The 2023 Rugby World Cup will be the tenth edition of the quadrennial world championship for rugby union national teams. This will be a major sports event, so affordable flights will be harder to find. Thankfully, points can help soften the blow.
It will be entirely held in France from September 8 to October 28, 2023, in nine different venues nationwide. The focus of the strategy to score affordable flights to attend the event will be to find flights to France, yes, but not exclusively, as many cities in Europe can serve as an entryway. Indeed, after reaching the old continent, you can easily make your way to your location by bus, train or with a low-cost carrier.
Starting by using Google Flights explore’s feature, we can quickly view the price range for flights from Montreal to Europe during October, when the finals of the Rugby World Cup will be held.
The cheapest flight seems to be to London with Air Transat compared to direct flights to Paris with Air Canada or Air France.
Then, you can evaluate different transportation methods to your venue and see if the add-up costs are worth splitting or if it’s more economical and less of a hassle to fly directly to your destination.
Remember, with a travel rewards program like Scene+, you can redeem your points on any travel purchase charged to your card like the Scotiabank Passport Visa Infinite* Card!
Here are a few examples:
There are a lot of Travel Rewards programs that will give you a statement credit when you redeem their points on flights or other travel expenses:
Therefore, you can book what you want freely and employ the points to cover the cost.
When using a gateway like this, you can either leave right away for your Rugby World Cup venue or choose to make the most of this opportunity by visiting another fantastic city such as London, Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Rome, etc.
For economy flights to Europe, Aeroplan is not always the best way to maximize the value of your points. However, it will constantly depend on the cash fare of a similar ticket and how easily you can earn them.
Indeed, I regularly calculate the worth of my Aeroplan points to know if it’s a fair redemption or not. But if you do not have additional future short-term use in mind, it may be a good idea to redeem them before they devaluate. Since some cards, such as the TD® Aeroplan® Visa Infinite* Card gives a lot of points, it’s a quick solution to get affordable flights to attend the Rugby World Cup!
Air Canada announced many new routes, such as Copenhagen, Madrid, and Amsterdam, from Montreal and will increase the frequency of some of their other flights, such as Rome. More destinations mean more availability to reach Europe!
At the time of writing, the cheapest Aeroplan flights for the Rugby World Cup are towards Toulouse, a secondary airport in France; it’s a known trick to aim for these smaller airports as compared to a big hub like Paris when you want to look for affordable fares, especially during a peak period or a big event.
The prices are great whether you wish to fly in economy or business class.
With Flying Blue, you can easily find affordable flights from 15,000 miles in economy still during the Rugby World Cup’s time, and with some occasional Promo Rewards, you can even find them at half-price.
As Paris is Air France’s main hub, you won’t have any trouble searching for flights. However, if you cannot locate seats at that price, look for secondary airports in France or other central destinations such as Amsterdam.
In Canada, you can get Flying Blue miles with American Express Membership Rewards credit cards. The transfer ratio is 1:0,75, meaning you need 20,000 Membership Rewards for a 15,000 miles flight.
British Airways Executive Club is also a great program to find affordable flights to Europe for the Rugby World Cup. What is wonderful about it is that flights from Montreal to London during their off-peak dates are priced at 50,000 Avios + $200 in taxes.
Then, you can add another segment to France for a supplemental number of points or take one of the many alternate methods of transport to get to your final destination.
Here are some credit card that allows the earning of Avios:
As we can see, there are various ways you can employ points to get cheap flights to Europe to attend the Rugby World Cup. How to choose which program to turn to then?
It will depend mainly on the following:
Therefore, the most valuable points are Membership Rewards because they can be used as Travel Rewards or cashback and transferred to Aeroplan, Flying Blue and Avios. Armed with a handful of Membership Rewards points, you can easily book flights to the Rugby World Cup without breaking the bank.
And if you want another flexible program, you can look at Scene+ with the Scotiabank Passport Visa Infinite* Card or the Scotiabank Gold American Express Card. Both cards will be great to use during the Rugby World Cup, as they have no foreign transaction fee!
Remember, you can also mix and match programs depending on the award availability and price. Indeed, your outbound flight could be with Aeroplan, and the return could be with Flying Blue. Also, by incorporating other means of transport, such as buses, trains and low-cost flights, you can build a wonderful trip at an affordable cost.
To plan your stay and book your tickets for the 2023 Rugby World Cup:
Savings are here:
