Award Success: Gol Smiles Award On Korean Air Business Class Vancouver-Seoul-Bangkok

In our popular series Award Success where we feature awards with extraordinary value we showcase a GOL Smiles redemption today that allowed a great Business Class ticket on Korean Air.

This time I redeemed two separate tickets on GOL, operated by Korean Air: Vancouver to Seoul and a week later Seoul to Bangkok.

Korean Air redemptions on GOL Smiles sometimes follow a strange availability as often there are several months where no awards are available and then suddenly they are back.

I’m enrolled in ClubeSmiles which is a monthly subscription/membership that helps me collect 10,000 miles per month for 300 Real (~ $70) which is a pretty good value.

This time I needed two flights back to Asia after a cruise that ended in Vancouver and I used my Gol Smiles balance for the following routes:

• Vancouver to Seoul – Korean Air Business Class 87,000 Gol Smiles
• Seoul to Bangkok – Korean Air Business Class 7,000 Gol Smiles + $210 cash supplement

These two flights are 2 out of 4 award tickets booked with GOL Smiles this year:

The value is still pretty amazing with GOL Smiles at least when it comes to Korean Air and Qatar Airways in Business Class. Only the availability is sometimes an issue however this hasn’t been popping up so far during this year (2019).

Another benefit was that Korean Air used aircraft that had a First Class cabin but only sold Business Class so it was possible to select the First Class cabin on both flights.

The best was Seoul to Bangkok operated by a Boeing 777:

Conclusion

I haven’t flown Korean Air long haul for a long time and was pretty impressed with both flights as far as service and food and beverage is concerned. The quality of the main course was very good on both flights.

I’m glad I kept holding onto Gol Smiles as a side program where I keep buying miles when they have a good promotion that allows you to acquire them for a very low price. Keep in mind though that GOL Smiles now requires each member to hold a Brazilian tax identification number which can be obtained through a Brazilian embassy with a little bit of paperwork.