Air Miles Program in Canada
 

I have seen a few Canucks "out and about", and wondered if they could point me to a decent web site discussing the Air Miles Program in Canada (blue card, or gold for those so privileged)? I am looking for a focus on maxing out bonus opportunities.

www.airmiles.ca or www.airmiles.com are the official sites for the airmiles program. I haven't see any unofficial sites yet.

I earned quite a few bonus airmiles over the last few years. They have closed some loopholes that I took advantage of earlier - Bank of Montreal used to calculate airmile based on your account balance for the last day of the month. I used to pile cash into a account using a cash advance, then pay it off using a check (on the same day) to avoid any interest charge and collect airmiles based on my account balance. However they have now fixed that problem by using the average daily balance for the month instead.

Currently, I would suggest that you change your address frequently. Everytime you move they send you a booklet of bonus offers for your new neighbourhood which are quite lucrative (100 miles for a $100 purchase at The Bay, or 5 bonus miles per fillup etc.)

For the Americans here, under the program in Canada, 1 AirMile is 1 real mile i.e. to go somewhere 500 miles away you need 500 AirMile points.

I once calculated that each AirMile is worth roughly $0.20 each. I can't remember exactly how I made that reckoning. BTW, all reward travel must include a Saturday stay making it less lucrative than airline points. I have a non-fee AirMiles AMEX that I use quite infrequently.

I was once a member of the Air Miles program here in the US. Unfortunately, our version was short-lived. I did receive cash compensation for my banked miles, however. I think it was a good program...