Booking Starlux Airlines
I wanted to share my recent experience booking Starlux Airlines. They are a Taiwanese international airline company headquartered in Taipei. Their first flights launched on January 23, 2020 and expanded to North America in 2023. They are one of the newer international carriers available to us, and haven't received as much attention, so I figured my booking would be of interest. I'll go over how I booked my flights and the seat selection process. Let's dive in!
Starlux Booking Options
Assuming you don't want to book your Starlux Airlines with cash, your options for award flights are a bit limited. They have their own rewards program, called COSMILE, but that isn't useful for most. The option that we will want to focus on is their partnership with Alaska Airlines that started back in April of 2023. When airlines have a partnership it allows you to earn & redeem miles between the two airlines. It also allows you to book connecting flights on a single ticket between the two airlines. That is assuming your award search shows those options of course.
How I Booked My Flight
With the Alaska Partnership, this meant I could use Alaska miles to book a Starlux Airlines flight. Luckily, I had just taken advantage of the Bank of America Alaska Airlines business card welcome offer. Availability has been slim pickings since shortly after the partnership was announced and I had been scouring for a flight back from an Asia trip. I had been looking almost daily and scouting for some other airlines as well.
Funny enough, while on another flight I received a Thrifty Traveler Premium award alert email for Starlux availability. I searched and found Taipei (TPE) to San Francisco (SFO) non stop for 75,000 Alaska Miles and $46. I jumped on the space as quickly as I could, and a few clicks later I had my ticket.
My Experience Choosing Seats
Often times the booking can be easier than figuring out how to choose a seat on partner airlines. When booking a partner airlines award it can sometimes be confusing, or difficult, to figure out where to start.
For Alaska Airlines you need to look under, “My Trips”. Here they provided me with my Alaska Airlines e-ticket number and confirmation code. Additionally, they provided me with a Starlux booking code, which is mighty helpful.
The only misleading information is in the actual Alaska instructions which stated, please visit Starlux Airlines website with a booking confirmation to manage partner seat assignments. However, you will actually have to contact Starlux to choose seats with the current set up.
Figure Out Seat Options Before Chatting
We have some resources on general seat selection tips that may come in handy for your booking. As for my Starlux booking, their website has a great section with seat maps which helps you plan ahead before you reach out. I like how they noted seats with obstructed views as well.
Finding Starlux Chat Can Be Difficult
You will need to chat with Starlux customer service in order to actually select your seat. Even though the website mentions their chat feature all over the place it isn't the easiest to locate. You have to scroll down to the bottom of the page to locate the chat feature. They will give you various chat options for different countries etc. I elected to chat in Taiwan during their business hours since I figured this would be most productive. Once you click on that you will enter your information and be put in a queue.
Booking Starlux Airlines With Alaska Miles: ToP Thoughts
My experience booking Starlux Airlines with Alaska miles was a fairly smooth process over all. The most difficult part of the process was selecting my seats. Hopefully my lessons learned will help you when it is your turn. I love having another option to Asia, and is a good use of Alaska Airlines miles. Maybe it will be what you use your Bilt Rewards points for, since Alaska is their newest transfer partner.
Have you booked Starlux yet? Let us know over in our Facebook Group your thoughts.
