Emirates Skywards Transfer Outage: Plan Your Points Moves Now

In what could be a significant disruption for points collectors planning summer holidays, Emirates has announced a complete shutdown of their points transfer system from 29th May through 18th June 2025. This extended three-week maintenance period means that if you're planning to transfer points from credit card programs like American Express Membership Rewards to book Emirates flights, you'll need to act quickly or adjust your strategy.

The timing is particularly inconvenient as it overlaps with peak summer booking season. For those of us accustomed to the flexibility of transferring points on demand, this represents a notable limitation that requires some advance planning.

What This Means for Your Summer Travel Plans

If you've been eyeing a specific Emirates redemption for the summer holidays, you essentially have two options:

1. Transfer now: With the current estimated transfer time of just 2 working days, there's still a window to move your points across before the blackout begins. The minimum transfer is 1,000 points, which is quite reasonable.

2. Wait until mid-June: If you're not ready to commit yet, you'll need to wait until after 18th June when the system comes back online.

Strategic Alternatives During the Outage

If you find yourself needing to book Emirates flights during the outage period, consider these alternatives:

• Book using existing Emirates Skywards balance: If you already have miles in your account, you can still use those for bookings during the maintenance period.

• Book through partner programs: Remember that you can book Emirates flights using other currencies like Qantas Points

• Use our Award Travel Finder: This tool can help identify alternative routing options using different airlines that might actually represent better value.

• Consider cash tickets with a points rebate: Some credit cards offer "Pay with Points" options that provide a rebate when you use points to cover travel purchases.

Why This Matters for Points Collectors

For those of us who rely on the flexibility of transferable points, this outage is a reminder of why maintaining balances across multiple programs can be advantageous. It's also worth noting that similar maintenance periods have occasionally preceded program changes or devaluations (though there's no indication that's happening here).

This sort of disruption highlights the value of our BA Avios Balance Boost calculator and similar tools that help us understand where our points are best positioned for maximum flexibility.

My Personal Take

As someone who carefully plans redemptions months in advance, I find these types of outages frustrating but manageable with proper planning. What concerns me more is the traveller who might need to make a last-minute booking for an emergency or unexpected opportunity during this three-week window.

This situation reminds me of when Singapore Airlines ran their record 40% off Spontaneous Escapes promotion earlier this year - had there been a transfer outage during that period, many would have missed extraordinary value opportunities.

Final Thoughts

While this maintenance period is inconvenient, it's a good opportunity to review your points strategy. Do you have enough diversification across programs? Are you relying too heavily on the ability to transfer points on demand?

If you frequently book Emirates flights, now might be the time to explore alternative routings using oneworld or Star Alliance carriers that could provide comparable experiences. Our Smart Redemptions tool can help identify these alternatives when you're searching on Google Flights.

Have you been affected by this transfer outage? Are you rushing to transfer points before the deadline? Let us know in the comments or reach out on Instagram.

Jack @ Smart With Points

P.S. Remember you can use our Great Circle Mapper tool to calculate distances for Emirates' distance-based award chart and plan your redemptions more effectively.