It’s been a tough 18 months in the frequent flyer world. It’s easier than ever to earn points, but the cost of awards has gone up, up, up.
Miles and points have been very good to me, and I do my best to give back where I can. I don’t make a public show of my charity, but I do my best to give the best advice I can and to offer giveaways when things are offered to me. And when I have gift cards, I can either turn them into money orders or do various frequent flyer experiments, or I can give them away.
So here, I thought I would give away $400. And what better way to give them away than to my readers who comment on this post?
Goodness knows it’s been a tough 15 months or so for frequent flyers.
- United devalued its award chart, especially premium cabin awards and especially partner awards in first class.
- Delta devalued its award chart, and then decided they didn’t want to wait for changes to go into effect so they imposed an interim devaluation. Then they finally decided to go revenue-based.
- Southwest devalued its points, underscoring just how arbitrary such changes can be — there’s no fundamental reason to devalue a revenue-based frequent flyer program, higher ticket prices automatically make an award cost more already. Here they just decided to make their points worth less.
- American eliminated international gateway stopovers and distance-based awards and US Airways eliminated the 90,000 mile business class award.
- Hilton devalued the most among hotels, such that I am no longer inclined to stay with them when I can avoid it. I didn’t re-up my Diamond status (or accept free Gold status).
- Others devalued as well – Marriott with big award category shifts, Hyatt with a new more expensive award category 7 and other changes.
And that’s just a small sampling.
So I would like to focus on something positive for a change, and I’m looking to you for help to do so!
Here are the prizes:
- (4) $100 gift cards
So here’s how you enter.
- Leave a comment on this blog post. Say something positive above miles and points, blogs, forums, or your fellow travelers.
- Enter by Noon Eastern, Friday May 30. That’s 4 days from this writing, and there are four prizes.
- Enter no more than 4 times. Four prizes, four days to enter, you can enter by commenting up to four times. (It doesn’t have to be one per day, the only limitation is that you cannot enter twice in a row you have to at least wait for someone else to enter before you enter again each time.)
- Four prize winners will be drawn at random. As in past, I will use random.org for the drawing.
- Fine print. Void where prohibited by law. All of my decisions are final and unappealable, I want to make giveaways as easy as possible and with the fewest headaches possible.
So, what do you like about miles and points, blogs, forums, or your fellow travelers?
- You can join the 40,000+ people who see these deals and analysis every day — sign up to receive posts by email (just one e-mail per day) or subscribe to the RSS feed. It’s free. You can also follow me on Twitter for the latest deals. Don’t miss out!
Free (or close to free) flights are good!
I love being able to visit my family overseas with miles.
I also love free upgrades.
And free hotel nights on points!
But best of all I love learning new things! Thanks for your blog!
FT is still a great place for information, even if you have to dig deep.
I love the “surprise” of getting a free trip every once in a while!
First mileage redemption this weekend. Will be first time in first class.
And first time in business class in 2 weeks. And a few free nights hotel stays in between.
I also enjoy random bonding experiences with friends and coworkers upon discovering that they also collect miles.
I love that no matter where I am going, there is a website or forum out there that my fellow travelers have created about my destination!
I enjoy the occasional bit of luxury included in vacations mostly focused on adventure: better airline seats and nicer hotels.
Thanks to points, being able to fly in business class at an economy class price! 🙂
One way awards are expected in the near future on Delta, so that’s some good news, at least for me.
I love being able to use points to make things happen that would be normally out of reach.
Your site is great and has been instrumental in getting me more involved in this hobby and all that it can offer!!
Enjoy having the freedom to anywhere in the world when I wanted!
I haven’t crossed an ocean in economy in years. Thanks, miles and points!
Not an entry but a comment: would like to know how others are able to insert a smiley icon into their post. Testing 1..2…3 🙂
well, it worked!
Thanks for everything!
Though the award is decreasing the value, we still get something out of them. Little is better than nothing!
Great hobby / great rewards
Family trips on points
The signup bonuses. Thanx.
I love reading about all the methods to earn points and your honest opinions of them.
So…who won?