Last week, Alaska Airlines (AS) completed its acquisition of Virgin America (VX) and announced some of its future plans. Today, the full integration plan for the two airlines’ frequent flyer programs has been released. Let’s take a look at which changes are worth paying attention to.

The Alaska Airlines–Delta partnership is about to end

Just as we expected, competition between Delta and Alaska Airlines has become increasingly intense, and the good old days are clearly not coming back. PR Newswire reported the following changes.

  • Codeshare flights between DL and AS will end completely starting May 1, 2017.
  • Through April 30, 2017, Mileage Plan members and Delta SkyMiles members can still redeem award tickets on each other’s programs, regardless of the actual travel date. However, after that deadline, those award tickets can no longer be changed.
  • If your Delta ticket was purchased before today (December 19), you can choose to credit the flight to Alaska miles no matter when you fly. But if it is purchased today or later, only flights actually flown before May 1, 2017 can be credited to Alaska miles.
  • Starting May 1, 2017, all reciprocal benefits between Mileage Plan and SkyMiles—including priority boarding, free checked bags, and complimentary upgrades—will be eliminated.

Integration of Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles and Virgin America Elevate points

Transfers

Starting January 9, 2017, Elevate points can be transferred to Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan at a 1:1.3 ratio. The transfer appears to be one-way only, meaning you cannot transfer from Mileage Plan back to Elevate. That ratio is fairly reasonable. If you stocked up on Virgin America Elevate points during the recent Membership Rewards transfer promotion, that turned out to be a pretty successful move. If you need Alaska miles now, we recommend transferring from SPG to Virgin America Elevate, which effectively gives you a 1:1.6 transfer ratio into Alaska miles—an excellent deal. By contrast, ThankYou Points transfer to Virgin at a 2:1 ratio, and even after applying the 1:1.3 conversion, it is still not a good value. We do not recommend transferring from TYP.

Fly Virgin America and earn Alaska miles

Starting today, all flights operated by Virgin America can be credited directly to Alaska Mileage Plan! The best part is that earning follows Alaska’s old rules: miles are awarded based on actual flight distance, not ticket price. So if you are flying Virgin America, don’t forget to switch your earning preference to Alaska miles. In almost all cases, crediting to Alaska will be the better deal. The earning chart is below.

Alaska award ticket redemptions: big price cuts for short-haul flights

This may be the most exciting update of them all. Alaska miles have always offered very solid value, and now they have become even more valuable. Domestic award pricing will now also be based on distance. Short-haul U.S. routes under 700 miles will start at just 5,000 miles one-way. Routes like SFO/SJC-SEA/PDX and LAX-SFO will benefit, and even LAX-SEA will see lower pricing in some cases.

Earn Alaska miles by flying partner airlines

On top of that, flying some of Alaska Airlines’ partner carriers, such as Cathay Pacific and Hainan Airlines, will also earn more miles.

Award ticket upgrades

If you are an elite Mileage Plan MVP member, you will now be eligible for upgrades on award tickets, which is a new benefit. Overall, today’s news brings more positives than negatives. If you had doubts about the value of Mileage Plan, this announcement should at least help you feel better for now.