shareholder. Even if you don’t want to go to Atlanta itself, you will have no problem picking up a connection to pretty much anywhere in North America on Delta for cash or Virgin Points.

The reader was correct. Here are the number of dates with Upper Class Saver seats priced at 29,000 to 39,000 Virgin Points outbound:

• January – 8
• February – 15
• March – 10
• April – 7
• May – 13
• June – 6
• July – 0
• August – 10
• September – 13
• October – 13

Seats for the latter half of November and December 2025 are not yet bookable.

For most of the year, it’s looking pretty good. There are actually MORE Saver dates than indicated above, because I have only flagged dates priced at the lowest levels of Saver pricing. The majority of the dates indicated above are at the lowest 29,000 points level and if you are willing to pay 47,000 points each way there are LOTS more dates.

And yet, and yet ….

It seemed too good to be true, and of course it was.

It is VERY easy to get from Manchester to Atlanta for 29,000 Virgin Points in Upper Class, one way.

Tough luck trying to get home though.

Perhaps foolishly, I assumed that if availability was relatively open flying TO Atlanta, it should be relatively open in the opposite direction.

More fool me.

These are the number of dates with Upper Class Saver seats priced between 29,000 and 39,000 Virgin Points flying from Atlanta TO Manchester:

• January – 2
• February – 2
• March – 0
• April – 0
• May – 0
• June – 0
• July – 0
• August – 0
• September – 0
• October – 0

It’s makes no sense

How can demand from Manchester TO Atlanta in Upper Class be so low that there are almost 100 days next year when you can fly at the ‘lowest of the low’ price of 29,000 to 39,000 Virgin Points one way, but only FOUR days in the entire year when you can fly back?

Obviously the fact that it’s a day flight outbound and a night flight inbound accounts for part of this – some travellers may only want to pay for Upper overnight – but is the difference so huge to effectively wipe out the lowest level of Saver availability?

To be fair, there are a handful of dates (25) where the return flight from Atlanta to Manchester is priced at 40,000 to 50,000 Virgin Points – it’s just that you never see them at the lowest price level. This means that, combined with a 29,000 to 39,000 points outbound flight, you can still do the return trip for under 90,000 points. This isn’t a bargain compared to the pre-changes pricing though.

Conclusion

I thought we’d finally found a small chink of daylight in the new Virgin Atlantic reward pricing chart. I was wrong.

We will keep digging on your behalf though. And, of course, there are a fair number of Upper Class Saver seats on Heathrow to New York, Washington, Bangalore, Boston, Mumbai and Riyadh – at least outbound.

PS. If you are not a regular Head for Points visitor, why not sign up for our FREE weekly or daily newsletters? They are full of the latest Avios, airline, hotel and credit card points news and will help you travel better. To join our 65,000 free subscribers, click the button below or visit this page of the site to find out more. Thank you.

---

How to earn Virgin Points from UK credit cards (April 2025)

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 18,000 Virgin Points and the free card has a bonus of 3,000 Virgin Points):

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.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on the ‘free for a year’ American Express Preferred Rewards Gold card is increased from 20,000 Membership Rewards points to 30,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (30,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

The Platinum Card from American Express comes with 50,000 Membership Rewards points, which convert into 50,000 Virgin Points.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on American Express Platinum is increased from 50,000 Membership Rewards points to a huge 80,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (80,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

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

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