those are hard earned nickle and dime miles, 500 here and 1000 there...not to mention innumerable sleepless nights searching for them.... http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif
takes a long time to save up 25,000 for a domestic ticket, that is why i am really reluctant to let it go... would rather pay than redeem....

Earning is a lot of fun. I too enjoy the thrill of the chase.

But seeing what they can bring is very nice. I used miles to upgrade a friend's wife when she flew to Europe. Never flew in FC before. The profuse thank yous were well worth 20K (could only upgrade 1 way).

Ditto when I was able to send a friend to visit his brother and nephew in Alaska.

I save money because money = security. I'll spend miles because miles = fun.

------------------
"I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered. My life is my own."

I enjoy accumulating the miles but I also enjoy using them just as much for the free trips and getting the upgrades. It's interesting how these promos and bonus opportunities influence behavior. Especially now that I travel more and more for business.

I'm sure there are mileage program marketing managers out there just rubbing their hands together thinking of the best way to tap into our obsession/addiction/afliction et al and get us to do something for the miles.

What a bunch of lab rats we are! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/rolleyes.gif

I'm an earner until I've requalified for at least Delta Gold Medallion each year then I'm a spender.

I will use miles for upgrades on a paid fare even if I haven't yet requalified.

Where my parents and family are concerned I'm always a spender. Just knowing my Mom brags to her friends that her son sent her first class to Las Vegas for her birthday makes me smile. Mom and Dad are on a trip to China right now and I helped them upgrade to First with Diners Club Rewards miles.

But 'ya know, I'd really rather earn miles!

Jim

And talking about miles and upgrades,
sure beats talking about the Clintons!

Being relatively new in the "earning" category (2 years?), I've still got a long ways to utilising ALL possibilities for earning capacity. Then watch out! I'll be bursting with miles and wild with FF euphoria.

At the beginning of this calendar year, I had a total of over 250,000 ff miles between three accounts, and not wanting to part with any. My first ff miles redemption was a domestic RT EUG-DCA, booked at 8 pm Monday, departed 6 am Tuesday, and returning on Thursday. Boy, what power, how extravagant, what a whim! Saw a Dali exhibit in DC, met FTers at an Irish Pub, and got some online booking bonuses from Starwood. It felt great doing something that normally I would not even act upon. That flight would have cost me over 2100 dollars, one less FT opportunity (midweek? rare), and more Dali research.

Like geo1004 and others, I pay for my own plane tickets out of my own pocket, so spending miles for the DREAM department is a good way to go. I have since used another 50,000 miles to take an employee to WDW, and have a trip to NYC on hold. I will not part with miles to upgrade, since legroom is not an issue with me. Although getting upgraded by status over 15 segments this year gives me another perspective and I may be getting spoiled and fat (too much cheesecake in FC). I made my first extensive mileage run for triple miles this July, and I'm currently planning the rest of year's itinerary to utilize mileage earnings and achieve status quotas. In the future, I plan to use miles for a friend to accompany me on a trip, and I also want to keep a large stash for in case of an emergency as others have mentioned.

What can I say? I love earning miles, and I love spending them. The planning of the whole scenario is my hobby. You better believe I'm a list maker! And there went the garden, the aquarium, the collecting....

Linda

I love collecting miles. Then I don't want to use them for free flights since I still benefit of good youth fares, so I want to take upgrades. But when I'm not travelling alone (most of the time) but with some non-milager they can't so I end up in coach again. How the heck should I spend them anyway? ;-)

I have been an addict twice...

In the late 80's, early 90's I gained a lot of miles on several programs and squandered them all....

From the early to mid 90's I still flew a lot, but with so many different airlines and carriers that I could never get status nor heavy accounts...

From the mid-90's thru today I have put together over 1.5 million miles on two carriers. I only used 100,000 grand for my honeymoon with my wife. I will never give them away (except to her).

I will never use them for free flights and in the future only on upgrades internationally. My goal is to never fly in economy on a flight longer than 3 hours again. For the last 5 years, I have accomplished this 100% of the time (when not flying on business, in which case the point is moot).

Knowing that at the moment I do not have to fly in Economy agin for the next 10 years or so gives me great satisfaction.

Besides cash, travel is the most cherished gift (according to the USA Today, anyway). I burned over 700,000 AA miles in 5 years, mainly as gifts to Mom (rt FC to Japan x2) and a couple of fc trips for wife, self, mom, aunt and uncle to Hawaii. I've also just given a close cousin a fc honeymoon rt to the Cayman Islands on USAIR miles and I'm sure that will be remembered much more than if we gave a place setting!!! Since my wife and I have no kids, I don't want to wait until we're too old to enjoy adventure travel. The current trip we booked to Hawaii was reserved even though I still had yet to earn 25,000 miles to cover the two fc rt tickets. Once we get too old for the hectic fly there, have fun, fly home routine, we'll hang out with the cruise ship folks. Although previous fters worried about the lessening value of miles, I've already seen it in less availability of ff flights...remember a few years back when you could almost get any itinerary you wanted on ff miles?

I definitely enjoy both. Like some others, I don't worry so much about the total balance with my primary carrier, as long as it doesn't get too low, but I do become obsessed with status miles. I go out of my way to earn every extra 500 miles I can.

I definitely believe that the value of miles will only continue to decline, so I'm not afraid to put them to good use. I like to use them for family, and although I try not to waste miles on domestic runs that would be relatively inexpensive, I have done so.

My wife stays at home with our children the 35 to 40 weeks a year that I travel (usually in F/C thanks to CO's wonderful upgrade policy), so I take her away once or twice a year (w/o children), and definitely fly her in F/C even if I have to EasyPass it (burn extra miles for seats when regular award seats aren't available).

I'm definitely addictive, and competitive, but isn't earning free stuff what it's all about.

I am relieved to know that there are others out there who also are reluctant to spend the miles. The common theme is that people prefer to use miles as gifts or to get upgraded travel for their spouses/family and friends. Very few people use miles to buy economy tickets though at times of emergency they can be life-savers. With low competitive air fares available for advance purchase economy travel, I guess the best use for miles are the upgrades, specially on the long-haul flights.

Thank you FTers for the insite; it has been very useful. BTW, I never thought I reach 100 posts so soon http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif

I acquire miles and points to use them and the benefits they come along with. I save them for a rainy day, or a special trip. I love free things!!! Who doesn't?

I love thinking about how much something would have cost me had I not had the miles/points to use them?

For example, my wife and I got recently went FC to Seattle from MSP for $200 each, and stayed at the W Seattle in a junior suite that would have cost at least $350 a night for free.

For $400, we got to live like the Jet Set crowd, we got more for our money than I could dream of. I like to accumulate miles, but spending them is what life is all about. it's not like money- money can set you free and give you independence. miles can not. They are a luxury, not a necessity, and using them is in and of itself a luxury.

For all of you that love accumlating miles, but get no joy in spending them, please contact me, as I will be happy to spend them for you.

Part of this has to do with the fact that we are young and have no kids, knowing that we won't be able to do things like that if we had kids....

For me the joy comes in spending miles for an upgrade to a higher class cabin while earning miles for the lower paid class fare at the same time.

There's nothing like give a little and then take some. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif It makes me a happy person at 35,000 ft for 10+ hours.

[This message has been edited by jazzhou (edited 09-18-2000).]

Using them. It costs so *#@#*#&* much to fly out of the local airport, that I usually drive to MSP to fly. It's usually 1/3 to 1/4 the cost. So I relish when I can fly out of the local airport for nothing, like my open jaw to Tampa/from Ft. Myers last winter which was over $1100, best price at the time.

i am with the majority here, but didn't realize until last month....

i've been collecting from a lot of bustrav the last couple of years and have just started to begin redeeming when my fiance questioned "why would you rather spend $120/night @ marriott than use a few thousand of your points?"

it was still hard to do this, even though i saved about $500 and hardly dented my marriott rewards balance.

a feel like pavlov's dog... when the ff miles ring, i am salivating http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

[This message has been edited by kev LAX (edited 09-20-2000).]

I had been wondering about why I enjoy earning miles. I realized one important, yet unpublished, benefit: The complete control over the size of your Milage account.

This fall, the growth in my AAdvantage account has taken my mind of the decline in the value of my tech-dominated brokerage accounts. I check my milage balance much more than the brokerage accounts, making sure that the miles and upgrades are posting correctly. I wonder how I would have reacted if the charts were reversed http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/tongue.gif

By nature, people accumulate whatever gives them joy. Everybody accumulates money; but accumulating miles is definitely more exciting http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif. And since you have total control over the direction of your account, being a milage junkie makes you feel good even if you are not doing all that well accumulating money. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/confused.gif (it is way pass my bedtime perhaps).



[This message has been edited by SJC2ISP (edited 12-07-2000).]

Earning the miles is just a means to the end more travel ... however, I'm always reluctant to spend miles because I always thing there will be a better use for my miles right around the corner. In the past year and change I've spent our (me + girlfriend) miles on:

2 BC tickets on UA to HNL + 5 free nights at the Hilton Hawaiian Village (PiP Express & PiP ... the best use of miles ever for me I dare say http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif )

1 FC ticket on Swissair MSY-BCN

1 BE ticket on DL MSY-BCN

1 BE upgrade on DL CLT-LGW

This compares to having spent my miles previously on domestic FC upgrades and coach tickets. I learned the best use of my miles is in the longer journeys in premium classes of service http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

I can get compulsive about both, but I'm definitely on the "user" side, having earned about 1.5 million lifetime miles and spent 1.3 million of them.

Like a few others here, my funds are very tight. I'm too much of a mileage miser to use awards for anything but free travel. I'll typically do short domestic or Europe trips to earn miles and longer trips to "cheap" countries (Southeast Asia is a favorite) for redemptions.

A big part of the game is piecing together elaborate bookings, using the Internet as an aid.

You can do it for both paid tickets and award tickets. On award tickets, I really like to use the stopover and open-jaw rules to best advantage (why see one place when you can see 2 or more?)

It's also neat to dig through the partner and other awards and frame the possibilities. I especially like the more out-of-the-way places; a recent sidetrip for an Asia trip went Manila-Marshall Islands-Guam-Yap-Manila. Great trip, and for only 20,000 miles (vs. a $1,000 paid ticket).

It takes way too much time to book it all and get it to work, so there must be something habit-forming about that. I think it's important to use the miles, though.

me...
I'm a fanatic for collecting but enjoy using. i was able to using 80k DL points to upgrade my mom and sister from coach to Biz from SAT to FRA in June. They paid $900 each and got Biz seats listed at $6400 each. They couldn't stop talking about the experience since they had never flown FC or Biz before. The pleasure on my part was significant. I also use my points to upgrade my wife to FC when she travels on business. Now that's where the rewards really come into play http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif I love it when she comes home after a long flight and returns the favor! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif

I hardly ever use miles for travel, because I'm usually in one of two situations: either I can get an inexpensive ticket or someone else (a client; when it's my own company, we can plan for discount fares) is paying.

I use them for upgrades, especially trans-oceanic, where the price difference is absurd but the number of miles is not so bad. And I've used them once in a while for "whim" travel when cheap tickets were not available, as in attending a Wednesday evening party given by a friend on the opposite coast of North America (no Saturday night stay, ticket would have cost $2,000+; I used 25,000 miles).

More than anything else, though, I give them away. The most recent was a US round trip to a niece graduating from college. In terms of value, it was her biggest present from anyone except her parents. It was appreciated even more than a check for the price of a ticket would have been. I think, subconsiously, people think about all those hours we have to spend sealed into aluminum tubes to earn the 25,000 miles or whatever.

I can imagine wanting to use lots of miles to travel with a special someone, though my current situation doesn't lend itself to that. Still, I'd be tempted to use miles for her business/first class ticket, buy myself a cheap ticket so I'd earn miles, and use a few more miles to upgrade that!

Thanks to RustyC -
for bringging this interesting question back to the top.

Me - I find earning the miles is a lot of hard work. I find the joy comes in using them so that one of our children can fly to visit us, or taking my wife with me (F or B of course) on the business trips - which is how I earn ALL my miles.

Am I a miser or not? NO - I think not. Have earned 2.25 million in AA; 800+k in Amex MR and 150k in HH with another 50k in three other airlines. Current AA balance is at 550k; Amex MR is unused and HH is down to 50k because I just gave my middle daughter and her new husband 5 nights at the Hilton Hawaiian Village and three more night at Hyatt on Lahai with a cert for a honeymoon gift. Looking at the AA balance says I have "used" 1.75 million miles on AA for tkts mostly; and mostly for the Wife and Kids. I spent 120k AA miles for my wife and I to go to London B/C (got an freebie to F/C r/t at checkin http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif ) so that is 60k for me and twice bought stickers @ 40k each time for 80k, so that is a total of 140k on me over all these almost 17 years.

Nope - the joy is in seeing others use the miles as in having taken all of the four kids multiple times to SFO, including the Grandson - who loves the coast and the cable cars.
Earning = Hard Work http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/frown.gif
Using = JOY http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif

I like earning the miles.......because I only earn them from flying.......and that means holidays !!!!!

I am fairly new here. Would someone please tell me the benefits and significance of being a one million miler?

Also on this board is it possible to be emailed when someone answers one of my posts?

Thanks, I have learned alot from all of you!

Things have completely changed since miles don't expire in three years anymore. I am definitely in the "earning" miles phase of my life. Since learning that you can become lifetime gold with AA for collecting 1 million miles, I wouldn't think of using an award ticket unless i really had to. I see my mileage account as my 401K for travel. While I can find cheap fares and reap lots of miles, I'll spend the money cause I have it. Once I get lifetime gold, I will be able to use my award travel and be sure of having elite status. I am only 75K away, thanks to these boards. I will lose my platinum status and am really upset that I couldn't fit in two more trips to Europe to achieve it - and get all those miles. Oh, well. But I will have gold, and will achieve my lifetime gold real soon - sort of triple gold! I've used award travel to Mexico and Hawaii and the Caribbean because they are "good value" of miles spent compared to airfares, and miles would have expired. I did one discounted (20,000) domestic. 25,000 for a domestic trip seems "expensive" unless the fares are really high. However, that was all before I knew about lifetime gold, or ways of achieving status such as the challenges. I would have made some different decisions way back when if only I had known (such as signing up for frequent flyer programs sooner - I always though that I didn't fly "enough." I think that the change to miles not expiring has made the difference for a lot of us. I would never be collecting so many miles if they expired in three years.

------------------
DtG

sorry, duped

[This message has been edited by dgordon (edited 12-14-2000).]

Using the miles is ALWAYS better than earning them. Mostly because I get to travel with Mrs. Fundi. Basically being a cheapskate, Mrs. Fundi and I get to enjoy much better vacations that we could normally afford because of the savings in airfare.

As mentioned above, Free tickets make fabulous gifts as well.

The only time I feel regret using miles is when I see really cheap fares to where I am going AFTER I have spent the miles.

I like the fact that I earn most of my miles for business-related travel and then redeem them for vacations.

There's no high in the world for me like sitting in a business- or first-class seat on an international trip and thinking "This would have cost me *thousands* of dollars if I had to pay for it out of my pocket.

The one catch that I've found is that I've become so addicted to requalifying for elite levels each year that I no longer redeem miles for a free vacation ticket. I always buy the cheapest available upgradable ticket and use the miles for an upgrade.

The above quote and others compare collecting miles to other kinds of collecting. There's one huge difference, however, that hasn't been elaborated on: Other collectibles can serve a purpose other than being sold/used. Miles do not.

For example, you don't need to sell a painting for it to be useful. You can hang it on a wall and admire it. It will serve some purpose even if you never sell it. This is true of other things such as coins or stamps.

But what about miles? Unless you get your kicks admiring FF statements or bragging to friends, miles have no use unless they're used.

It's certainly a good idea to save for that big free vacation, but I'd rather be lounging in Maui than admiring my banked miles on a computer.

For you hoarders of miles:
I had two elderly people in my life that died a few years ago. My grandmother and my great aunt.
When my grandmother passed, my mom cleaned out her residence and found all the gifts she had given her over the years, in the cupboards, unused. She was saving them for a special occasion. She never had another special occasion and died at the age of 89. She was saving all those things/experiences for a future that she never took an opportunity to have.
My great aunt, on the other hand, died at 87, and before she died she told me she had regretted plenty of things she had bought, but had never regretted spending her money on one thing: Experiences
She said every penny she'd ever spent on concerts, plays, and lots of travel had enriched her life in many ways and she could treasure those memories always. She never had any regrets from serving in WW2 in the Red Cross in Australia, living in Paris for a year, travelling to the East Coast, South America, etc.
So...what are you waiting for??? Life will always get in the way...unexpected illnesses, job changes, 3 friends who recently found themselves unexpectedly pregnant (but that was a blessing), etc etc. If you don't use the miles today, you might not have time tomorrow.

Just a thought, and a lesson from a wise old lady, my late great Aunt Edy.

When we postpone using miles, we are not postponing travel. In fact, we ARE spending money - getting miles for cheap tickets purchased. In fact, I have traveled more to achieve status and get bonuses. I hadn't been to Europe in 15 years, and I went 3 times this year! So, we are not saving our miles and postponing travel - just the method of "paying" for those tickets. I want to achieve lifetime gold with AA before I use an award ticket - only if the fare were astronomical would I use award travel instead of paying for the ticket right now.

------------------
DtG

It gives me great joy to redeem miles for airline tickets for my children and grandchild.

At 17 years old, not exactly in a position to start giving tickets to grandchildren http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/eek.gif but...

For me, the part that attracts me themost is daydreaming about what I could do with the miles. As it stands, I can almost redeem the miles for a First Class ticket from Asia to US, but I am collecting even more to redeem more lucrative journeys. Hopefully, Star will start a RTW award ticket soon... http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

I have to agree though, once I have children, I would be delighted to redeem miles for tickets for them. Watching the smiles will alone be worth the miles...!

-stargold-

I have used airline miles for me many times and I also used them to have family members to join me on vacations or to visit me. So far, I haven't touched the hotel points, so I have a fat HHonors account.