The dream trips-saving miles thread got me thinking in a direction I never have before.

Bill has 400,000 miles in his FF account. Jon has 25 miles in his. Bill doesn't have the time to use all his miles and fears they will be wasted. Jon wants to take his family to Bermuda.

Bill can't sell or give his miles to Jon. Bill can't get award certificates and give or sell them to Jon. The airlines frown on the selling of miles. I got that, no sweat.

But what if Bill and Jon are neighbors. Bill IS allowed (as I understand it) to redeem his miles for tickets for Jon and his family if he so desires. Maybe this is because Jon always lends Bill his riding mower, and Bill wants to make it up to him. Thats ok with the airlines, right?

Well what if Bill and Jon are "cyberneighbors", and the favor being repayed is the loan of a modem, or perhaps the "loan" of a few hundred dollars.

My question here is where's the line? If Bill redems the reward himself with his own miles for anyone he chooses, is this a problem?

No specific plans coming up, but It's an interesting topic to explore.

Actually the scenario is more common than most know. I know through the years a few thousand people who have swapped "awards" for redemption. Johnny can't seem to get seats on United to XXX, doesn't have enough with American so trades Bill (golf buddy) for an American award with the "promise" to let Bill use his United awards when Bill wants. My guess is that a few ten thousand awards are exchanged annually this way. However, they do create some problems. I know of a few cases where when it came time for the person to go back and get the awards to use, that the person had used all of theirs and just said "sorry." It does create a few problems because it these cases it moves off of being a friendly exchange. But what can you do? Nothing, except find new friends or wait around til they get some more miles. But what happens if that person changes jobs and no longer flies, etc. It is a rather interesting topic and I'd love to hear from others.....

Randy, your point is well taken, that expecting some future exchange is chancy. However, the agreement would probably be enforceable legally (if only you could get a lawyer involved in a $1000 case ), even though it violates the airline's FF program rules. That alone does not make it illegal or unenforceable by other parties. Points out that a person is much safer exchanging the miles for $ if they are going to do it, rather than exchanging for future consideration. Of course, it has always been one of my contentions that one of the reasons that all of the airlines want to continue the photo ID requirement for boarding is that it has virtually killed the secondary market for FF awards from what it used to be. A "friend of mine" once sold a FF award ticket in his name to a friend, who just traveled in the other person's name. That really can't be done very easily now, and I am sure the airlines are glad, for more than just security reasons.

Djlawman

I was just reading an article on this over the past few days, don't remember where it was though ... I think we all agree there's no problem if the airlines don't suspect anything. But what if they do?

What the article said is that they'll ask questions of the person using the ticket and the person who issued the ticket ... stuff like who gave you the ticket (if you're using it) or who was using your ticket (if you issued it).

The reasoning here is they want to bust the brokers, and if the ticket is brokered you're unlikely to be able to answer those questions. However, if it was an exchange between friends, you'll be able to answer those questions fine, you'll be smart enough hopefully to say it was a gift, and you'll be on your way!

A few years ago, one of my graduate students phoned and woke me early in the morning from my comfortable hotel bed in Irvine, CA, to ask me what he should do since his return ticket was confiscated by a CO ticket agent at checkin and he was forced to pay nearly $1000. to get back home. I told him to put it on his charge card! What could I do? The ironic thing was that the person who gave him the ticket was the same one who took him to the airport that morning. They had gotten together on the car rental and all he had to do was let him check in for him! Sad!

Is it against airline rules to obtain reward tickets for acquaintances? Can there be a not for profit "club" of such acquaintances? Can there be the collection of dues to sustain such a non-profit club? Can the dues be scaled to match the "participation" in the club? (As in people who have redemed 5 award tickets for other club members pay a little, people who have redeemed none pay lots more, and the "dues" go to purchase tickets that club members can not get via award?

I have no interest in starting such a venture, so I have no problem discussing it. I'm just curious if this sort of club would work? Could the airlines do anything about it (as opposed to just not like it)?

[This message has been edited by NJDavid (edited 06-03-99).]

sounds dodgy to me, NJD...

... I'll discuss that idea with some of my Fuerstentum Lichtenstein lawyer-friends ...

(may be "off-shore" would be safer for such a untertaking)

Once I loaned a FF ticket to a good friend of mine, who later returned me the favor. Maybe I should have gone to a lawyer to draw up a legal contract, but the lawyer fees would have been more than the value of the miles.