Originally Posted by
Dave Noble
If able to get fares 50% cheaper by shopping around, what does it really matter whether the airline has any award scheme
Originally Posted by
tom911
Have you looked at Sun Country's award program? Do they have many international partners?
Originally Posted by
TrojanHorse
If you save 50% off domestic fares enough times then you have enough to purchase an Int'l fare on a big 3 carrier when needed.
Unless you are completely price-insensitive and buying tons of full-fare premium tickets with OPM, the miles factor is probably driving irrational behavior. You are probably over-paying for domestic travel (and making other sacrifices like unwieldly connections, suboptimal schedules, etc.) in order to amass miles of dubious / uncertain value. Chances are if you book the cheapest ticket on whatever airline every time and bank the money saved, you'll have enough in a couple of years to buy exactly the overseas ticket you want.
It wasn't always this way, of course, but much of the time now miles are a narcotic that get us to do diseconomic or inconvenient things.