Question about rewards on partner airlines
Oct 23, 2002 | 9:02 am
#1
Original Poster
Join Date: Nov 2001
Location: RDU
Posts: 2,346
Question about rewards on partner airlines
This question comes out of sheer curiosity (couldn't pull up any info in a search).
How much do the airlines pay to cash in a reward on another airline? Does actual money change hands?
My question stems from the following: take Delta for example. You can fly on Malaysia Airlines using Skymiles. To go from the Continental US to SE Asia "costs" 80,000 miles for economy, but only 100,000 for biz class. That's a relatively minor increase for biz class, considering the spread between actual fares must be in the thousands of dollars. Why wouldn't they charge many more miles for biz seats?
Any insight would be appreciated.
How much do the airlines pay to cash in a reward on another airline? Does actual money change hands?
My question stems from the following: take Delta for example. You can fly on Malaysia Airlines using Skymiles. To go from the Continental US to SE Asia "costs" 80,000 miles for economy, but only 100,000 for biz class. That's a relatively minor increase for biz class, considering the spread between actual fares must be in the thousands of dollars. Why wouldn't they charge many more miles for biz seats?
Any insight would be appreciated.
Oct 23, 2002 | 9:53 am
#2
Join Date: Apr 2002
Location: Pennsylvania
Programs: HHonors Silver
Posts: 4,029
No answer to your question, but my observation has been that trading miles for Business class tickets always seemed like a much better deal than trading for coach tickets. Even doing an apples-apples comparison within an airline's own program, the % increment in points to go Biz is always smaller then the % increment in $ to buy a business class ticket compared to coach.