So, before I suggest this, let me say that I do not beleive that this inquiry is a violation of the TOS. If I'm wrong, please let me know ASAP and I'll pull the thread - that said....

I was in the American Airline board and came upon a thread discussing the value of a mile and the debate surrounding it. I will not recount the issues raised there - but needless to say, there was much discussion about value inflation, etc.

So I wondered - how could you calcuate an accurate value for an award mile?

What I'm suggeting is that people interested in this question post to this thread starting on Oct. 1st, the following information:

1. Airline
2. How many tickets you purchased
3. The class of service you booked into (first, business, coach)
4. Date booked
5. Date of travel
6. The number of miles used
7. The cost of the award in real dollars to pay taxes and fees not covered by the award
8. The cost of a seat on the day of purchase for the identical flight using the tool you most often use to PURCHASE flights. (So if you search on expedia, but generally buy from the airline's web site)

My method/rationale:
I would argue that real-world analysis is far better than hypothetical ones. One need only take the cost of the identical ticket - the cost you had to bear anyways (taxes and then some) to get the cost you avoid paying out of pocket to get what you would have paid to purchase the ticket. Some people choose to burn their miles in first class, and that choice would be weighted into the calculation. I've asked for class separately so that I can take that data and also calculate value in preferred class - cut the overall number still provides a good weighted average based on ACTUAL consumption.

I propose that we start this experiment on October 1st and continue for the entire month of October so we'd get 30 days worth of data. I suggest that far off time because others may want to make suggestions for the experiment. I'm willing to hear all ideas and will post another thread with the experiement on October 1st, once I hear that the idea is not a violation of the TOS. It may also be that this has already been done. I'd be interested in hearing that too.

I've been lurking for a while. FTers imply that their useage patterns are different. If that's the case, then this data would allow us to identify our demands and useage patterns. I don't know if we are different - but without data to show we are, we can't assume that we are.

I volunteer to do the analysis. Because the data is open posted, it is open to anyone who wants to look at it.

Comments?