The best (and worst) award programmes for booking infant tickets

Bringing your child along for vacation? Here's the award programmes that make booking infant tickets cheap and easy- and those which don't.

One of the best reasons to travel with your child before they turn two is the significant savings on airfare.

Infants travelling as lap passengers are eligible for highly discounted tickets. Singapore Airlines — and many other carriers — charges just 10% of the best available adult fare for lap infants (though beware of budget airlines, where a lap infant can sometimes be more expensive than booking a separate seat!). If you’re flying domestically within Japan or the USA, most major airlines even allow lap infants to travel for free.

Guide: Booking infant tickets with Singapore Airlines

Booking commercial tickets for your family is usually straightforward. Most airline websites let you add an infant to your booking in the same transaction as the adult tickets.

However, booking infant tickets with award flights can be more complicated. For example, Singapore Airlines does not allow you to add an infant to an online award booking. You’ll need to book the adult tickets first, then contact the airline by phone to add the infant. Additional challenges can arise if you use miles from one airline to book tickets on another- who do you contact to add the infant in this case?

In this post, I’ll highlight the frequent flyer programmes that make booking infant tickets a painless experience. Some even extend the 10% rule to the cost in miles, let infants fly for a fixed fee, or waive the charges completely!

Who do you contact to add an infant?

If you couldn’t add an infant at the time of booking an award ticket, the general rule is to contact the frequent flyer program that issued the adult ticket—not the operating carrier. The infant ticket will also be priced according to the issuing programme’s rules, rather than those of the operating carrier.

For example, if you used Air Canada Aeroplan to book an award ticket on Singapore Airlines, you would need to contact Aeroplan to add the infant. The cost of the infant ticket would be based on Aeroplan’s pricing rules, not Singapore Airlines’.

However, there are some exceptions such as Alaska Mileage Plan and Cathay Pacific Asia Miles, where you have to contact the operating carrier instead (which is often a confusing and frustrating exercise!). I’ll explain these exceptions in more detail later.

The best programmes for booking infant tickets

Here’s a summary of the best mileage programmes for booking infant tickets.

Programme Infant Cost Transfer Partners
Air Canada Aeroplan 2,500 points or CAD 25
  • Heymax
  • HSBC
ANA Mileage Club 10% of adult miles N/A
British Airways Executive Club 10% of adult miles
  • AMEX
  • Citi
  • Heymax
  • HSBC
  • OCBC
Qantas Frequent Flyer Free
  • AMEX
  • Citi
  • DBS
  • Heymax
  • HSBC
Turkish Miles & Smiles 10% of adult miles
  • Citi
  • Heymax
  • HSBC
Virgin Atlantic Flying Club Y: 1,000 points
PY: 2,000 points
J:  5,000 points
N/A
Y= Economy, PY= Premium Economy, J= Business

Since ANA Mileage Club and Virgin Atlantic Flying Club miles/points can’t be earned in Singapore through credit cards or Heymax, I’m not going to focus on them below.

Air Canada Aeroplan

Air Canada Aeroplan has a very generous infant ticket policy.

Adding a lap infant to an award booking costs just 2,500 Aeroplan points, or CAD25 (~S$24) each way. The fee is the same regardless of cabin — yes, even First Class — and a huge saving compared to 10% of the adult fare. 

SIN-BNE on SQ Business: 45,000 points for adult, 2,500 points for infant

You can book infant tickets concurrently with adult tickets online, though Aeroplan’s website only allows you to pay for infants with points. If you want to pay with cash, you’ll need to book the adult tickets first, then call Aeroplan to pay the CAD25 fee.

❓ Should you pay with points or cash?
I personally feel that it’s better to pay CAD25 than 2,500 Aeroplan points, given how hard the latter are to earn in Singapore. However, Aeroplan wait times over the phone are notoriously bad. After waiting on hold for more than 90 minutes, I think I’ll go for convenience next time and just pay with points to avoid having to make the call.

The bigger problem with Aeroplan is how difficult it is to earn points with the programme, for us in Singapore at least. Transfers are only available from Heymax or HSBC, and the latter has a relatively poor transfer ratio of 35,000 points = 10,000 miles (versus 25,000 points = 10,000 miles for most partners).

British Airways Executive Club

British Airways Executive Club charges infants just 10% of the adult cost, in Avios, and their website allows you to book infant tickets at the same time as adult tickets.

For example, suppose we want to fly from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur via Malaysia Airlines. The adult fare is 6,000 Avios, so the infant fare is just 600 Avios.

SIN-KUL on MH Business: 6,000 points for adult, 600 points for infant

Another advantage of British Airways is that if your infant turns two during the journey, they will assign the infant a seat on the next leg of the flight and not charge anything extra. All you need to do is contact customer service to arrange for this. 

If your infant turns 2 during their journey, you’ll have to book them a seat for any flights on and after their 2nd birthday. We won’t charge you extra for this, you’ll pay the infant fare for the entire journey. This booking can’t be made online, so please contact us and we’ll happily arrange it for you.

-British Airways

However, this only applies to British Airways operated flights.

Qantas Frequent Flyer

Qantas Frequent Flyer does not charge any additional points for infant bookings on Classic Flight Rewards bookings, whether on Qantas or partner airlines. 

 

14.2.5 Infants under two years, and not occupying a seat, travel without the need to redeem Qantas Points as long as the accompanying adult is travelling on a Classic Flight Reward. There is a limit of one infant per adult travelling on a Classic Flight Reward. Taxes, fees and carrier charges (including GST) may be payable in relation to infants as specified by us at the time a Member books a Classic Flight Reward.

-Qantas Frequent Flyer T&Cs

I can’t think offhand of any taxes or fees that would apply to an infant in arms (since such charges are usually based on a seat, rather than per head), so it should be free in most cases.

SIN-LHR on Finnair Economy: No extra charge for infant

Infants can be ticketed along with adults when booking online.

Turkish Miles&Smiles

Turkish Miles&Smiles suffered a massive devaluation in 2024, but if nothing else, their policy for infant tickets remains favourable. An infant costs 10% of the adult cost, in miles, and infant tickets can be booked online together with adult tickets. 

For example, suppose we want to fly from Singapore to Istanbul via Turkish Airlines. The adult fare is 65,000 miles, so the infant fare is just 6,500 miles.

SIN-IST on TK Business: 65,000 miles for adult, 6,500 miles for infant

The worst programmes

Alaska Mileage Plan

Alaska Mileage Plan may have some solid sweet spots, but I wouldn’t book through them if I were travelling with an infant.

Here’s their official policy:

“Lap infants are not permitted on international partner awards and will not be accepted for travel. Members will need to book seats at prevailing rates.”

In other words, Alaska expects you to book a separate seat for your infant, and pay the full cost in miles.

That said, it might be possible to add an infant for 10% of the adult fare or some other nominal fee. What you’ll need to do is contact the operating carrier (an exception to the general rule I mentioned at the start), ask them to add an infant to the booking, and hope they don’t bounce you back to Alaska. Don’t be afraid to hang up and call again if you get rejected the first time.

Your odds of success really depend on the operating carrier, and the willingness of the CSO to help. There are some successful data points in this Flyertalk thread; more comments can be found on Reddit.

Cathay Pacific Asia Miles

Cathay Pacific Asia Miles is a poor choice of award programme if you’re travelling with infants, for two main reasons.

First, if your award is on Cathay Pacific, the cost of a lap infant is:

  • 25% of the adult fare for flights to/from the USA
  • 10% of the adult fare for flights elsewhere around the world

25% is much higher than the market average of 10%; can you imagine paying that for a First or Business Class ticket?

Second, if your award is on another partner airline, Asia Miles will not be able to issue a ticket from their side. Instead, like Alaska Mileage Plan, you’re expected to call up the operating carrier and ask them to add the infant.

Remember: in the event that you can’t add an infant and need to cancel your award booking, you’ll have to pay a cancellation fee of US$120 per ticket (much more severe that Alaska Mileage Plan’s fee of US$12.50 each way)!

Conclusion

Paying 10% of the adult fare for lap infants is standard practice across the airline industry. However, some frequent flyer programmes go above and beyond by charging only 10% of the adult miles cost, or even offering fixed-price or free tickets for infants.

Other frequent flyer programmes don’t make life easy by charging infant fares above the industry average or absolving themselves of responsibility, requiring customers to contact the operating carrier instead (which may lead to getting bounced back and forth).

Any other good/bad programmes for booking infant tickets?

Aaron Wong
Aaron Wong
Aaron founded The Milelion to help people travel better for less and impress chiobu. He was 50% successful.

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Joe

I’ve successfully used the online chat for both CX and SQ to tag infant tickets.

Beware though it can take up to one hour – not sure why it takes so long

OJW

I’d just like to share my experience flying with an infant on Turkish Airlines though. I didn’t have much of an issue flying with them, but it was a little concerning when they refused our request to label some of our luggage as fragile – and this happened on both my outbound and inbound legs. Of course, I trust the baggage handlers would do their job professionally, but sometimes it’s just about having a peace of mind, y’know.

BQT

EVA charges 10% of the highest fare type within the cabin class so the cost can rather high at times but not prohibitive.

Sean

Have done so on SQ for SQ metal (different CSO’s can price differently even on the same day, so HUCA and try again if fare is on the high(er) side), AM for CX metal (CSO’s are slower than SQ CSO’s in processing it) but similar 10% revenue fare experience and can be done via online chat. Both able to secure bulkheads once infant ticketed. AF is not as friendly as must call in only and in my case flight was ex-CDG so local office can’t process in EUR and needs to transfer you to their office in Paris. I had… Read more »

Al al

You can redeem miles (adult rate) for infant but you need to come down to SQ ticketing office to book. Can be helpful depending on your circumstances.

JayM

Can you book infant tickets for an unborn child on any airline ? SQ said no but after some wrangling agreed to save me the bassinet seats regardless though I have to call back to lock it in

Anon

Don’t bring the infant. Leave them with the grandparents.

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