I redeem for benefits where there is no chance of me paying regular price for it.. isn't that a perk of FlyerTalk, where we are obtaining what we consider unobtainable in our lives?..

I end up doing trips and increased frequencies where I have no business doing.. but because everything is now within reach and affordable, I don't see why we can't take advantage of these far out perks..

and its not that we won't be spending the money anyways.. but its getting maximum value for what is being spent.. not just spending less..

Or... you could use those Priority Club points to redeem for a 5k Point Breaks night. Or the many, many 15k redemption opportunities at Holiday Inns that sell for $100+.

Or switch over to Marriott points that can easily be worth 1 cent each.

Sounds like you might want to do a little more research.

Especially when you factor in the $0.75 - $2 or more, per day, for the FF surcharge. It has to be a bonus of at least 1000 miles or 600 WN points before I'm willing to consider paying the fee.

None of this really compares to Club Bing. Such a ridiculously small payoff and so much hassle with Microsoft's lack of customer service.

Moreover, Alamo (anywhere) and all the agencies at BOS charge me the "limit", whether it's a day or a week.

addiction costs money.

I recall one great use of miles was when I wanted to fly to Aspen to ski one winter but it was going to be $800 RT on United with a short connection in Denver.

Using miles, I was able to save all that money as the trip cost only 25,000 miles!

Ok so that was great.

But then when I wanted to go the following year and only had about 24900 miles in my account at the time, I figured I would buy something on the MP mall. I knew to both do this well in advance and also to book the ticket well in advance.

I bought something that I needed and would generate at least 100 miles within 6-8 weeks.

At week 12 I was wondering what to do now. This was cutting into that time frame one should be booking a ticket far out from. This began taxing my brain and time on the phone or emailing United and MP about it all.

At week 15 I got angry. And had now escalated this to places within the airline or the mall consortium most had never been. Finally at week 18 I got my mere mileage posting... only to now find that the mileage award I wanted was no longer available. We flew to CA to ski instead (traveler 2 had her own miles and waited for my booking).

In the process I got INTO this stuff with malls and promos and failed T&Cs and all that crap.

I had been upset, had wasted time on the phone, faxes printouts, computer time, time not working, and more.

So were both trips worth it in the end or could I have been better off *JUST* spending the money?

I dunno but now it's far too late. I am in the game--deep. I cant get out and dont want to

Received a promo email from DL inviting me to use SkyMiles Shopping for Groupon purchases, with a two day window for 16 mi. per dollar, plus a 250 mi. bonus. I already had reason to make a couple of Groupon purchases, so I signed up with "SkyMiles Shopping" -- including setting up a new Groupon account and email address, so as not to confuse the offerer. At one stage, received a web page from Cartera saying - i.e. - "Now go shop." I did. No indication from that point forward that it had anything to do with SkyMiles Shopping. My first encounter with Cartera.* And I wouldn't even have paid attention to the name if it hadn't been for the commentary in FT.

The Groupon confirmation did show up, and it was a super discount, so it's good enough. But I don't think I'll go that route again for a Groupon until I see some evidence that this purchase made it to my Cartera - er - SkyMiles Shopping account.


* Y'all did warn me. But I didn't know that it was Cartera until I was in deep.

I have a somewhat different take on the miles game than most. Over the last eight years I (actually we, ned and mrs. ned) have accumulated and burned millions of miles. We use the miles almost exclusively for long haul premium seats and hotel rooms. We also give tickets to our children and siblings. This year we will burn approximately one million miles. For our travel my goal is to have a premium award ticket for the cost of an economy ticket. So if the total of taxes, fuel surcharges, fees, etc., and the cost of acquiring the miles is less than the cost of an economy ticket I am satisfied. I have taken advantage of most of the lucrative activities to accumulate miles: savings bonds, gift cards, cc bonuses, the mint, etc., etc. I no longer engage in any activity unless the reward is substantial. What I do now is take advantage of opportunities to �buy� miles when the price is right for me. This right price for me will vary by program and the form of �buying� will vary. �Buying� may take the form of an outright purchase, paying a surcharge when paying taxes, exchanging miles for a fee, etc. Of course to keep the overall cost of miles reasonable I continue to jump on the good free opportunities that become available.

Bravo..

My mindset is similar.. I don't spend time punching in Juice box codes to get 10 miles per transaction.. I swipe the cc and accumulate the miles on regular spend and special one time purchases..

While I don't spend a million per year in redemptions.. I have redeemed over 1.5 million miles, and currently have over 400,000 miles in the account..

There is still some untapped potential cc spend as we handle operating costs for close to $50 million in commercial and residential property.. still working with the accountant to find a way to harness the potential..

This would put me up to your league..

??

Isn't that what the majority of us do?



Sorry I had to.


I do think it's great that you gift tickets to your family/friends. Keep it up.

Big waste of time & no rewards. Lenghy medical surveys about the Doctor. I rather "feed" the paper shredder.

Spouse wants me to help her fill out a survey the medical insurance sent to her. I rather spend my time filling out a credit card application for 50K+ miles. Much better use of my time. ^

My redemptions are usually Y, 25K within NA, or HI in Y

e-rewards comes in first for the hours I spent doing surveys which, after asking 25 or 30 questions, would come back and say I didn't qualify for the survey. It only took me a half dozen or so before I abandoned that site as a scam. The surveyors were gleaning tons of information from me prior to telling me I didn't qualify, and their only obligation was 5 or so points. Prior to that, I'd completed a very lucrative survey (75 points?) and they never credited me with them. Good riddance.

The next is the B of A 100,000 credit card offer. I accumulated several thousand miles in addition to the bonus before I did a test and realized that an economy award seat to the UK was just $200 less than what I could have booked with cash. I paid one annual fee, but have yet to find a way to ditch the miles.

BTW, I participated in the stamps.com promo and was awarded 2500 miles on 9/7. On 9/26, out of the blue, Stamps.com sent me a notice that they'd received my request to cancel my account and would do so immediately. Funny because I never asked them to cancel my account. So I guess I have the others who went through hoops to get their account canceled for saving me a lot of aggravation.

That is not e-reward. It must be My Point. Because e-Reward does not award points, nor it gives 5. It is usually 0.25 or 0.50 or 1.00 $ when you are not qualified - usually dont take more than a couple more screens.

The survey from My Point though, is scam - and they get what they deserve for - put in fake info and quickly get out of the survey with 10 points. 2 minutes thingie.

That is not BA or Chase's fault - you should have researched BA program first before applying the card for the 100K miles. A lot of it have been discussed on this forum that coach award is not worth it due to the YQ. It is best used for business or first class awards because BA has a superior product. Folks consider paying the YQ to travel at business or first class, is like buying a coach ticket but flying business or first. Well worth it to many (including myself.)

Dont you know redemption of domestic AA, including Alaska and Hawaii, do not have YQ? Nor the redemption to South America on AA or LA also dont have YQ? Many have used the miles on LA to South America including the expensive Easter Island. (not a destination I would go, but it is a "trophy" destination and it costs a lot more AA miles to go there than BA miles, just so you know now if you want to "ditch" your BA miles.)

No, it definitely was e-rewards. It's been so long ago that I forgot the currency it uses. Let's revise that to say that it would give me a nickel for answering 25 questions. In the beginning, it was great. I completed a moderate amount of surveys and redeemed the points/e-dollars for airline/hotel points. All was good. Then they limited the number of times you could redeem an airline award in one calendar year. Then they started allowing companies to ask a ton of questions (questions such as, "In what investment vehicles do you mainly invest?") before telling you that you didn't qualify, and here's your nickel.

I didn't say it was their fault. The question was what was the most I invested for the least return.

Yes, I've read that. I'll be investigating that further.

This has been an entertaining thread. My time invested vs. miles/points earned pet peeves: 1).My Points - total scam. 2). E-rewards; asks way too many demographic questions (sometimes involving 10+ minutes) only to be told you don't "qualify" for a survey. I have actually gotten pretty good at knowing when the questions are leading toward an abrupt cut-off/disqualification, and at that part I start to give them totally false information; in my opinion they have cheated me (wasted my time to glean demographics then reward me 50 cents) so I hope to skew their data somewhat. I actually have earned 2,000 USAir points per year thru them for the past 3 years, and maybe a small gift certificate (used to be Borders) as well, but I have begun to wonder if the time spent is worth it. Their "survey partners" also perpetuate ageism in my opinion, so if you are in your 50's or 60's and admit this to them, you are not very likely to get picked for a survey unless it is about banking or investments. Their partners are not interested in the shopping/dining habits of 50/60 year olds! 3). AAdvantageeshopping: Still awaiting an award from 11 months ago along with several others; I have been asked repeatedly for the order #, etc. and when this and all other pertinent information is sent to them I continue to get e/mails requesting the same information and verification over and over again. I have missed out on over 2,500 miles this past year because I was told I "didn't click thru" the eshopping portal, did not provide the correct order number, etc. Also, two years in a row I did not receive the "Holiday Bonus" award of 500 miles until I bugged them multiple times over many months, each time providing verification of qualifying for the award. 4). Car rental miles; almost never worth it when you compare the paltry award mileage to a great deal on Priceline.

I would tend to agree with all of your posting list here.

I am going to add UA shopping mall to this and anything run by Cartera, who does many of the airline malls.

I am beginning to think it is time to only pay attention to the big scores.

then again, 1000 little ones IS a big one, is it not? When it works