If not 50 times, maybe at least 49 times. :p

According to this article the 14 trillion miles accumulated worldwide only equates to $700bn of business. Surely that's less than 1 years worth of business for all airlines globally? And doesn't that mean that since FF programs were created a huge amount of miles haven't been claimed?

The article says:

Later in the article, it says:

So I think when they say "corresponds to a total value", that's just multiplying the 14T by .02

The term accumulated is also ambiguous. Following the footnote link to the source (always a good idea when Wikipedia is involved) helps a little: after the cite, they discuss the worth of the global stockpile of miles. So my guess is that they mean there were 14T miles outstanding in accounts as of then. This would exclude miles that had never been claimed, miles that had expired, and miles that had been redeemed.

More than just the issue of the claim there are many people who travel and are never part of a FFP, those miles just go waste :(

14T * $0.02 is $280B

14T miles worth $700B implies $0.05 per mile

I believe the statement is true, from what I read once in a newspaper about FF, more miles are left in cyperspace unused (unclaimed) now than all the miles combined that has ever been used.
Can't remember the %, but a huge chunk of miles are wasted each year because people don't remember even having them and then they expire. So, I believe the 14trillion miles figure probably includes a huge amt of miles that expired and are useless as they can't even be used by anyone.

United/Continental estimates that 24% of its frequent flying miles go unused (based on its filings with SEC). That's a lot but I would not call it "a huge chunk" - 76% of miles are still redeemed

Is that 24% of miles credited to someone's FF account? Or 24% of miles that could be credited.

I am sure as planesimple already mentioned, there are quite a few people without FF accounts. What happens to those miles?

I flew Texas Intl in the spring of 1980. I bought a multi airline ticket MBS-AUS to visit the Univ of TX for graduate school.

I flew the following:

Northwest
Texas Intl
Southwest
Continental
Braniff

The ticket was alot cheaper with those mix of airlines. At that time, I went to the MBS airport and they wouldn't take my check because I didn't have any credit cards even though I banked one mile away in the small town the airport was near. My mother had to come and write a check as they wouldn't take cash or my check. :mad:

I got ticketed and joined the Texas Intl FF program. Never flew them again.

I've heard/read something about this sometime ago , not sure if it was a newspaper or TV news but basically correct.

Also, the 24% unused is only based on UA/CO numbers and may not reflect the overall industry which could be alot higher, but even if using averages and assume all airlines have about the same unused miles rate at 24%, it is still a big chunk of change as we are talking about close to 3.5-4 TRILLION miles unclaimed.

The man who thought of Frequent Flyer at Western Airlines
 

I worked with Western Airlines in HNL and MIA/FLL from 1977 till they closed the stations around 1983. I was Reservations supervisor in MIA. There was a function of ending a reservation with ER and enter. It gave us a 6 digit reference # like 5AQ782, so we could do a quick recall on the reservation, rather than entering WA561/26JunMiaLAX and passenger name.
I put in a suggestion that the people like Ann Margaret and her husband who live in S. Fla flew Western quite often. My suggestion was to make a passenger name record(PNR) with their names, address, phone and leave the flight segments open, then end this PNR with ER giving that person(s) a unique Code.
Several months went by and I heard nothing from the suggestion section in LAX. I had my manager call them. They said send the original suggestion, we seemed to have misplaced the first one. No I didn't make a copy. About 6 months later, I'm thinking we should have this in place already and still didn't hear anything back. My manager, Sue Molmen, called again. She was told that someone else came up with the same idea at the same time.
So, that's the truth. I never received any credit but have told my kids this story for years and just found this forum today. William J. Winkler

aa started may 1 1981....i joined may 29 1981....braniff started a bit later....

those that joined aa day1, could get 20k mi during the 20th anniversary promo...

i managed to get enough mi on braniff to get awards for 2 daughters for spring break in 1982 iirc....awards were easier in those days....

Miles and points history
 

I'm about to write a essay about miles and points. What is the history with miles and points? When did it started?

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