Stealth Mode 101: Asia Miles Cancels & Refunds Miles Without Notice
Imagine my surprise when Asia Miles cancels & refunds my award bookings without even sending me a notification. To be clear: I wanted these flights to be canceled, and this is a good thing. I’m just a bit surprised they didn’t tell me about it at all. Here’s what happened.
Our Bookings
We had flights on Cathay Pacific to fly business class through Hong Kong and then to Dubai. These were part of our ill-fated plan to go to the Tokyo 2020 Olympics. We booked using Asia Miles and used 45,000 Asia Miles each for these one-way bookings to Dubai.
Once the Olympics were postponed to 2021, I wanted to cancel these flights. I didn’t want to rebook, since our dates for 2021 (plus life plans) are totally a mystery at this point. I’d prefer to get my miles back and then make a new booking later. However, since the flights weren’t canceled, I waited. I didn’t want to pay a cancelation fee. That fee is $120 each.
“The Olympics got postponed” wasn’t going to get us out of the fee, to be honest. With the Coronavirus situation, I figured these flights would be canceled at some point. If not, we might be prohibited from entering Japan, Hong Kong, or Dubai, and that would give us a path to canceling the flights for free.
Flight Cancellation Email
On June 1, I received an email from Cathay Pacific stating that our flights had been canceled. It gave me a link to fill out a form with several options. Those options were to receive a voucher, apply for a refund, or to change the flight dates. I chose “refund”, since there was no option that said anything about award bookings or miles & points.
What’s Next?
I did not receive any email confirmation confirming my submission. All I saw was a “thank you” on the screen, which disappeared before I realized I should take a screen shot. I sent a direct message to Asia Miles on Twitter asking for an estimate of how long this typically takes and gave them my booking reference number. They didn’t answer my question.
Imagine my surprise to get a notification from Award Wallet on June 4 that my Asia Miles account balance went up 90,000 miles. 3 days. I hadn’t expected that. That’s a good amount of time. What surprises me is that I haven’t received any notification from Asia Miles or Cathay Pacific. No email or call told me that the ticket was canceled and finalized. No communication told me that the miles went back to my account. I assume the taxes are being refunded, but they haven’t hit my credit card yet.
Final Thoughts
I’m glad to see the miles came back so quickly. I’m surprised it went that fast, to be honest. The real surprise is that no one told me. If Award Wallet hadn’t notified me, I have no idea when I might have realized the miles were refunded already. If you’ve canceled an award booking that doesn’t include an automatic re-deposit of miles, and you’re waiting for the miles to come back, I guess there’s a lesson here. Don’t wait on a confirmation from the award program, because you might not get one. Check for yourself. I’m happy this went so quickly. I’m also amused at the fact it didn’t come with a notification.
Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer: I’m looking at you to stop dragging your feet now and finish my last cancellation from this trip.
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