I am a member of 8 programs: (AA, UA, US, DL, NW, YX, SAA and CO) and I'm looking for some free bonus miles. Could anyone tell me how to get some without flying?
DC-10's Forever

Welcome to FlyerTalk!

You've come to the right place to learn. A few minutes reading some of the forums will help you narrow down your question, or perhaps answer it completely.

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Middle_Seat

Welcome,

it would probably help if you specified what you mean by "free bonus miles without flying" ?

You know, sign up bonus's, places where I can take surverys, any ways to get frequent flyer miles while keeping my feet on the ground. For example, NWA sent me a promotion offering 500 bonus miles to sign up for a program that had a series of bonus's on it for flying, but you could sign up and not take the flights. Another example would be opinionplace.com where you can take surverys for AAdvantage miles.
DC-10's Forever

Start here:
http://home.earthlink.net/~pgary/TravelFrame.html

Click on "Free Frequent Flyer Miles" on the left.

I track this site for mileage opportunities:

http://www.mileageworkshop.com/

take a look http://miles.hotdealz.com


[This message has been edited by milehunter (edited 11-06-2002).]

Depending on your spending habits, the most lucrative way of accumulating miles and points without flying could be to use credit cards linked to one or more programs.

Check each of the sections on specific programs and you will find lots of discussions about VISA/Mastercard/AMEX/Diners Club opportunities for earning miles. There are also discussions about these cards in the separate section on credit cards.

Milehunter,

It is getting kinda boring seeing you constantly pushing your web site like this.

I don't think you should benefit from others looking for ways to get miles/points.

Anyone else agree?

MeWantMoreMiles

Don't you think that is somewhat unfair to me given pgary's site and mileageworkshop site are also being "pushed" here?

I don't see how I am "benefiting from others looking for ways to get miles". Please compare my site to pgary's site, and mileageworkshop.

I just ask I be treated fairly.

Others should not be allowed to do it either. You sound like a little kid now "well how come he can do it and I can't?" You don't see how your benefiting from others?? I looked at your site and under just about every suggestion you ask the person to use you as the referal so you can get something out of it, that sounds like benefiting to me. You don't even tell people you run the site, most of us here know you run it but not the new people that are just getting here.

Pretty cheesy.

MeWantMoreMiles

This is the fist time I looked at milehunter's site.It is a nice resource.

I think all the three sites give a nice clean concise answers to the question "how can I earn free miles?".Flyertalk is the greatest resource on the web, but it takes time to learn from it. These sites provide a primer to the new flyer talk readers and initiates them to mileage mania.

So I dont understand your objections.

For the record,Iam not connected with any of the above sites and I have just expressed my opinion.

When Dave Fisher, Gary Steiger, et al started their websites -- in the antideluvian days, I believe -- loyalty marketing programs provided ff miles without flying rather generously. Guess what? The opportunities have now trickled to a few points or miles here and there. The only ways to gather meaningful ff miles without flying is in the very competetive credit card area. If there are people who want to alert others to these opportunities while gathering a few miles or points for themselves, I see no harm in that. Maintaining their websites is rather labor-intensive. Besides, their referral points or miles have probably maxed out.

in glancing at this post, I think of the following:

rolling my eyes first at the daunting task of trying to think of and then list everything I can think of to earn miles and then catching myself and saying, "hey, I was once there too!

Then I see these posts that list one liners like the site of Gary or mileageworkshop. AND THEN I see people being bummed out that those sites were listed, as if to promote them over something else or sell them to you and I...

In defence of both those sites and those who remind us of them, Consider this:

1) the people who put them together did so TO tell you and I about THEIR experinces with miles and they just happen to have had the time and skills to make a web site about it. They do not appear to be selling anything. The tell people what they have seen or done alllll the time, thus offering their knowledge for nothing and expecting nothing in retrun excpt, maybe a little satisfaction that someone enjoyed it or got some points from the sites and their info.

If I had time I might make a site.

BUT most strangely, I see that few have actually spent the time to LIST some of the power-house ways to GET miles and instead many in this post have spent the time TALKING about ways to talk about miles or who is right or wrong on how they do just that! Only SOME have posted a few things that may help this person and how to do that!

Thus, we have collectively failed and done some of the same gun slinging recently seen in the elections (Talk about agha-Ethics!!! - dont get me started on that one).

ANYWAY. I may not em all, but here ARE a few of the things I do to raise many miles and they work for me:

1) Idine - set up debit or credit cards of any kind to associate for free with any of your airline programs and when you eat or drink (or sometimes, yes, even buy items) at the many selected restauarants and bars in the lists you get 10 miles per dollar spent, tax and tip included. An example is taking a bunch of friends out where you use your credit card to pay or a business dinner, or even "credit card roulette," when you lose that game! ha ha. You charge up, say $150 and that would be 1500 miles! They take 4-6 weeks to post.

-Credit card use, as was indicated in this thread a few times. Yes, these are nice but they have fees if you do not pay off your bal and so is it worth it? I think if I get a card (I only use debit in my life and it works well for me thus far) it will be the starwood Amex since you can convert all points to airlines and if you have 20k, they give you a 5k bonus and YOU chose the airline! The DL amex is soundinggood but then you are locked into that airline... Your choice.

-Debit card from the much talked about Bank of America. That's what I do to pay rent in one apartment and mortgage in a ski house up in VT. Besides that, other money runs thru there and yes, I HAVE earned 16+ k on Alaska Airlines since beginning of Sept only! And that's mainly buying PIN money orders and doing other large charges at the 2:1 rate even!

-surveys like OpinionPlace.com which you can do every 2 weeks. I go there myself every 2 weeks and log in and sometimes alter my answers. I dont wait for them to email me but I just know to go there every 2 weeks. 150,200, 300 AA miles will be avail depending on what seems to be the luck of the draw (which is fine by me) and will post to my AA acct within a week, mostly. I only do those surveys because others that do not give miles instead give spam in my email inbox. I have done a few airline's own surveys in AA and NWA and the NWA one gave me 500 points. It happened in the summer and was 4 questions long. If you see one, do it and share it! I do think that some are bad news. Many i know say NO to E-poll because they are failing to actually GIVE the awards people win when reaching certain point levels. Be careful!!!!!!!!! trust me.

-Kelloggs cereals or products when they appeal to me. I once suggested to the web site Smarterliving.com that you could go buy tons of the boxes with the miles coupons on them and then take the coupons and donate the cereal to a charity and get a tax break on that! They gave me a free t shirt for the idea but Ive only bought and earned for about 1500 miles total since I first saw the kelloggs certs. I find that the cereal is too expensive. Did you know that Frosted Flakes, for example, sells its product in such a way where stores like SHAWS can call it "Shaw's Frosted Flakes" and you can buy the SAME THING for like half? So woud the miles ones with a pricey tiger on the box be worth it?

-US AIRWAYS BONUS BAR. once installed, if you buy a lot on line, this one works well. I earned at least 1000 miles. I have yet to buy that new Dell laptop. There are many other airline portals for that one.

-Click Rewards. I am new to this one but it seems to be the same thing as above. AND it seems as though you can even log onto a site THRU its link such as J Crew.com and get not only the click rewards points but also the Bonus Bar ones! Do the transaction using a miles-earning credit card.

writing long letters like I do... seems they work because I have found that if a marketing department of an airline gets a long letter, they will read it all eventually (they must because the ball is in their court!) and if you are patient and persistent, you can get them to turn anything into miles. Example: Send in some annoying vouchers explaining how you cannot use these online, you cannot go to self-check in, you cannot reap the benefits of today's market by having to use paper vs. the internet, etc. See if you can craftily write in to get them to please give you a value in miles vs useless certificates and vouchers.

-Anything Amazon.com... Again, using click rewards, Bonus Bar and milepoint, I have done things involving amazon certs or items and miles happen... That site has a lot of good stuff I need anyway. Stick with what you know.

-sign up bonusses on all airlines or hotel programs, selecting that you want E statements instead of snail mail, and of course, renting cars.

Does this list help a bit? I can elaborate on ANY of these, OR... to make you all NOT have to read long winded posts and have me sound like I am some jerk who thinks he knows it all (I am not) I COULD just make a free Web site to try to get it out there fer ya!

Enjoy!

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If speed is not your thing, distance may as well be. Enjoy and embrace it all!

When I first started lurking and seriously collecting miles, pgary's site and the mileageworkshop were invaluable. I was glad that someone took the time to collect all these sources of easy miles that most FTer's now take for granted - if they got a referral bonus, great - a small payback for their help.

What gets old is that these "how do I get miles" threads always pop up by people new to these boards, and everyone makes the same posts to referral sites (with the occasional thrashing of the referring party) plus their individual favorite tips. CMK10 - this is not a poke at you. There is no easy way to find out about such opportunities unless you ask or wait for someone else to post a thread (someone will say use the search function, but you can spends hours doing that without finding the information you need).

What I'd like to see on FT is a reference section for newbies that lists all these referral sites (with a note that the site owner may get a referral bonus for some opportunities). When someone posts a general "how do I get miles" question, they can be referred to that section of FT, and the issue is closed.

Edited for bad spelling - hey, it's 6:50 am.

[This message has been edited by singlemalt (edited 11-07-2002).]