raehl311

For base fares less than $100:

* Redeem 25,000 miles to cover the total fare.

For base fares equal to or greater than $100 and less than $250:

* Redeem 10,000 miles for $100 off the total fare or
* Increase the redemption to 25,000 miles and increase in increments of 5,000 miles ($50 off) to cover the total fare.

For base fares equal to or greater than $250 and total fares less than $1,000:

* Redeem 10,000 miles for $100 off the total fare or
* Increase the redemption in increments of 5,000 miles ($50 off) to cover all or part of the total fare (15,000 miles for $150 off, 20,000 miles for $200 off, etc.).

So if I am reading this correctly...

A base fare of $99 requires 25,000 miles to use PWM?

A base fare of $101 requires 10,000 miles and $1 *OR* 30,000 miles?

A base fare of $201 requires 35,000 miles and $1 or 40,000 miles?


Does anyone else find the verbiage for the $100-$250 range to be unnecessarily convoluted?



However:

In the event of a refund (including fully refundable fares), only the paid portion of a refundable fare will be credited back to the credit card, the Pay with Miles portion of the fare will be returned as non-refundable credit equivalent to the dollar value of the portion of the ticket redeemed with Pay with Miles. Credit may be used to purchase future travel and Pay with Miles terms and conditions will not apply to such tickets.

So looks like you could buy a $1k fully-refundable Y fare with $500 and 50,000 miles, wait, refund the ticket, and then use the $500 credit on another ticket and still get your miles/upgrades. Anyone tried that?

ttjoseph

So this is just a way to convert miles to cash at 1 cent each...not the greatest redemption value by FT standards.

raehl311

But still better than the less-than-one-cent-each plus no RDM//MQM/upgrades Pay-With-Miles way.

keeton

I just looked on dl.com and saw what the OP stated. Have the rules changed? I thought earlier on it was just a flat 10,000 miles for every $100 off.

Clearly under these rules, using PWM for a ticket less than $250 is a ripoff. A $251 ticket costs 25,000 PWMs while a $249 ticket could cost 40,000 PWMs . (edited: and wrong)

EDITED: I did some mock bookings and found results similar to WBurcham's note below.

For tickets $100.01 to $250, you can buy the whole ticket with miles for 25,000 miles or get $100 off with 10,000 miles.

ifette

The way I read it is that you can pay between 10,000 and 25,000 in increments of 5,000.

E.g. if your ticket cost is $249, you can pay 20,000 + $49, or $25,000 + 0.

raehl311

If that was the case, then why does the first item say you need 25,000 miles to cover a $100 base fare?

Also, if what you were saying is true, why wouldn't DL just plainly say "redeem 10,000 miles for $100 off, and increments of 5,000 miles for another $50 off?"


I am 99% sure that if you want to pay for the full ticket that is less than $250, you will have to pay 25,000 miles plus 5,000 miles per $50 over $100. Or, basically, the same 25k you'd pay for the first $100 plus another 5,000 for each $50 after that.

WBurcham

For a $65 ticket, it wants 25,000 miles.

For a $165 ticket it offers:

$100 off = 10,000 miles + $65
$165 off = 25,000 miles

For $210 ticket

$100 off = 10,000 miles + $110
$210 off = 25,000 miles

For $289 ticket:
$100 off = 10,000 miles + $189
$150 off = 15,000 miles + $139
$200 off = 20,000 miles + $89
$250 off = 25,000 miles + $39
$289 off = 30,000 miles

For $300.19 ticket
$100 off = 10,000 miles + $200.19
$150 off = 15,000 miles + $150.19
$200 off = 20,000 miles + $100.19
$250 off = 25,000 miles + $50.19
$300 off = 30,000 miles + $00.19
$300.19 off = 35,000 miles

septrack

Can you use this program to buy a ticket for a friend who is not traveling with you?

tonypct

Yes. I've used PWM to purchase tickets for my son in the past. Unless this has changed too.

raehl311

I'm still not sure that's right - if that were the case, why would it say:

For base fares equal to or greater than $100 and less than $250:

* Redeem 10,000 miles for $100 off the total fare or
* Increase the redemption to 25,000 miles and increase in increments of 5,000 miles ($50 off) to cover the total fare.

Instead of just:

* Increase the redemption to 25,000 miles to cover the total airfare

??

raehl311

I just tried a sample booking, and for a $204 AI airfare, it wanted 25k miles, so I guess I'll just be mystified as to the overly complicated language.

ifette

I will give up and say that, except for perhaps buying a full Y ticket PWM and refunding it for an ECV, I will not be using PWM.

I miss the NW version of PWM -- 10k miles for $100 ECV that didn't add restrictions / take away upgrades and EQMs.

pbarnette

Exactly, which is why I don't understand why this topic gets so much attention. Who redeems at a penny per mile? I guess it makes sense if you are very miles-rich and cash-poor, but I would never, ever use this, even if it did bring back all the 'benefits' of the NW program.

This was always a rip-off at DL. The old NW program was a rip-off. Why are so many now so shocked that the merged program follows in their footsteps and continues to be a rip-off?

ifette

Being SFO-based, it's prettymuch impossible to redeem miles at a reasonable rate. For some reason, award travel is never available at the "saver" level - if I want to fly to see the family in Detroit, it is always 50,000 miles, even when a ticket is $300. Not sure if it's because of the damned tourists or what, but award reservations from SFO/SJC just don't exist. So, I really appreciated the ability to at least redeem for dollars off - it meant I could get a ticket to DTW for 30,000 miles instead of 50,000.

As it is now, all I can use miles for are upgrades on my SFO-NRT monthly, and even so I'm still flush with miles. SFO-NRT nets me currently about 36,000 miles (double miles amex, 100% plat bonus, 50% class bonus, -30k to upgrade == still positive mileage).

ttjoseph

If you have so many excess miles, why not redeem some for SQ or KE F for an occasional NRT trip?