Does it Make Sense to Use Frequent Flyer Miles This Way?
January 2016
We don’t typically recommend using reward miles for flights or upgrades when traveling domestically. In most cases we believe international travel in either Business or First Class provides a much better exchange value for your hard-earned miles.
We believe airline reward miles are worth about 1.5 – 2.0¢ per mile. But, conversion values well above that are not uncommon when you use your frequent flyer miles for international flights and upgrades.
So whether you use your reward miles for an intercontinental trip of a lifetime or simply to get from coast to coast, use this simple calculation to determine whether an AWARD TICKET is a good value for your miles:
- Find an award flight and determine the price of the ticket if you were to pay cash.
- Add any taxes and fees you are required to pay on the award ticket to that cash price.
- Divide that amount by the number of reward miles required for the award ticket.
- If the result equals or exceeds 1.5-2.0 cents (the value depends on the airline), it is a good redemption value - the higher the better.
To determine whether redeeming miles to UPGRADE is a good use of your miles:
- Subtract the coach fare from the cost of the premium class ticket if you were to pay cash (the difference is the cash value of the upgrade).
- Divide that amount by the number of reward miles required for the upgrade.
- If the result equals or exceeds 1.5-2.0 cents (the value depends on the airline), it is a good redemption value - the higher the better.
trvlvip focuses on Luxury for Loyalty so we recommend choosing just a handful of airline, hotel and car companies. Loyal travelers reap big rewards and much more comfortable travel.
The Wrap-Up:
It's smart to pick one airline and to fly on that airline or their partners as much as possible and credit all your reward miles to that one airline. This will build Elite status, which means complimentary upgrades, faster lines, free checked baggage and better seats.
Paid flights earn Elite qualifying miles - award flights do not - so we typically don’t use miles to upgrade or pay for a First Class seat on domestic flights unless the flight is expensive and the reward miles required for the flight make good economic sense (which means we enjoy a value for each reward mile we redeem that exceeds what we believe the miles are worth).
Our Perks and Tips are your ticket to luxury travel for less and will open up a world of Elite benefits! We encourage you to sign up for complimentary email alerts so you never again miss an important update on the programs you care about most!