Domestic
Making Your Miles Go Further In These Hyperinflationary Times
In 1939 there were five Hungarian Pengos to the US dollar. By 1946 there were 4,700,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000. That year, the Hungarian National Bank introduced the 100 Quintillion Pengo note.
Have you noticed it’s getting harder to ‘spend’ your airline miles? (That’s a rhetorical question.) And that even when you can spend them, how they seem to buy less? The aviation industry is fast becoming the inflation industry – make that the hyperinflation industry – when it comes to frequent flyer miles. It now has 15 trillion unredeemed miles on its books.
Were all the seats on all the planes on all the airlines in all the world devoted all the time to repaying the debt owed, it would still take donkey years to clear it. That won’t happen, of course. Airlines are still dishing out four times as many miles as they are redeeming. The mileage mountain just keeps growing. And since every award seat is precious revenue forgone to airlines starving for the stuff, they won’t (unlike their customers) be falling over themselves to effect redemption.
They will just keep finding bigger and better ways to devalue the currency. (See First Class Flyer 8/08 on the Qantas ignominy.)
Is that an award seat? And is that a loyal customer? How about we put a fat fee between the two?
Just last month, on Aug. 17, Continental increased its fees for booking award tickets close to the date of travel. American has increased many of its fees and mileage levels in the last few months. In the last year, few airlines have resisted the temptation to devalue their mileage award levels.
It irks, doesn’t it, paying for something that’s free? Until, of course, you remember that award seats never were free anyway (then it irks more).
Never forget, you have already paid for your award seats, well in advance, with that most coveted currency of all – loyalty. To that entitlement – your entitlement – we’ve devoted our latest title: Airline Miles to Europe.
The good news is that just as acumen gets you a long way in business, it can get you – still – a long way in Business Class. Even in these hyperinflationary times, even with award seats... and especially with upgrades. A caveat here: There are no guarantees (except for those who eschew shrewd, which guarantees they’ll get nowhere fast).
Aviation Acumen
To give yourself the best chance of scoring an award seat, start booking a long way out. Everyone knows that. But how long, exactly? Wouldn’t it be nice to know, airline by airline, when award seats get loaded into their system? So you can work back from your ideal departure date and know when to go for it?
To quickly increase your odds of nabbing an award seat, the easy advice is to have miles in multiple programs. But because of variances in fine print between programs, you need to stay on your toes to stay ahead of your Redemption Competition (your fellow travelers).
Advance Mileage Award Booking Schedule: 354 days British Airways; 352 days Northwest; 335 days Delta, Virgin; 331 days American, United; and 330 days Continental, US Airways.
With these figures, you know exactly when to work the phone, and trust me you will have to work it, but award and upgrade gain is worth that pain... especially when you do find a kindhearted airline phone rep.
Another shrewd move is this counterintuitive one...
Buying Miles
Buying miles – the very currency that’s being battered by hyperinflation – may seem crazy in these times, when so many folk are trying to redeem them. But it’s a strategy that’s more loophole than loopy. Trick is to know which airlines to buy miles from, or even better which partner carrier. You need to know which airlines offer the lowest cost per mile and which airlines allow you to purchase enough miles to game the system.
There are not-insubstantial differences that separate airlines on mileage cost, and massive differences that separate them on their buy/gift limits. First Class Tip: The two airlines that offer the lowest-cost, Mexicana (not such an obscure program, when you consider its amazing list of redemption partners) and US Airways (partner of Star Alliance and friends), are also the only two airlines that allow you to buy unlimited miles. You can buy enough miles to get into Business or even First Class for a fraction of the cost of buying the ticket itself with cash or credit.
But your best bet’s usually a mileage upgrade (you can also buy quickly, with many airlines).
For 13 years, First Class Flyer has been two steps ahead of the airlines, providing customers with insider tips on upgrade secrets, mileage plans and how to fly well, for less.