If you hoard Citi ThankYou points, there's a fresh reason to pay attention. Between September 20 and October 24, 2026, Citi is running a 25% transfer bonus to Avianca Lifemiles, its Star Alliance partner programme. Normally points move across at 1:1 in 1,000-point chunks; with the promo, every 1,000 Citi points becomes 1,250 Lifemiles.
So what are Lifemiles actually good for? Avianca sits in Star Alliance, which means you can spend the miles on flights with United, Lufthansa, Singapore Airlines, ANA, Thai and the rest of the alliance — and crucially, without fuel surcharges. That last part is the real selling point: booking a business class seat on a partner airline can cost dramatically fewer miles and none of the painful cash add-ons you'd face through some other programmes. Occasional first class redemptions exist too, though they're rare.
The catch, and it's a real one, is availability. Lifemiles doesn't always see the same award seats that other Star Alliance programmes can access — sometimes it's worse, occasionally it's better. That means a cheap-sounding redemption is only cheap if the seat actually shows up for your dates.
The sensible move before moving any points: run some dummy searches first. Search the routes and dates you actually want, confirm the award space appears on the Lifemiles site, and only then pull the trigger on a transfer. Points moving into Lifemiles generally can't be moved back out, so going in blind is how people end up stuck with miles they can't use. It's also worth noting that these bonus events to Lifemiles pop up regularly across most transferable currencies, so if you're not ready to book now, another window will likely come around.
If you do want to play, Citi makes the points easy to gather. Cards like the Citi Strata Premier and Citi Strata Elite earn ThankYou points, and you can pool balances across cards before transferring.
Who is this for? Anyone with a specific Star Alliance premium cabin redemption already in mind — say business class to Europe or Asia on a partner airline. With the 25% boost, the effective cost per seat drops noticeably, which can make a flat-bed flight for the price of economy genuinely achievable. If you have no trip in mind, treat the bonus as a reason to start searching, not to transfer speculatively. The maths only works when the seat exists.
