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!
My favorite thing about fellow travelers is the willingness of everyone to share tips and tricks for getting the most out of those precious miles and points!
Positive is that we are all still here!
I enjoy the challenge of maximizing purchases, trip and stays to earn points to visit family, friends and new places. Shopping portals, emiles, erewards and blogs like these allowed my family of three to fly from MCO to SFO and enjoy a week for next to nothing. Best part is it took less than a year to earn! Thanks!!
Despite all the negative changes to the programs-I continue to feel the pain with United and Hilton, two of the bullets listed above-blogs like this and the forum that accompanies them are a great resource for the point collector and avid traveler. So there is definitely some good things to take away. We just have to work a bit harder when it comes to redemptions.
Despite the devaluation, we can still fly first class at a reasonable price using miles.
You make everything sound do easy in this world of miles. Thanks for the give away 🙂
Positive that I can still get places with my family for free
I like how I’ve learned enough to collect more miles in one year than I did over my lifetime. Although, what I did in a year others do in a month… but it’s still great for me. I appreciate the advice/tidbits of fellow readers too.
I stick with Delta because I know when there is a problem, there are enough options available to “get me to the church on time”.
I still like to fly!
The most positive thing that I can come up with is that at least the mileage programs still exist.
Thrilled that status is still within reach.
What a wonderful day!
Hey, if it wasn’t for these blogs, I would not know which mileage programs work best for me.
Free travel for quality time with my family.
Someday, sometime in the future, I will have enough miles to go first class over the ocean. That’s positive.
Thanks so much for the opportunity. Everyone is always so helpful in the points community.
Great thing about miles and points is when you can use them for something that just would be cost prohibitive – eg long haul business class, or the honeymoon trip to Hawaii. That and the ability to have elite status and be treated well (especially overseas with alliance partners).
Ditto to what joelfreak said!
I have earned tons of miles and points over the last few years and have had great success in using these miles and points to travel to many places. Love all the information shared on this blog!
Happy that credit card bonuses still exist… and even that some MS is still possible
I haven’t been forced to buy a airline ticket in many years thanks to collecting frequent flier miles.
Miles for flying first class out of Vegas after a few days of gaming. That’s a good reason to earn miles!
Hoping and praying that we can get our Delta RTW trip organized!
I love the fact that because of this blog I have managed to accrue enough points in less than 3 months to travel first class to Asia and I’m really looking forward to my 50th birthday trip to do just that
I have traveled more in 2 years than in my entire life because of points.
At the end of the day, I am getting free stuff with relatively little added work. It might be less free stuff than before, but it’s still free stuff. And I like free stuff.
Happy that you’re asking everyone to be positive. 🙂
The game is always a constant challenge – we need to stay informed to stay on top of the game!
Points and miles have made traveling a much nicer experience.
Appreciate all the great, info and tips. This has really helped me be a more informed traveler and points utilizer. Keep pointing the way!
No matter the obstacles, there’s always another way around.
(Entry #2) AA merger with US means way more opportunities to earn AA miles flying out of DCA!
Keep the good info coming, it is much appreciated…
Andaz Maui compliments of my Hyatt credit card!
Citi handing out 100k per application is definitely a positive thing to me.
Redeem to award ticket!
I got into the points game several months ago and am amazed by the awards that can be reaped by just a little bit of research and perseverance! The ability to travel more cheaply, or to enjoy a premium travel experience at a reasonable price, is incredible even today. I can’t imagine what it was like 18 months ago then – must have been incredible!
I’m grateful for the network of enthusiasts and hobbyists among us so we all benefit from our shared experience and knowledge.
I love that I can travel around the world for almost free!!!!
It certainly takes alot of time to manage all of one’s mileage plans, hotel programs, etc. But with all these blogs, forums and comments from fellow travelers, it helps tremendously in sorting through all the details to get to the meat of the issues! Thanks so much!
Thinking positive is way better then being negative….. Thanks for all your positive information.
Flied 5 flights in the last week. Glad to see your post.
It’s all about the awesome buzz you get successfully chasing down the flight and hotel deals
This weekend is my first experiencing airline club lounges. The Star Alliance lounges have been an amazing experience, and showers and hot breakfasts have really made my long flights much more pleasant. I’ve decided I’d like to renew my United gold+ status this year so I can keep star alliance gold.
Positive is my puppy got hit by a car and he survived, though with $8000 in medical bills, but he’s alive and that is positive!!
http://www.youcaring.com/littlelevi
Gary,
Thank you for letting us know the quirks of miles and points 🙂
I love Ultimate Rewards points!
In spite of all the negative changes there it is still a very positive thing that we are still able to travel in C or F on long haul using miles and staying at very fine hotels for points.
This in my world still make it worth all the business travelling I do every year a little easier to live with 🙂
Br,
Henrik
I’ve earned lots of nice hotel nights with not much work!