Expiration Date of Elevate Points
Aug 26, 2009 | 1:14 pm
#16
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: Upper Sternistan
Posts: 10,684
Wow - I'm certainly not happy to understand the details here. I thought it was more like the others where you needed activity every 18 months. This is a very different story.
I just booked my family of four on Virgin LAX-JFK. The price was almost identical to Delta, which I now realize I should have chosen. I probably would have made medallion on Delta, plus the miles would all be in one place. But, I figured, they have an FF program, so I'll try it. Had I realized, no way.
What's crazy is that their price is competitive with Delta, but once you factor in the miles situation, it's not even close. I figure for every five coast to coast flights on Delta, I get one free. I probably make enough to get that in under 18 months, but my kids don't. So I just blew 20% of the ticket price on their fares - and that adds up to a decent amount of money.
Unless/until this policy changes, these will be my last Virgin flights.
I just booked my family of four on Virgin LAX-JFK. The price was almost identical to Delta, which I now realize I should have chosen. I probably would have made medallion on Delta, plus the miles would all be in one place. But, I figured, they have an FF program, so I'll try it. Had I realized, no way.
What's crazy is that their price is competitive with Delta, but once you factor in the miles situation, it's not even close. I figure for every five coast to coast flights on Delta, I get one free. I probably make enough to get that in under 18 months, but my kids don't. So I just blew 20% of the ticket price on their fares - and that adds up to a decent amount of money.
Unless/until this policy changes, these will be my last Virgin flights.
Aug 26, 2009 | 1:50 pm
#17
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Sep 2002
Location: Portland
Posts: 11,687
Welcome to Southwest Rapid Rewards. Lots of people only fly WN a few times a year. 24 month expiration doesn't seem to hurt them too much.
I, for one, do NOT find RR useless, even though I don't fly WN to the same extent I fly AS/VX, because I dump all my car rental mileage awards there (and have sent AMEX points there, too, on occasion)- and you get a MUCH better deal on WN for those than you do on other airlines- half a RR credit, sometimes up to 1.5/2 credits. If you figure a WN award is worth ~$300, half a RR credit is a value of about $10 (and if you do it right and get a cheap rental, you can get a significant amount of a rental's cost back as RR credits). VX's awards aren't quite as good, though, from what I can see- 1 point per dollar spent + some bonuses.
All in all, VX isn't spending money on making their FF program particularly lucrative. This is unlikely to make them popular on FT. Whether it's a bad strategy is another question, and I am not sure I know the answer- it seems everyone is watering down their FF plans, from the good ones (AS) to the bad (DL), so maybe VX is ahead of the curve.
Oh, and I've taken VX a grand total of 14 flights in the space of ~17 months, all flying as roundtrips or one-ways to LAX/SFO/LAS to and from SEA, all bought pretty cheap as Main Cabin flights. I've already redeemed one one-way award (SEA-LAX), and after the next two flights I take, I'll have enough to redeem another (and I don't own the credit card). So I don't think it's impossible to get SOME value out of this, even if you only take a few roundtrips a year. The key is to think as sfozrhfco and aviators99 have suggested: you want to redeem the points for the cheapest flight available (and thank goodness, SEA has tons of cheap VX seats).
Er, why? Why wouldn't you just pay for the fare with cash, since they have a fixed value of exchange for points?
I, for one, do NOT find RR useless, even though I don't fly WN to the same extent I fly AS/VX, because I dump all my car rental mileage awards there (and have sent AMEX points there, too, on occasion)- and you get a MUCH better deal on WN for those than you do on other airlines- half a RR credit, sometimes up to 1.5/2 credits. If you figure a WN award is worth ~$300, half a RR credit is a value of about $10 (and if you do it right and get a cheap rental, you can get a significant amount of a rental's cost back as RR credits). VX's awards aren't quite as good, though, from what I can see- 1 point per dollar spent + some bonuses.
All in all, VX isn't spending money on making their FF program particularly lucrative. This is unlikely to make them popular on FT. Whether it's a bad strategy is another question, and I am not sure I know the answer- it seems everyone is watering down their FF plans, from the good ones (AS) to the bad (DL), so maybe VX is ahead of the curve.
Oh, and I've taken VX a grand total of 14 flights in the space of ~17 months, all flying as roundtrips or one-ways to LAX/SFO/LAS to and from SEA, all bought pretty cheap as Main Cabin flights. I've already redeemed one one-way award (SEA-LAX), and after the next two flights I take, I'll have enough to redeem another (and I don't own the credit card). So I don't think it's impossible to get SOME value out of this, even if you only take a few roundtrips a year. The key is to think as sfozrhfco and aviators99 have suggested: you want to redeem the points for the cheapest flight available (and thank goodness, SEA has tons of cheap VX seats).
Er, why? Why wouldn't you just pay for the fare with cash, since they have a fixed value of exchange for points?
VX's program isn't totally useless - I spent about $4,000 on VX last year and so far have received two free trips that would have otherwise cost me about $100 a piece. There's a bit of value in that, but I would have received a much better value had I spent that $4,000 on just about any other airline. For those who spend under $1,000 a year, redeeming is nearly hopeless.
Aug 26, 2009 | 2:24 pm
#18
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: SEA, but up and down the coast a lot
Programs: Oceanic Airlines Gold Elite
Posts: 21,271
VX's program isn't totally useless - I spent about $4,000 on VX last year and so far have received two free trips that would have otherwise cost me about $100 a piece. There's a bit of value in that, but I would have received a much better value had I spent that $4,000 on just about any other airline. For those who spend under $1,000 a year, redeeming is nearly hopeless.
Aug 30, 2009 | 11:02 am
#19
Original Poster
Join Date: Jan 2007
Location: SFO
Programs: United 1K, Marriott Platinum, SPG Platinum
Posts: 2,002