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Originally Posted by Reindeerflame
(Post 16540105)
I have never had more success than in the last two years in avoiding payment for flights and instead flying nearly free for most of my flights.
My primary goal with FF miles is to get free international reward travel - business class (since the 2 airlines I use the most - CO and Delta - don't have 3 class planes for the most part - maybe not at all). Or perhaps first class transcontinental (like I'lm doing JAX/ATL/LAX this year on Delta - but I wouldn't pay up in terms of miles on CO - since half the trip - JAX/IAH - is on a 2/1 Embraer). Heck - I could get all the "free" flights I want from JAX to LGA or EWR - but why would I do that if I'm using my miles at < $1 per mile? Like slider34 - I insist on getting more than $1/mile - as much as possible more. IMO - the international front of the plane trips are where it's at IMO in terms of maximizing use of miles. Robyn |
Originally Posted by slider34
(Post 16538380)
Thanks for letting me know MCO is difficult to obtain.
I'm under the mindset that if I can't get $1.00 per mile I don't use miles. So for me to fly to Orlando and use 50,000 round trip that would mean I can't find flights for less than $500.00 which is never the case. Thus I would just pay for the flights instead and save the miles for another day. If I had a million miles lying around or didn't travel often then it would be a different story. Personally I don't use miles unless I can get at least $0.02/mile. |
Originally Posted by lwildernorva
(Post 16535316)
Yeah, flying was a whole lot better when you could smoke your cigarette, walk out onto a tarmac, and board a prop plane that had a better than negligible chance of crashing.
Oh yeah, FF programs have jumped the shark (hey, thanks for the retro use of a term nobody's used since 2000). Because nobody gets to fly anywhere, anymore on any FF program. I mean nobody's interested in FF programs at all. Oh, wait, there's at least one internet forum that appears to be devoted to discussing in minute detail how to get FF miles? And a ton of blogs? And every time a credit card company puts out an offer more people jump on it? As the eminent hipster Emily Litella used to say, "Never mind. . ." FWIW - the Holy Grail of many old time FF people like me is free front of the plane international travel. It's where you're getting at least $4-8 or sometimes more per mile. A lot of us old-timers got used to being able to get it. If we saved our miles - and were patient. And planned our trips carefully. Now - it's seems to be on its way to becoming an historical footnote. Robyn |
Originally Posted by robyng
(Post 16540304)
I have flown a lot of those prop planes over the years. From Philadelphia to Ithaca NY. Miami to Tallahassee. Miami to Bimini (sea planes). Etc. I'm not sure what the crash/death stats were on those flights - but a lot were kind of scary because they were small planes that couldn't fly "over the weather" (whether the weather was snowstorms up north in the winter - or thunderstorms in the south in the summer). The one thing I can tell you for sure. The barf bag factor was really way up there :D. But I find myself on planes these days that still don't get "over the weather".
FWIW - the Holy Grail of many old time FF people like me is free front of the plane international travel. It's where you're getting at least $4-8 or sometimes more per mile. A lot of us old-timers got used to being able to get it. If we saved our miles - and were patient. And planned our trips carefully. Now - it's seems to be on its way to becoming an historical footnote. Robyn |
Originally Posted by robyng
(Post 16540201)
Heck - I could get all the "free" flights I want from JAX to LGA or EWR - but why would I do that if I'm using my miles at < $1 per mile? - I insist on getting more than $1/mile - as much as possible more.
it did make me think what a $1 per mile redemption would be... :D |
The rules may change but it's still the same game. It has always been find the promo and milk it, whether it's the 2x deals last year, RDU/STL/BNA/PIT for AA, the current LAX-PVG deals on AA and UA/CO, 2x LAX/SFO-ORD/DFW etc, etc etc. Of course, it would be more appropriate to complain (the great American pastime,) about high airfares and hotel rates. I do miss the 3x promos and the low Asian and Euro fares, but nothing lasts forever.
As far as awards, I see some issues, but it is more a matter of lower capacity and more mileage balances generated with coins, credit cards etc, putting more miles into the system. That said, I still find award space that meets my needs, being flexible. |
Originally Posted by robyng
(Post 16540304)
FWIW - the Holy Grail of many old time FF people like me is free front of the plane international travel. It's where you're getting at least $4-8 or sometimes more per mile. A lot of us old-timers got used to being able to get it. If we saved our miles - and were patient. And planned our trips carefully. Now - it's seems to be on its way to becoming an historical footnote. Robyn
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By "twitter substitute", I was saying that a lot of the posts on FT say nothing, offer little or nothing and are meaningless almost on arrival. There's nothing wrong with Twitter, texting or other forms of communication-I use them too to find out information I need fast. But filling FT with meaningless posts about information useful only to the poster-like how many hard pulls you've had in the last month-has really changed FT and for many ruined it. To prove my point, just look at the number of FT posts by many of the most active participants-low totals, indicating recent arrival. Now high totals don't assure wisdom, but in my mind's eye, things have changed and not for the better.
As a smart person once said, on the Internet there is lots of information but not much knowledge. |
Originally Posted by rbAA
(Post 16540476)
As far as awards, I see some issues, but it is more a matter of lower capacity and more mileage balances generated with coins, credit cards etc, putting more miles into the system. That said, I still find award space that meets my needs, being flexible.
I wonder where things go in a year or two. Many people with fat FF accounts seeking to use them-I think of Mr. Pickles as the poster boy here, as I recall he claims to have 1.7 million AA miles and to have never set foot on an AA aircraft. So do you think AA will just allow Mr. Pickles et al to take all of the available award flights? If so, how does AA use AAdvantage to get people to buy tickets and fly using them? Good questions, with uncertain answers to come. P.S. Lest anyone think I am being critical of Mr. Pickles, au contraire. I rarely laugh harder than when I'm reading one of his great schemes. He's one of the funniest people I media today to me-somewhere below Steven Colbert but certainly above Larry Kudlow and Kathy Lee. |
Originally Posted by MrHalliday
(Post 16540334)
Of course you likely mean 1 cpm, but still...
it did make me think what a $1 per mile redemption would be... :D |
Originally Posted by trooper
(Post 16534865)
Just quietly... since you mentioned it... IMO the ban on smoking is the biggest improvement since the jet engine....;)
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Originally Posted by Mountain Trader
(Post 16540564)
a lot of the posts on FT say nothing, offer little or nothing and are meaningless almost on arrival. There's nothing wrong with Twitter, texting or other forms of communication-I use them too to find out information I need fast. But filling FT with meaningless posts about information useful only to the poster-like how many hard pulls you've had in the last month-has really changed FT and for many ruined it.
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Originally Posted by Mountain Trader
(Post 16540564)
By "twitter substitute", I was saying that a lot of the posts on FT say nothing, offer little or nothing and are meaningless almost on arrival. There's nothing wrong with Twitter, texting or other forms of communication-I use them too to find out information I need fast. But filling FT with meaningless posts about information useful only to the poster-like how many hard pulls you've had in the last month-has really changed FT and for many ruined it. To prove my point, just look at the number of FT posts by many of the most active participants-low totals, indicating recent arrival. Now high totals don't assure wisdom, but in my mind's eye, things have changed and not for the better.
As a smart person once said, on the Internet there is lots of information but not much knowledge. OTOH - Twitter - Facebook? Does anyone really want to know that I'm at Whole Foods - and the chorizo sausage looks great today? I sure don't need that info from anyone I know. As for Facebook - my favorite thing about that is the South Park episode - the one where Kyle (?) goes from 0 to like 400k friends. If you haven't seen it - see it. Note that my 92 year old father is on Facebook - because a lot of people he meets want to have a 92 year old friend on Facebook. Not that any of these "friends" would ever meet him for lunch or dinner :rolleyes:. IOW - be a real friend. Concerning the cloud - as people who have tons of sensitive and/or hard to get financial records/data on computers - not to mention thousands of pictures and tons of music - well I don't think "the cloud" will take better care of my stuff than I do. I back up every day. Does the cloud? And where does it back up? And what do you do when it gets hacked? As for the phrase "hard pull" - when I first saw it - it sounded somewhat intriguing and dirty :). But when I found out it had to do with credit card applications <snooze>. Robyn |
Got any good (read: low mark-up) sites for bonds?
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Originally Posted by kokonutz
(Post 16538376)
It ain't what it used to be.
<snip> Having lots of miles and top status used to be something special. Now it's just something. When I started with "our" program, we were all pretty equal at the bottom, which was also the top. Then they added "Premier". Then they started making you re-earn it each year. Then they created "Premier Executive". Then 1K (as you say, with special rooms, special luggage tags each year and each airport, and really special treatment). Now "top status" is UGS, and friends of mine who have it say it's "really something special". Lots of ups to the pointy end of the plane on International, etc. I never made it to UGS, though. Is top status really deteriorating, or are so many people getting to "top status" that they periodically have to make a new, higher "top status" that's really, really hard to get to (a la HON on Lufthansa) and that now gets the perks we were used to? |
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