Originally Posted by HeelLaw
I think djlaw has it exactly right.
Keep in mind a few realities:
First of all, the market for a product like this is very small. Most people don't really understand how miles work, and they don't seem to be interested enough in them to spend a lot of time trading them.
Second, the purpose of miles (by those who issue them); namely, to encourage brand loyalty. If there was a successful system (and it certainly appears that points.com is not one of those) that was developed, a couple things would/could happen:
1) The airline would change the rules in a manner that we would not appreciate. Think of a rule that said that you could only redeem your miles for yourself and immediate family...or just yourself.
2) The airline gets rid of miles altogether. Think about it. If the means to encourage brand loyalty is not accomplishing that, and is, as djlaw said, completely fungible, the airline has no incentive to issue them any longer.
Finally, consider what you really want to do. You're wanting to buy a sandwich at Subway, and trade your subway club stamps for a quizno's sandwich. It's just counterintuitive.
Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it, to the detriment of all.
agreed, in part. Again, I am trying to make something happen that forces points.com to stay loyal to its customer and play fairly!
it does not right now. I would rather not have them around as a trade off.
as for mile to cash systems, I get burnt out on the corruption that I see taking place in these airline partnership schemes the marketers come up with. I mean, nowadays it's not about customer loyalty, it's all about companies abilitiy to steal or hijack one's loyalty! It's guerilla marketing and near scamming that makes us "stay" with a company! We have no choice! They have our money or miles or info and so we have to use it or lose it! We have to use those 15,000 miles here or those 4000 points there or else they will expire or something. We have to find ways to transfer that 20k miles to someone else because they will become worthless since that amount is no longer enough points to fly... Things like that.
As for airlines that have poor redemption rules, I give you British Airways and their household accounts, or Singapore Airlines where you actually have to pay to change the limited names your account can have to fax in a form to nominate who is authorized to use your miles!
Places like points.com that allow you to transfer miles is a good thing, but the way they do it is not so good. This is because they will often drop the ball and things will go wrong with your request. I think transferring miles wont cause a breakdown in the system in itself, but if they dont fix their errors, that will cause a breakdown in the system.
I dunno, i tried to fix this but am too tired to type.
!MM