I logged into United.com this morning and saw my lifetimes miles total – 500,024. I am half-way to become a Million Miler! For United MileagePlus, One Million Miles is a significant milestone (no pun intended). It gives you and a significant other Gold Status for life! No matter how many miles you fly in a year henceforth!
Most airlines and some hotel programs have a Lifetime Miles reward. It is their way of rewarding customers who have been loyal over an extended period of time. For airlines, it is typically at …

Chase Card holders with most United Credit Cards need not lose hope. If you are within 5,000 PQM (Elite miles) of reaching your Elite miles target for the year and you cannot make the last flight you needed to get over the threshold, you have an option!
Elite qualification is something some of us have to fight for all year. As a (un)road warrior, this is an annual process for me – scrounge for every PQM to get to (for me) 50,000 PQM in a year for qualifying as a Gold …

I found three new credit cards that not only have a sign-up bonus, but also offer extra miles for transferring you balance. This is a unique opportunity to earn miles for transferring balances to potentially lowers interest rate APRs and earn some miles along the way! Not too many cards offer miles for balance transfers.
I will be the first to point out that none of these are great deals. I am personally not getting any of these cards as I do not have any balance to transfer. Without the transfers, …

I have been traveling. I will post an article on my recent travel soon. I did write some on the flights, but the posts are still in outline form. Got some work to do. In the meanwhile, the world did not stop and things have been going on in the past few days. Here are a few tidbits.
1. Lufthansa shares its seating layout for the 747-8i:
Lufthansa is the first airline to fly the Boeing 747-8i. It will be referred to as the 74H in the 3-character mode of referring to …

In my last post I wrote about earning a minimum of 500 miles for flights taken. This prompted a question from a reader – what is this minimum miles you speak of? Well, here is the answer.
Airlines award miles for flights based on the miles flown. For flights that are very short – less than 500 miles, most airlines award at least 500 miles. This is known as minimum miles award. Different airlines have different rules as to when they would award these minimum miles. Some airlines give them to …

I have to fly US Airways every once in a while. Going in and out of Charlotte (CLT), which I do every so often, forces one to do so. One of my peeves with US Airways (amongst several others), is that when earning miles on United, I would not earn a 500 minimum miles. Dulles (IAD) to Charlotte is 321 miles. United stopped giving the 500 minimum to even it’s Elites a few years ago and only awards the actual miles earned. Continental, on the other hand always gave the …

If you want to get on any sort of waiting list for your flight – whether it is for an upgrade or to get a seat if the flight is not assigning you one, it is best to check-in online and check-in as early as possible. In the US every airline lets you do an online check-in 24 hours in advance of the flight.
Key point to note here is that it is 24 hours in advance of your first segment. If you have a connection, you can check in to …

Star Alliance has announced a contest anyone can enter using their new ‘Publish your upgrade’ app. Prizes range from Around the world trip for 2 to free Star Gold status! To enter, you have to take and post pictures using the app. Entries are open till April 4th.
Here is how it works:
The Star Alliance Picture Your Upgrade app gives you the chance to win exclusive prizes, including designer chairs, upgrades to Gold Status and Round the World Business Class tickets, just by taking photos.
It works like it sounds. Take photos …

The Airline world is made up of three alliances:

Star Alliance
SkyTeam
OneWorld

Understanding the alliances and the airlines that make them up, and which airlines do not participate in an alliance, is key to maximizing miles and status. What alliances allow you to do is pick one airline per alliance and earn miles on that one airline’s frequent flier program no matter which airline in the alliance you fly. That way you can maximize miles. Airlines not only give redeemable miles but also status miles across alliance partners, so this also maximizes Elite …

Focus all your Airline Mile earnings – from all sources (flying, credit card, surveys, etc.) – on one airline or no more than one airline per Alliance. The thinking here is pretty simple and straightforward. If you do not do this, you end up diluting your miles earned and also potentially lose your ability to get to a higher Elite Level in one airline. 25,000 miles earned with one airline’s program is worth much more than 10,000 miles spread out over 5 or even 12,500 over two. If you have …