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!
I find it great that we still have free snacks in Delta Lounges !
Getting to fly from Tokyo to New York, and then to San Francisco three months later on the same ticket.
My wife and I have redeemed over $100k worth of free travel in the past few years thanks to award programs!
I love learning from the mistakes of my fellow bloggers who aren’t leery of posting their experiences to help me have a better experience than they have had.
I’m trying hard to earn miles but my income isn’t high enough to get the good credit card deals I’m at a loss, but reading here give me hope.
it’s nice people like you are nice enough to do giveaways like this.
Even though things have gotten harder, when one can get an award ticket in business or first, it is way more comfortable and worth it.
A point in the hand is still better than a poke in the eye. 😀
Sitting in cabo at the westin staring out at the beautiful water on a tuesday afternoon….paid for in points! Pretty positive to me!
This hobby makes me enjoy spending money.
Redeeming miles for flights and points for hotel rooms means more $$$ left for food & activities, often paid with cc’s that were used to earn the miles and points in the first place (and also to earn more miles and points, of course). Love how it all comes full circle!
I enjoy this miles and points hobby.
As a non-American living in America, when I travel and meet Americans, I find that they are some of the most friendly people in the world.
My wife and I only dreamed of traveling in business class before discovering this hobby. Now our dreams are reality!
The main thing that I like about frequent flyer miles is that they offer the opportunity to fly first class without buying prohibitively expensive tickets for cash.
When I really think about it, I am thankful for having all these miles and points bloggers to share with me all their knowledge – they could have kept all the ‘secrets’ to themselves and enjoy all the award flights. But they teach you things and tricks that they know for free so you can enjoy (almost) free flights and hotel stays! (Yes I do know they get commission here and there by you sign up with the links they provided, but that’s up to you to decide to use their links or not) Kudos to you guys!
The feeling boarding your plane after a successful mileage plan comes to fruition.
Have been able stay free at hotels for the last few years because of points.
Twice this year I had cushion in my schedule, and volunteered my seat for two free flights. How did I get the original flights? POINTS of course!
We made it to Seoul to visit my daughter and son’s new home. Stopped and stayed in HI for a few days. All from credit card signups and creative ways to use those cards. I can’t believe anyone is whining about the good old days.
I like that I got to fly first class on my honeymoon thanks to miles! Made our trip very special.
Helped some friends who never thought they’d ever sit at the front of the plane get to and stay at Oktoberfest last year in style, all using miles and points!
Traveling for almost nothing is what I love
When we’re traveling by car, sometimes I am able to tell my wife, “this hotel stay will be free,” because I have enough points. She is always pleased to hear this.
Their are always new deals coming on the horizon.
I love your blog. I try to read it every day! Thank you for all you do!!!!!
What I like best about the forums/blogs and this site is all the free Hilton Breakfasts and internet I’ve had along the way thanks to them.
Points helped me enjoy a recent trip to Paris for an excellent vacation with my wonderful wife
Points will enable my family to take a first class flight to London.
(Entry 2):…& unexpected goodies, such as the Gold Marriott status that I received last year for being Star Alliance Gold on United…
My wife and I were able to go with my daughter’s family to Disneyworld this month, and the flights were “free” with my Southwest Air points.
UA miles are still the most valuable ones out there and I still love the award availability of *G in Europe.
I always enjoy reading about how to maximize the points.
With points, I can fly to destinations that I never would have flown to 🙂
The only way to learn the points game is to follow a travel blogger.
When I’m off work, it is great to really get away.
I use points for my honeymoon! First class + PH Maldives + Bangkok + Japan. All points redeemed!
1
Taking the whole famille to Shanghai , Beijing and Hong Kong in July! All air and hotels throughout points”
Points and miles allow my children to visit their grandma more than they would otherwise.
I love the willingness of my fellow travelers in sharing advice, insight and knowledge.
Thanks everyone!
Employees at United seem to be in a better mood this year.
miles are bringing my 13 year old Israeli nephew for a vist
Status matching for my spouse at a million miles – and then him getting upgraded on his own (as opposed to as a companion).
There’s an old saying: “You will not be remembered for what you said. You will not be remembered for what you did. You will be remembered for how you made other people feel.”
I think your blog makes other people feel good about traveling, friends, family and most of all, themselves.
Points still allow me to enjoy experiences otherwise out of my budget!
I’ve been collecting and spending frequent flyer miles for 23 years and still going strong. I hope to keep enjoying them for many years to come!
Thanks to the advice of bloggers like you, I can treat my husband, who does not have the “travel gene”, to some business class flights and nicer hotels, which makes us both happy!
Miles let me visit Tokyo…for the weekend!
I love the feeling of riding up the front of the plane that I could never have afforded without discovering USDM’s amazing program…
My fellow travelers and the bloggers have given me so much info about how to collect miles/points and destination details in the form of TR’s to enable me to have nearly free vacations. Thank you all.