America West FlightFund (Discontinued Program) - Elite Bonus Miles Question

Having recently taken advantage of the Corporate Awards match, I now am planning some HP mileage runs out of Tucson.

I am wondering what the elite bonus miles are on flights less than 500 miles. I am used to Continental where they only give bonus miles on the actual miles flown, even though they credit you with 500 miles for the segment.

I have found an 8 segment run from Tucson $111. If I can get the elite bonus on the 500 miles, not the actual miles, I come out pretty well with 12,000 miles earned (with the 3,000 online booking bonus.)

If the elite bonus is calculated using actual miles, then I only end up with a little under 9,500.

[This message has been edited by MarshKing (edited 12-14-2001).]

As a CO Platinum I can't say for certain about HP, but Continental has always awarded bonus milage based on actual flight milage. For example TUS-PHX flights yield 636 miles for a Platinum. 500 + (125% of 109 miles)

In 1998 HP, CO and NW all changed to a common program, so I expect HP to be the same.

What's your mileage run routing?

Good news MarshKing. As an HP Elite, when earning HP miles, your elite bonus miles are based on a 500 mile minimum per flight.

------------------
When all Frequent Flyer programs become equal, they will cease to exist! Be careful what you ask for!

Thanks for the quick replies Old Gold & MRLIMO. That is terrific news about HP's generous policy.

The routing I have is:

Flt 6076 TUS-PHX 1820 - 1912
Flt 775 PHX-LAS 2239 - 2246 (One nt. stay)
Flt 229 LAS-PHX 0700 - 0912
Flt 027 PHX-LAX 1120 - 1152
Flt 234 LAX-PHX 1241 - 1505
Flt 257 PHX-LAS 1543 - 1552
Flt 210 LAS-PHX 1824 - 2035
Flt 441 PHX-TUS 2127 - 2211

Using my Corporate Awards ID, the fare prices at $110.11. It seems that the tickets have to be for a Tuesday and Wednesday. I priced it for the 8th and 9th of January for the example above. I have not tested it with the 8 segments for other dates, but I was able to get six segments for a few dollars over $100 for multiple dates. It was after messing around for a while that I discovered I could grab an extra segment each way.

Now that I know about the bonus miles, I have a follow-up question. One of the things that makes this run profitable (for me, at least) is the 3000 mile online booking bonus. The bonus is for round-trip tickets. Since this is priced by using a multi-city search, does it still count as a formal round trip?