jetsetter

Joe's columns do bring out big 6 negative points, but service really has gone down hill. How can you not complain each month with $100 change fees (was $25 in paper ticket days), reductions in food service, paper cups in first class, use it or lose it, charges to go standby, and the government bailing out the industry. Oh and who could forget the Customers First thing which the airlines used to buy off congress.

outoftown

Sosafan, I thing you have a somewhat "corked" view of things. IMHO, I think miles have already been devalued. Future worth is diminished by the ability to deliver, i.e. devaluing is occurring even without changes to the redemption table. Financial well-being, airline consolidation, limiting flights, reduced service all devalue miles because of the higher risk of failing to deliver. As with the time value of money, I'll take present worth over equal future worth anyday unless I am compensated for my risk of holding onto these scrips. I eliminate my risk by burning now.

kappa

quinella66, I agree with you:

I would not trust airlines to "be my bank". I spend miles when I have the chance to get a reasonable value for them but I would not "take a run at the miles bank" to burn as fast as possible. I will save them for a good use. .... Even if I lost all of my miles that I have now, I still have made enough return on what I have redeemed that they were worth it.

I will no longer write the word 'burn' for using miles. Like you, I am prudently 'using' my well over half-million miles on various airlines (supplemented when needed with even more DC, AmEx and hotel credits) to fly both business and pleasure trips.

FF miles are not the travel equivalent of a 401(k) for the AARP eligile. I qualify but am using them NOW.

[This message has been edited by kappa (edited 08-04-2003).]

lensman

Regarding the perception that airlines have become stingy with their standard awards:

I would like to put forward a positive speculation. I know, I know, this is heresy, but bear with me.

So it is well known that airlines are desperately seeking positive cash flow and less concerned about a good looking balance sheet. For maximum positive short term effect, they should reduce or eliminate frequent flyer redemptions so that these travelers will instead buy a ticket, providing needed revenue. Sure, they can't completely eliminate FF redemption because that would create too much bad will, but they can tip the scales to milk as much revenue as possible out of the system.

At any rate, this view is positive because it means that should the airlines become comfortable with their cash flow, they may again focus on their balance sheet and try to reduce their frequent flyer mile liability by increasing redemption rates by making more seats available.

This might be wishful thinking, but it is certainly plausible.

MileKing

Restricting redemption of FF miles does not necessarily mean flyers will suddenly buy a ticket. The airlines seem to think this way, but the airlines are simply incorrect....once again, they just don't get it.

For many, utilizing miles is the only way they would be able to afford some trips. This is certainly true for overseas destinations, and for families may even apply to treks to Disney World where purchase of multiple airline tickets (on top of hotel, food, and park costs) is simply cost prohibitive. In many instances, these folks will change their destination and drive somewhere if awards are not available. This hardly helps the airlines.

Milesjamie

He states, "I think the decline could be more dramatic, especially if one of the Big Six realigns its award chart and substantially raises the price of claiming awards." and that it has been 15 years since the last major upwards movement...

Is that really true? It seems that miles levels bump up slowly; I'd love to see a graph of miles required for awards vs time.

[This message has been edited by Milesjamie (edited 08-05-2003).]

Pegasus23

My two cents on burning miles....I decided this year since I lost my Premier Exec status I would use my miles. As a General Member with MP I was still able to get a saver award to HON from DEN....just returned [Flt 44, 777 non-stop HON-DEN is Great!] and a saver award to LHR from DEN early in Sep. Also snagged a last minute Delta saver award from COS to MCO. My plan is to maintain 25 to 40,000 UA miles for emergency deaths of relatives etc and use my lifetime Silverwings when I have 14 day advance planning...usually is a bit cheaper than internet fares, but not always.

BizyGirl

This is my first post, so let's see how I do! I live in a very small city where the only two airlines one can fly are NWA & United. I've been burning my miles since moving here because the costs to fly out of here are insane in comparison to other markets. I'd agree that the airlines don't get it...I'm only using my miles because the prices to fly from this market are insane! My last four flights (in four months) have been free tickets...I guess I have good fortune in finding available award seats, but I'd rather purchase tickets to maintain my elite status and gain the mileage bonuses.

phoenixitc

The value of miles for free tickets is relative to each person. I used 80k DL miles for my mother to fly BizE to FRA. The value of this ticket is high knowing she flew more comfortably than had she been in coach. I just used CO points for two FC tickets on an NWA flight. I have used over 60k in points to upgrade my wife to FC all of her recent business trips. I used credit cards for all of my purchases. I pay my cards off every month. It's worth it...to me

infinityplusone

MileKing said...
I think you hit the proverbial nail on the head, at least for myself and my family and several others that I know.

I fly 2-4 times a year for work and 1-2 times a year for leisure.
The vacation flights are the cheapest possible and do not always gain miles.
The miles I have earned (or as I feel, researched and scratched and clawed to earn - to find any deals where I could get any ff miles when I was not flying, eating out places I wouldn't always eat at to get the iDine miles, finally winning my spouse over to drive a little bit out of the way/stay at a little bit more expensive hotel/make purchases through certain websites, etc) over the past 2 years for NW are being held onto tightly.

I do not have status with NW and have under 90k total miles with them.

Until my wife and I are ready to fly to either Hawaii or Europe (I know I might not be able to purchase two tickets, but I will be able to purchase at least one).
If NW (or the other airlines in general) keep raising their award levels or de-valuing them, it just means that we do not go to Europe or Hawaii - until we can pya for it outright.
We go places that we can drive to... which means places that we can afford to get to and still have some money to spend once we get there.

Perhaps in 5 or so years I will have enough of an income (or miles) and will have paid off the other more important things to be able to spend money flying/doing MRs, etc... but by then maybe the airlines will have done away with their FF programs. *gasp*
(I doubt it... but it is a possibility)

But all that aside, that is why I hang around FlyerTalk so I can learn the in's and out's of squeezing all of the extra ff miles that I can from life.

[This message has been edited by infinityplusone (edited 08-05-2003).]

knowitall

I tend to agree with Joe B, despite his usual doom & gloom messages. Recently I used 5000 miles on Midwest Airlines to get an Amtrak award ticket worth $40 since I'm not certain of YX's viability. I keep my NWA balance around 100,000 tops & do use the miles quickly. Also, I have a similar balance on DL which I intend to use quickly on NWA. Despite all the no upgrade talk, I fel that as an NWA Gold, NWA will upgrade me when I use DL miles on NWA, as long as I contact NWA & put my WP# on the reservation.

pdb

Few BAEC NA members left anything in their accounts after 30-Jun, due to a massive devaluation/restructuring of the program. 1st Class USA-AUS award jumped from 140K to 420K.

I'm happy that last year my partner and I cashed out 20 P200EE (2 FC txt EUROPE) at AA...not only would these now 1mm more miles, but moreover the new electronic awards require completion of travel within one year of txt issue date, whereas the old coupons could allow travel to finsh up to 3 years after ordering the reward!

And which AAdvantage member with available mileage did not rush to beat the 31-Jul deadline to lock in at least a couple of Cathay Pacific 140K FC trips from USA to AUS/NZ or South Africa, to avoid the new mileage cost (225k / 275k)?

Now, where do we find the time to travel?!

landspeed

If you aren't a member of his site, the column appears here:

http://www.usatoday.com/travel/colum...rancatelli.htm

The thing that really rubs me the wrong way is:

"Claim your awards as fast as you earn them. More importantly, stop obsessing about claiming only the cheaper, restricted awards and then *****ing when the airlines won't give you a seat. All of the Big Six offer unrestricted awards at about twice the price of a restricted seat. Whenever you can't get an award at the restricted level, claim the higher priced award. You're better off using more miles now than watching their value shrivel while you wait for a chance to claim a restricted award."

Hmm- half the value of your miles now, because they'll be devalued sometime in the future.

RustyC

I think all the non-flying miles being issued have put things more out-of-whack on supply/demand than anything else. I recently revalued miles downward from 1.66 cents to 1.5 cents each (my benchmark is a favorite award, in this case an Asia RT from the eastern half of the U.S.).

I generally earn about 120K a year and use that same amount, give or take 20K. I have about 230K total banked on top of that, nearly all earned during the 2000/01 bonanzas.

I think many of the people running up huge balances are workaholic baby boomers with an eye to using them when they retire. But I think the valuation crunch will really start hitting around then.

MileKing

That's Ol' Joe ranting away again without thinking or doing one bit of analysis. For his strategy to make sense, one would have to believe that in the future awards will require MORE THAN twice as many miles as they do now. There is no evidence to suggest that will happen any time soon, if ever. Furthermore, the basic domestic coach saver ticket (now 25K miles), has NEVER been 50K miles, even if you go back to the beginning of FF programs when they were 40K with no capacity controls.

In addition, the current industry climate is the worst it's ever been, with some airlines in bankruptcy. Yet the airlines have largely held the line on award increases. Sure there have been some, but nothing even remotely approaching a 100% mileage increase. Again, for Joe's strategy to make sense, one would have to believe that even worse conditions are ahead for the airlines.

I might also add that 84% of award tickets claimed are saver awards (that figure is from Randy on another thread). So many people ARE succeeding in getting saver awards.

Sorry, but until there is some evidence that things are really changing, Joe's strategy is foolish.