If you willingly pay an annual fee for a credit card that earns air miles (most reward cards do come with a hefty price), you might want to re-think that decision. The problem is airlines are changing the rules to shorten the time before miles expire. Several years ago I learned this the hard way.
It looked like junk mail, but for some reason, I opened the envelope from United Airlines. Turns out it wasn’t junk, but I have a sneaky suspicion whoever designed this mailer hoped I’d toss it in the shredder. It was notification that my 38,000 MileagePlus miles would expire on New Year’s Eve if I didn’t activate my account by adding more miles to it before the stroke of midnight. Quite frankly, in the hustle and bustle of the season, booking a flight just so I could log a few more miles wasn’t exactly on my Christmas list.
It’s not easy to rack up 38,000 air miles. Either you have to actually put $38,000 on a qualifying credit card or fly a lot on that airline, which is how I earn miles. Thankfully, I wasn’t so loyal that I’d purposely book a Delta flight at a higher price, just to earn the miles. Having enough miles in my account to actually book a free trip someday was like a trophy to me. But knowing the miles were about to evaporate got me thinking in a new way.
I did manage to “spend” 25,000 miles, but not without a big hassle. That’s because so few seats on even fewer flights actually qualify for “reward” tickets. And just try to put together a workable itinerary that costs fewer than 38,000 miles. I must have spent three hours trying one tactic after another to book a trip as a gift for my newly widowed father-in-law. And I prevailed! I sure did. And he was surprised and very pleased with the gift.
Still, I lost 13,000 precious air miles, and that stings. I meant to donate them to a charity on the United website, but in the crush of the season it just slipped my mind.
Miles expire in most U.S.-based airline programs after 18 months of no earning or redemption activity. Award Wallet (awardwallet.com) is a good tool to track your miles and points balances, and expiration dates.
I’m thinking differently about frequent flyer miles these days. And I’m checking my accounts often.
Darius Dubash, on his blog, Million Mile Secrets (millionmilesecrets.com), says that sometimes all you need to do to keep your miles active without flying is to earn or redeem 1 mile to reset the mile expiration clock. He says we can easily do this by buying a $.99 download, making a $1 donation from the airline’s online shopping mall or downloading the airline’s shopping toolbar and making a few searches. With more than 3,000,000 airline miles in his current stash, I’d say this is a guy who knows what he’s talking about. Thanks, Darius.
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You can email her at mary@everydaycheapskate.com, or write to Everyday Cheapskate, P.O. Box 2099, Cypress, CA 90630. Include your first and last name and state.
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