WhoME

Unless you would actually buy a business class ticket, I think this is too high a valuation. I'd agree with UncleDude that the value of a business award should be about the discount fare + copay - upgrade miles. This is fair as both award seats and upgrade seats are capacity controlled. You have a bit more flexibility in terms of date changes and such with an award than with with an upgrade, but not a whole lot.

So, the cash value of LAX-LHR in June
$1k fare + $600 copay - $300 in taxes and fees on an award = $1300

The miles cost of LAX-LHR milesaaver
90k miles - 50k miles for the upgrade + 11k miles foregone = 51k miles (and potentially much more if the 11k q-miles are important to you)

for a total of 2.5 ¢/mi which is a good use of miles but not the fantastic deal you might suspect from looking at the full (or even discount) business fares.

On the other hand, if and only if you'd otherwise buy a business class ticket with cash money, the value could be much higher, as high as a I fare at $3200 (-$300 = 3.2¢/mi), provided you can get an award on the dates you want; discount suitably if getting an award requires you to rearrange your travel plans. As others have pointed out, the value can increase dramatically for last-minute bookings.

That's it for the value of awards which is relatively easy to establish, although it may vary from person to person. The value of the miles is much harder to establish. If you have millions of miles just sitting around not collecting interest, even 1¢/mi may be worthwhile (heck, even buying your Aadmirals club membership with miles may be worthwhile). Likewise, if you've waited years to amass the 75k miles to take the family to see Aunt Mildred in PBI, and you otherwise wouldn't take the trip, that may be a great use of miles for you even if it's only 1¢/mi. Most of us around here are somewhere in between.

Michael

WhoME

Do you count time spent in deciding whether a mileage run is worthwhile, or is it fun enough that you put it down to entertainment (i.e. the choice is between sitting on the couch watching a movie or sitting at 35k feet watching a movie and earning miles)?

Michael

gemac

No. I don't count anything else. The spread between one cent or less (to earn 'em) and two cents or more (to use 'em) is to cover things like:
My time (not a lot of value, I like to fly)
Parking
Purchases of food
Hotel sometimes
etc.

I don't like to complicate it too much.

Keith Flyer Maven

While I appreciate all this 'new math', for me the equation is far simpler: I fly to europe from LAX approximately once a year for pleasure. I earn roughly enough miles in a given year for a free business class or first class ticket (90-125K, mostly non-BIS).

economy from lax-europe is misery.
business class is decent.
first class makes the flight seem like it's 2 hours long.

As a result, as a nonelite (but Plat challenge this year after June 14, thanks to FT!!), it's a simple equation for me: pay for domestic tickets (usually in Y, sometimes in J/F), and my reward is an upgraded (in a slow year or depending on availability) or usually complimentary premium flight abroad.

the only exception is, if I have extra miles, maybe I'll upgrade lax-miami-caribbean, as that's a lot of flying for a cheap upgrade cost.

I understand that this reasoning is unique to my situation, but from where I sit, using miles for a 3 hour flight in Y is not the best use of them--- better to save them for something more substantial. then again, if you don't fly very much and don't have any particular, specific alternate goal for those miles, then why not use them?

just my two cents, and probably not worth anything close to that...

skye1

The Citi Reduced Mileage Awards often can be great 'excuses' to burn miles, especially when they're at signicant savings over the "normal" mileage required. Example: Last fall, 82K for a First Class, 777, roundtrip to EZE. Not bad at all, considering the 43K difference between that & what it usually is.

loudgonzo

there was (is) a 1, oli's original post shows $19k, but the "quote" shows 9....weird

badjuju

I concur - I tend to save/hoard my miles for upgrades only. For domestic flights, I'll only use miles on flights like ORD-OGG or ORD-ANC (If AA can hurry up and load their special summer flights). I look at how long it took me to earn those 25K miles so I'm not willing to give them up too easily.

brp

I use miles for family and such. I prefer to pay so I get EQM for me. They don't fly enough to warrant challenges as they would not use the benefits, and it would nt be worth paying. Four family members coming for Thanksgiving FLL-SJC in F, 180K miles. Having them here. Priceless

Cheers.

edwin_p_morales

I think the best use of miles (for me) is for things that I would just never get any other way. Just echoing what others have posted, but there's really no way that I could forsee spending over 8-10 thousand dollars on a single flight, at least not in the near future. But through some fairly easy planning (dining, cc miles, flying) I can get lots of them. For me if it's something I could afford fairly easily anyways it's a waste. Life is long and I expect to get a lot of long distance travel done sooner or later and flying J or F changes everything about the trip.

BenjaminNYC

If you get me an F ticket, I will also join you. But it has to be AFS F. I don't do two-cabin...

ScreenGuy

Post was edited after the person quoted his post...

I usually try to use the million mile giveaway as an indicator. According to another thread, 25k miles = $210... If the ticket is more than that, I use miles.

Just kidding of course!

blueeyes_austin

I spend miles when the ticket is priced at around 2 cents per mile.

jragosta

Sure - if Citi ever gets around to posting the reduced mileage awards. See the related thread.

OneXMarine

I consider my miles to be worth about .02 per mile and calculate that when making the buy/fly free decision. Of course if you can't get an award seat it becomes moot, but with reasonable notice you should be able to get a seat.

Personally I only fly FC on award tickets and usually that is at holidays.

suranyi

I just booked a triangle trip SFO-JFK-YUL-SFO for August for 25,000 miles. The ticket price is $760. That's over 3 cents per mile, a pretty good deal for a North American coach award, I think.

Ed