Can someone explain my "Idine" problem?
 

I understand the basics: Get miles for each dollar you charge on your registered credit card at participating restaurants.

But for some reason I can't get it to work right. I enrolled on the main site(Idine.com) and put in my Dividend Miles account and 2 credit cards. It accepted everything and said I was ready to go. I also wanted to earn Onepass miles and United miles, so I enrolled through their websites with different credit cards. Those 2 accounts are fine, but the main Idine account just won't work for me.

When I log in, it lists my account info, and says "Dividend Miles", but says there are no credit cards registered. So when I click on "Add" a credit card, it just takes me to a page to join Idine Prime. I don't want to join Idine Prime. But it won't take me to a page to add a credit card.

So I called the Idine phone number, and the woman said that Idine website is just to earn discounts on dining, and if you want to earn airline miles you must go through the airlines site. But I don't think that is right. The Idine site says that I am signed up to earn Dividend miles, but again, won't register a credit card. And all the restaurants list how many miles per $ I would earn there.

I know I can give up and just go through the USair website, but now I am really interested to figure out why I can't make this thing work.

Can someone explain my problem with the Idine website?

The lady was correct. Transactions thru IDine earn you cash discounts, usually 15%. This discount appears as a credit on your credit card bill. To get airline miles you join thru each airline, i.e. AAdvantage Dining, Skymiles Dining, etc. Then once a month, IDine posts the miles for each visit to your frequent flyer account.

Correct - ignore the main iDine site.
As long as the US, CO and UA iDine sites (if I understand correctly you are registered with those three) reflect the correct cards linked to each airline, you're fine.

As you are new I advise you to save your receipts . Once in a while restaurants fail to post properly even though the system is "automatic". The iDine reps cannot process a claim for outstanding miles without a receipt.

My Delta account, attached to an Amex card, almost NEVER posts correctly, and I need to email copies of the receipts, and then call a couple of times to get the credit.

Make sure that IDine has the updated EXPIRATION DATE for your registered card. If the date on the system is different than the date on your card, your credits will not post.

FWIW, I think iDine has a hard-to-follow and non-user-friendly set of systems. I have accounts with AA, NW, US, DL, and UA Dining. This means I have FIVE separate logins to FIVE separate (and nonstandard) websites. It's not the five nonstandard sites that bothers me the most: it's the fact that I have to create five UNIQUE logins! For Dividend Miles I seem to always wind up on the phone when I want to change something.

Shouldn't there be ONE iDine site capable of tracking all card-to-airline relationships and card-to-iDine Prime relationships (if applicable)? One user account maintaining my home address and other common information, one login, one place to maintain my CC-airline matrix.

Does that sound logical to anyone else?

(Not that I'm complaining *too* much. I participate in the program regularly and think it's a great way to pick up FREE miles at places I already eat. Once I cross 1MM on AA later in 2003, I will probably convert to iDine Prime.)

srodr,
From the US Airways website, http://www.usairways.idine.com/site/...questid=59094, call 1-800-818-8340 to register. I know this is what I had to do to register for US Airways miles. Most iDine airline registration forms are based o the airline's site (or you will be directed to call a number).

Like pinniped, I have multiple logins for my multiple iDine accounts and think it's silly. But it doesn't like they're going to combine multiple accounts anytime soon. Hope this helped!

"multiple idine accounts" -- are those set up so that using a different credit card will get you miles on a different airline? [i]or[/or] are people actually getting miles on more than one airline for the same meal by registering the same credit card number under different accounts?

One airline per credit card. One cannot double-dip on the same meal.

I have one card linked to American and two linked to Delta. It made more sense to be able to get a "second crack" at miles until recently.
Now, it seems most restaurants allow unlimited visits (up to the $600 month limit). If one really only cares about miles on one airline it's easy to concentrate them faster.