2006 Changes Not In Effect
 

One of the changes for 2006 according to the OP web site is:

"Effective February 1, 2006, you may redeem reward travel within the 48 contiguous U.S., Alaska and Canada on round-trip flights of 1,500 miles or less for only 20,000 miles."

Just checked a flight from EWR - ORD (719 miles) which is still showing 12500 for a standard reward and 25000 for easy pass. Anyone know when this is going to change?

Maybe someone in IT forgot to switch on the new system software. There are always glitches for things like this when new (enhanced) features are added. Send CO an e-mail. :)

- Pat

Ouch.
 

I called the Elite desk about a EWR-DFW reward reservation that I couldn't get to price out at the new, lower reward level, and I was told that the new 20,000 mile reward applies to short-haul flights only (750 miles or less each direction).

Effective February 1, 2006, you may redeem reward travel within the 48 contiguous U.S., Alaska and Canada on round-trip flights of 1,500 miles or less for only 20,000 miles.

I misread the program announcement to mean that the flights had to be 1,500 miles or less in each direction.

I'm usually a better reader than that. :D

Of course, that doesn't explain why EWR-ORD still doesn't work.

Seriously?

I was SURE that it was 20k miles for flights each way 1500 miles or less, an interesting competitive response to UA/AA 750 miles or less for 15k miles.

If this story is true, that it's really 750 miles or less = 20 k mile award then this is just another example of CO offering an inferior program. :td:

Why would you want to blow miles, abiet reduced, on as cheap a ticket as EWR-CHI?? Pay the rock-bottom fare, upgrade it on EUA, and use the miles for something that would otherwise be expensive.





TE=Spinky]One of the changes for 2006 according to the OP web site is:

"Effective February 1, 2006, you may redeem reward travel within the 48 contiguous U.S., Alaska and Canada on round-trip flights of 1,500 miles or less for only 20,000 miles."

Just checked a flight from EWR - ORD (719 miles) which is still showing 12500 for a standard reward and 25000 for easy pass. Anyone know when this is going to change?[/QUOTE]

[/QUOTE]

The reason I wanted to use miles is because it was less then 21 days out and the ticket was $367 for the flights I needed. I'll rather burn 20,000 miles for $367 then earn 1438 for $367. I found out that even though the standard reward lists 12,500 that when you select standard, it comes back with 20,000 for the round trip ticket so it in fact works. :)

Hmmm. I recall reading the same thing on the CO site, namely that it was 1500 miles each way. At least that was how I interpreted it.....maybe I was mistaken.

The AA and UA 15K award promos expire at the end of this month so CO's new offer will be a plus.....until AA and UA re-up with the 15K which I now imagine is much more likely. However, since CO never seems to have standard award availability anyway, I'm wondering if the 20K offer really matters.

The quote from the News & Offers page is I certainly took that to mean 1500 miles each way. Quite sneaky if otherwise IMHO. :td:

I assumed it was 750 miles each way. After all, a "roundtrip" of 1,500 miles or less implies those 1,500 miles are for both directions of travel. If it was a 1,500 mile limit each way, they would have said a "roundtrip of 3,000 miles or less."

It is a better deal than 25,000 miles for a short trip. However, I really doubt I'll use it since my reward redemptions are almost always for international BusinessFirst and long domestic/Canada/Alaska first class awards.

15,000 would be more reasonable. :(