binkata

Apologies if this has been covered before, but none of my search terms seem to be turning up any relevant posts...

I've been using milecalc for a few years to help me estimate earnings per flight and gauge the necessity of an end-of-year MR. I've recently noticed that AS shows a different number of miles earned, say, for SFO-BOS than any value I can find.

AS shows this as 2697 miles earned; milecalc (and other great circle mappers) as 2704. My Garmin tells me it's 2342 nm, which works out to 2695 sm--so maybe we're not getting shorted?

Anyone have any idea what they're basing their calculations on? Anyone have a better lead on a site that uses more accurate numbers?

mtofell

I've used this one and found it to be accurate:

Mileage Calculator - WebFlyer :: The Frequent Flyer Authority

Granted, I have only used it on a few routes so I can't really speak to it's widespread accuracy.

binkata

I've never seen this one, thanks for the lead. These guys have it at 2700, which is closer...

keitherson

https://www.iata.org/en/publications/store/mileage/

A couple of thousands dollars to find out.

Flying for Fun

I haven't seen this one before either but the distance from SEA-YLW shows 212. Sometimes AS will post it at 218, sometimes 219 & sometimes 220. Not that it really matters because you always earn a 500 mile minimum. Milecalc is usually within a single hand, thumb & digit count and is my go to.

James

NYC Flyer

Sabre has FF mileage (for AA) at 2704. Distance for faring purposes ("Ticketed Point Mileage") is 2698--this is the IATA figure.

chrisl137

I find the Webflyer calculator is right on for up and down the west coast, but AS adds 7 miles for flights from LAX to the east coast, and it sounds like from SFO, too.

binkata

I agree that milecalc has been very good, despite how low-fi the website is. I wish it were underestimating mileage, as it's better to err on the short side for status-earning purposes.

As for the IATA data I wonder how many packages they actually sell...

Huh....on a hunch I decided to look up the distance between VORs instead of airports, SFO-BOS vs. KSFO-KBOS. (VORs have established positions, whereas the "airport" position could be anywhere on the airport surface.) This is 2343 nm, which is 2696.2 sm. I suppose this (one mile extra for the partial mile) is the value they're using.

garykung

I would say it is not worth to find out the truth.

Years ago, there was a proposed class action about the short-changed miles against UA. The judge threw the case out very quickly. Basically, the lawsuit has told us that airlines can do whatever they want. Hence, you are stuck without the truth.

Rely on other airlines. This is as close as it gets.

beckoa

I was once building a database of mileage earning AS specific city pairs. AS once lumped area airports together for earnings (LAX/SNA/ONT/etc) I gave up though- too many city-pairs and many things were adjusted from an earnings perspective. Add all the new routes- too much for one person to tackle.

Now, we could make it a wiki

mtofell

I would have to think such a case would be an uphill battle from the start - Proving any real/sizeable damage would be difficult and this definitely falls under the category of first world problems. I think courts/judges have limited sympathy for a bunch of well-off travelers fighting for a few frequent flyer miles.

That being said, you'd think the airlines would have a verifiable method (and even pad it by a few miles) just to avoid problems. I mean, we've (mostly) agreed the earth is round and how far apart things are. This seems like something that could easily be solved/documented.

This actually almost mattered to me in 2020. Calculating out my miles I needed 1541 to make MVPG. As we know, the AS minimum is 500 and with the 1.5 EQM bonus I would have been 41 miles short if I just took a minimum mileage run round-trip. I ended up just moving longer somewhat flexible trip into the end of 2020 but I did find myself looking at some mileages to try to maximize things.

Ilove2fly

Some airlines classified some multi-segment flights as "direct." In this case, the miles are calculated based on distance between start and end airports of the multi-segment "direct" itinerary instead of sum of each segment. The difference can be significant. My experience has been with UA. It is very irritating.

jrl767

AS does this as well — the one I’m directly familiar with is SEA-STS-LAX (1106 vs 954)

Flying for Fun

Direct flights are easily distinguishable as all segments will have the same flight number. An AS direct flight that I am aware of is/was SEA-SFO-PSP. Both segments SEA-SFO & SFO-PSP had the same flight number (AS372, IIRC). The EQM/RDM earned was calculated on SEA-PSP.

James

xliioper

Every airline I'm aware of calculates mileage for direct flights (which are specifically connecting flights which share the same flight number) as the direct distance between the origin and destination. Note that there are some tax savings on such direct flight bookings as they are not subjected to the $4.30 US domestic segment tax or the $4.50 (typical, but not universal) airport PFC fee for the additional segment from the connecting airport.