Maybe this should be a sticky, to remind ourselves:

Thought this would be a nice reminder to start logging into your dormant airline and hotel accounts to see when your miles expire. If they expire this year, sign up for Idine under that airline, register your credit card and charge a small meal/lunch at a participating restaurant and this will re-activate your miles another three years.

If you need tips for how to keep your miles active, I'll list a few here:

AA: Idine, Opinionplace, Kelloggs miles, transfer from hotels: Starwood,
Priority Club, Hilton, car rental, hotel stay,

UA: Idine, car rental, hotel stay, transfer from hotels:Starwood, Priority Club,

NW: Idine, car rental, hotel stay, transfer from hotels: Starwood, Priority Club

DL: Idine. car rental, hotel stay, transfer from hotels: Starwood, Priority Club

CO: Idine?, car rental, hotel stay, transfer from hotels: Starwood, PC Club

Good luck...

Here's another tip : car rental. Normally I credit my Avis rentals to BA (250 miles per rental) but occasionally switch it to a US airline (50 miles a day) to "activate" the account against expiration. Like the OP, I also use iDine for the same purpose.

Not sure about the other airliners. AA, UA, NW all have these partnerships with merchants from their websites. Make sure you shop via the airliner's link though. Some of them evern offer bonus miles for your holiday shopping.

Thanks for starting the thread, Sggolf. One question, though. Does the credit have to be posted on the account (and therefore can be viewed online) by year's end, or would it be all right to simply have the transaction dated on or before December 31? If the former, it may already be too late now. I am thinking about Delta in particular. The debit (of an insignificant number of miles) for a magazine subscription ordered weeks ago still has not been posted. Does anyone have any experience here? Any comments appreciated.

The original post is a kind reminder. However, one should note that several airlines have 3 year expirations that do not necessarily end on December 31st.

Delta: miles expire on 12/31 3 years after the last activity
Northwest: rules state that miles expire after 3 years but there are several reports of miles not expiring
Continental: rules state that they have the option of cancelling miles after 18 months of no activity but there are many reports that this rule is not enforced.
United: miles expire 3 years after the date of last activity. This is strictly enforced. You can buy back your miles for 1 year after it expires.
American: miles expire 3 years after the date of last activity. I read a magazine article about someone losing 1M miles. They wrote to American in advance asking that their miles not be cancelled. American refused. The passenger played chicken and saw their account drop to zero.

Add to that

British Air: miles expire 3 years after the date of last activity.
Midwest: miles expire 3 years after the date of last activity.

That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard of. Why would anyone play chicken with 1M miles? For that many miles, it'd be worth doing a tiny MR (e.g. LAX-SAN) just to keep the account active!

Forget the MR, I would buy a box of cereal!

Unfortunately, as reported recently here in the AA forum, Kelloggs is no longer producing ceral boxes with AAdvantage coupons. If anyone needs a few boxes to complete a set of 5, now is the time to try to find them.

Yes, I noticed that my daughter's delta account would expire this December so I switched a credit card to her account and ate at a restaurant. Did the same with my account even though I had til next year - this way the expiration will be the same and easier to remember. She only has 7122 - but why lose them. I have 108K and definitely don't want to lose them. You never know when aa won't come through with availability and Delta will. Most of my miles were from MCI and and AMEX credit card promotions.

dgordon, you may want to top another free 10K to the Delta accounts for your family. Have you played the Dash to the Gate Game yet? There are cross posting of this promo all over Delta forum, MilesBuzz!, SPAM...etc.

Edited Just read the update from other forums. Seems Delta just pulled this promo. Hope you didn't miss it though!

lin821

Don't give up on the game yet. Some found a way to continue playing it after it was pulled.

However, it's not clear that those miles will post by Dec. 31.

This is good for any Onepass member, and can be found through the website.

1. Go to www.onepass.com (or www.continental.com) and click on Frequent Flier, News & Offers link. Then click on the "Continental Tab". You will see the "Our Gift to You Sweepstakes" link:
"Win a $5,000 gift card in the "Our Gift to You" Sweepstakes
The gift-giving season -- it's the ideal time to visit Continental Airlines ShopOnePass. Here you'll find something for everyone on your holiday list, plus a gift of 100 OnePass bonus miles.
Register Now 19 days left from 12/12/2004.
(Ends Fri., Dec. 31, 2004) Mon., Nov. 1, 2004 posted. "

So, click that link, and type in your Onepass Number in the white box in the blue window.
Other terms:
"The gift-giving season -- it's the ideal time to visit Continental Airlines ShopOnePass. Here you'll find something for everyone on your holiday list, and there's a gift of OnePass miles for you. Plus with a little luck, you could even win one of these valuable prizes:
Grand Prize: $5,000 Circuit City� Gift Card.
First Prize (2): L.L.Bean� Camping Package for Four or Kayaking Package for Two.
Second Prize: DellTM 17 inch LCD TV.
Third Prize (10): Staples� Digital Imaging Package.
Register for a chance to win with promotion code 56040 by using the form on this page or by calling 1-800-346-6090.
It's that easy. And, as our gift to you, receive 100 bonus miles* just for registering. You'll also earn up to 20 miles per dollar spent at ShopOnePass. With over 30 retailers to choose from, perfect gifts are easy to find. For convenience, value and a chance to win, visit ShopOnePass for the holidays.

* Limit one entry and one 100-mile reward per person per OnePass number. "

______
P.S. Yes, the Delta "Dash to the Gate" game works for 10,000 miles, and even though it points you to a slow off-site website hosted by an Irvine CA ISP, it is legit, and you will get a Delta email the next day confirming it. I have not yet seen it posted, but it is a good (!) deal. Only posting of find of it is in flyertalk.com, and it is not linked thru the DL website.

Thanks for the kind reminder. However, I think I might have just lost a few thousand Delta Skymiles to expirations. Anyone have experience in talking Delta into reinstating those? I know it's not much to lose, but when you combine that with the Dash to the gate bonus, I am really close to a free ticket. Thanks in advance.

LAX

I was wondering the same thing. Two of my family members have miles expiring 12/31/20004 and IDine miles usually post the beginning of the following month so in this case January. Will this activity be enough to keep the accounts active?