Miles kept by the Corporation
 

Hi! Does anyone have any information on corporations keeping FF miles?
Any info on studies that evaluate administration costs to maintain program?

Thanks!

Are you writing an article for publication?

Welcome to FT. I would imagine corporations or individuals wouldn't want to release any information if they kept employees miles or required the employees to turn them over. I didn't even think they were allowed to do this since all FF account are suppose to be private.

I worked for a company that kept the miles. We had to sign Power of Attorney forms to give them the right to run our accounts.

Fortunately, the company merged with another company which did not have this policy and we got to keep our miles. Since I also had personal FF accounts, I had to merge the corporate account into my personal account. This apparently is not too common, because it took a lot of effort on my part to make it happen.

I was talking with some people, and either their company or the government (in the case of Federal employees) required them to turn over their miles to their employer. They simply refused to join any FF program, or if they were already a member they didn't bother giving out the number.

I can't imagine a company forcing one of their employees to join a FF program, and forcing them to use it.

A lot of companies have found that the bookkeeping gets to be more trouble than it's worth, and the cost in employee resentment can be very high.

The Federal government finally abandoned this practice several years ago. I recall a thread on FT a few years back. FF accounts are deliberately made personal accounts. That is something that either escapes some people or compells them to try to find ways to circumvent the programs in order to capture the value. Personally, I consider such policy decisions to be small-minded, at best; right up there with Wal-Mart's infamous "unpaid mandatory overtime" shenanigans.

No - just analyzing my companie's process for retention and administration of FF miles.

I could drive the bean-counters crazy if they tried to do this.

I suppose they can get you a Frequent Flyer account and then put that number on the record when you fly on company business- not much you can do about that.

But, if you have existing accounts and they just want you to use the miles you got on company flights for company business, how do they handle, say, mileage bonuses if you attained Elite status through a combination of business and pleasure travel? Even if that doesn't happen, they'd have to track what mileage you earned from business travel to separate it from miles you earned through pleasure travel, credit card purchases, etc.

May I ask what industry you're in and whether this is a small, medium or large company? This is a pretty rude policy.

If your company's employees fly Delta, the company can get many of the benefits of a "corporate" FF program by signing up for the SkyBonus program. It's free. And I believe at least some, if not all of the other major airlines have similar programs. It also removes virtually all of the accounting headaches and the employee resentment issues mentioned above.

Delta SkyBonus

(I have no affiliation with Delta other than as a customer)

MFG large company. One of the many management issues is trying
to manage "Elite" status, 2 cards (personal/business) etc. One card has
business address - other card is for personal miles kept by traveler.

You're not the pointy haired boss, are you...?................ :D

..

From the Northwest Airlines program rules:

"Corporations or other legal entities cannot be enrolled as members.
Only one person may be enrolled per WorldPerks account.

"An individual may have only one account and that must be in his/her real (legal) name. Membership will be listed under the participant's full name including title (Mr., Ms., etc.) and middle initial.

Employer policies to capture FF miles are penny-wise and pound foolish because they breed contempt and send a poor message about how the employer values the time away from home and associated hassles of being on the road. You also make a point about elite status. Since more than 90% of my travel is personal, how do you think I would feel about being told to maintain a separate, non-elite account and sitting in the back because of an employer policy? The bottom line is that the employee is being told to give up far more than the value the employer is likely to receive (if anything) so it's a bad policy move.

Aussie FTers may have additional info but to the best of my knowledge Australian Government employees need to waive their rights to miles accrued while on Government's trips.

Boss - but completing six sigma ticket process of cost to administer this program.

This is very helpful!
Thank you!

OK, this is scary. I work for a sub of a large co. I'll call Giant Enterprise- also a Six Sigma organization. Hope you're with another company.

Tell those Black Belts to go back and do VOC (Voice of Customer) again!

Another thought: the Elite status I get by combining business and personal travel on the same account (couldn't do it with one or the other alone) has many benefits for the conmpany.

When upgraded, I have a restful and more productive business trip.
My current HHonors status means free breakfasts in Hilton properties.
Elite security lines and check-in lines mean I;m more likely to make the plane.
If I miss a connection I'm more likely to get re-routed promptly.
In general, I just feel better about business travel- because it's less hassle and because I'm building up points I can use for my own travel.

Finally- they may over-estimate the value of "valuable points". I redeem mine only with a lot of advance planning. Apparently the airlines do open up Reward travel at the eleventh hour for seats they can't sell- but your employer may find that they can't redeem points for the travel they want you to make unless it's flying from Kansas to Kenosha on a Tuesday. If it's travel to Europe, they can forget it. You may want to do a test of availability of sample trips (many airlines let you do reward travel searches on their Web sites).

The last time I traveled frequently for business, most of my trips were no-weekend-stay short-notice trips from AA hub DFW to places like NYC & BOS. Those tickets usually ran $1500-$2000 RT. At those rates, even an AAnytime 50K award would be a bargain.

That said, a policy saying I couldn't keep my miles would have had me looking for another job. The way I see it, the miles are compensation for all the extra hours I spent on planes on Sundays and weeknights. Unless the business travel were entirely between 9am and 5pm weekdays, then I'd object strongly.

As I have mentioned in another thread, the IRS and Congress have historically avoided (or been unsuccessful in) trying to value and regulate tax implications of FF miles/points, likely in part because they are not very liquid and thus difficult to value. IMHO, if companies start schemes to make these more transferable, that might cause renewed attention to these issues. Some of the results could include reduction of the company's tax deduction for travel costs by the "value" of any FF awarded (regardless of whether the FF were used), along with a host of other undesirable and complex consequences.

There are several large German corporations that require employees to hand over their miles. The corporations then use the miles company-wide for free flights etc.

I don't recommend you follow this path for a six sigma project -- having been there and done that on this specific area -- and/or if you do, then make sure you monitor some baseline measures that may capture the negative byproduct produced (and there are several).

In most cases, the employees most likely to accumulate sufficient mileage for an award ticket are those that are also amongst the most capable to move on (literally). The better way to gain advantage from employee's frequent flier programs MAY be allowing the employees to redeem their miles for tickets and get the amount 1099ed with X% of the savings passed on to the employer. This is a very mutually beneficial item when it comes to "international" business class or first class business travellers. Monetizing the frequent flier account can work to both parties advantages if done right, but it will be, regardless, an accounting headache.

not so rosy...
 

au contraire, I know the corporation where travel department is responsible for managing employee's frequent travel account... they automatically enroll person to FFP if they have to fly any particular airline.. if ee have enough bonus miles and there is award availability, travel dept issue award ticket instead of "paid" ticket...

It's been a few years since I say my friend back in Oz who works in the gov't. but she told me that she had to keep her own log of what was her privately earnt miles and gov't earned ones. She then had to redeem the gov't earnt miles when the balance was big enough. This was subject to audit controls and spot checks. The rational is that you earnt those miles using taxpayers (or the companies) money so they should benefit from the savings. The flyer was getting the benefit of status and priviliges they wouldn't of otherwise got.

With the amount of miles I earnt in my last job, the full fare equivelant would of been more than my yearly salary, so a very nice bonus for me! :D However I think that this didn't compensate me enough for the time I had to spend away from home. :( Catch 22. If my employer tried this I wouldn't of been loyal to any particular airline alliance and not bothered with the miles.

Speaking of Wal-Mart, they require all flights to be booked through their Travel department. I know for a fact that their employees (associates) don't get the frequent flyer miles. I wonder if they negotiate better fares in lieu of FFM because of the sheer volume?

I guess if the fare code purchased is some Priceline-type code, then there would be no frequent flier miles.

In terms of a company forcing an employee to give the company miles, I don't think it's workable. Obviously, the company could fire an employee who wouldn't play the game. Absent this, what's to prevent the employee from saying, "no, I don't want to be a part of those FF programs -- they're all scams." Then, in order to do an end-run around the Travel Dept., the employee just sends the BP to the airline after the fact and gets the miles anyway?

business travel is hard and stressful enough without a greedy employer taking my miles. If the company asked me to enroll in a program for their benefit, I would just decline. I guess a way around this problem is to add the FF number after ticketing and the boarding card is issued - then add the number for credit, or submit the BP for credit after the flight. It would keep the miles out of the boss' hands, but certainly keep the upgrades out of the employee's.

Bottom line - if my job required frequent business travel, I expect to keep my miles and upgrades provided I follow a normal corporate travel policy and my earning activities do not result in additional costs to my company.

I turned down a travel job a few years ago where the employer frowned upon FF memberships and forced employees to travel in coach, declining upgrades (good for team morale, they said), stay in 2* motels, and rent economy cars from second-tier agencies. My answer was to cut the interview short and say 'thanks, but no thanks'. If they want me on the road for their benefit, then I should at least have a shot at being comfortable and stress-relieved.

I have a friend that works for a publication company. She has just 1 frequent flier account for her personal & work travels. She has to provide copies frequent flier statements after her travels for work related reasons. After enough miles have accrued she is then forced to take a mileage ticket to her next destination, of course for work reasons.

Just plain sucks I think. Companies should let us keep our miles.

Ric

Plenty of publishing jobs out there. She should refuse to provide her statements and say she quit the FF game -- thought it was a scam (too many emails, too much cross-marketing, etc.) If Big Brother objects, she threatens to quit. A valuable employee (saying this as someone who has run several businesses) is far more valuable that the few hundred or thousand dollars required to buy the next ticket. A decent company will fold every time. If her employer doesn't fold, she's better off without them.

My company has a policy whereby they'll pay you half the value of the lowest-available fare (via a quote from the corporate travel agency) if you use miles to travel instead. Sometimes, this is quite a good deal for both the employee and the employer.

Say, for example, I needed to fly from IND to EWR (my company's HQ is in NJ, so this is a common route). Our standard fare through the travel agent is around $750. If I can book the flight far enough in advance to get an award seat for 25,000 miles, I can pocket $375, which is right at the 1.5 cents/mile value that many FTers put on miles. But chances are, if I were looking to take that trip for personal travel, it would include a Saturday night stay and the fare would usually be under $300. So I figure that under the right circumstances, I can come out ahead. Also, the company can come out ahead by getting the fare for half the usual amount, and employees are not offended by this kind of program.

One of my colleagues was saving up miles to take his family of 4 to Hawaii (and we all know it's practically impossible to get award seats to Hawaii). Instead, he used this policy for travel to Europe on 4 separate trips so far. He has pocketed about $3,000 from the program and is going to use the money to pay for the entire Hawaiian vacation!

A kind of win-win situation for everybody. Is there the possibility that someone will exploit such a system to essentially embezzle from their employer? Yes. Will it happen? Not very often -- and, even then, very rarely, as long as employee morale is good. For employee travel that is international business class, such a policy can be a windfall for both the employee and the employer -- and in short order reaps substantial gains.

Absolutely! She should simply not use her account number when she travels for work. If they automatically put the number into the reservation, simply ask at the airport that it be removed. When the company asks for the statement she can show that she asked for and received no credit.

Devil's advocate - the company paid for the ticket.

This type of policy is somewhat draconian to my way of thinking...but it is a sure bet to cut down unecessary "business travel" and cut expenses.

This could be applied to hotel programs, rentals as well.

I also work for a sub of "Giant Enterprises" listen to Athena53. Double check the VOC!

Status has helped me get to important customer meetings on-time in the face of multiple flight cancellations, has helped me book into hotels I needed to be for networking opportunites to further the interest of "Giant Enterprises" , I have also turned down job offeres from other company's in part because of the travel policy. If I am on the road and away from my family, at least let it be pleasant as possible.

I understand that it is the company's dollar I'm traveling on, and I abide by all of the rules and select the lowest cost option in our system. The points are a win-win for "Giant Enterprises" and the employees.

maps

Honestly, advice to sabotage corporate process is the worst advice which could be given under circumstances.
If company honestly believes (it has all the reasons to) that miles belong to them, then sucks or not sucks but that's one of the many conditions of employment. I do not honestly believe that someone could chose employment based on such non-essential thing as entitlement to keep miles.

Previous posts suggested that their status sometimes helped them to get to the meetings and/or to hotels. Now, nobody is trying to deprieve somebody from his/her "status" - status is non-separable. But miles - a by-product of corporate money spent on travel could be spent by company on company business.

now, if company policy require to travel coach, then this discussion will be very soon obsolete as A/C tend to gradually decrease benefits over time and now coach traveler on restricted economy fare may expect something like 25% of mileage flown or even nothing... so nothing to earn, nothing to take :(

Angel's advocate -- the company cannot own the miles because it is against the airlines' rules.

No one I know who travels for business is going to take 'unnecessary' trips in order to earn miles.

I think when you get to the Measure phase and determine the cost to control this process, it will get shot down.

Bob

Prospective company: "We'll need you to sign this power of attorney statement allowing us to keep your miles."

Spiff: "That concludes this interview. Good luck!"