Deciding When to Use Miles or Pay Cash-- A Family Affair

[plane2port]

I've listed all the flights that I and all my family members have taken this spring, and when we decided to use miles, and when we decided to pay for tickets.

As you can see, the way we value miles is fluid, and depends who is flying and how many miles each of us has in our frequent flyer accounts.

http://www.plane2port.com/use-airline-miles-pay-cash-decide/

 

[italdesign]

Intercontinental Y flights to Canada and Alaska are usually a fantastic award value. Don't quite understand why flights to Canada are so expensive.

I keep my decision tree pretty simple: use miles for every flight, if possible. I don't chase airline status so have no incentive to ever have a paid flight. There are also some restrictions to paid flight that don't apply to award flights, giving me even more reason to avoid paid flights altogether. I'm a solo traveler so this is possible.

I do buy cheap intra-Asia tickets when it's a much better value than any redemption.

 

[plane2port]

I like your strategy--use miles for every flight. I could do that but the other family members cannot.

The YUL-ATL flights I've usually redeemed for have been on American, with stopovers in ORD or LGA. The non-stop Delta's are usually a good value with miles if I can book far enough ahead of time. The cash price on those non-stop flights is usually about $200 more than the other airlines that connect somewhere.

Our biggest problem is that often we're booking last minute, and run into paying those fees. That brings our cost per mile down substantially.

 

[haserfauld]

I just booked a domestic business/first award on AA for the first time for this coming Christmas. I have extended family on the east coast, and it's a small airport that generally requires two connections to get to. Award availability is extremely sparse over Christmas, and tickets (in economy) can run upwards of $650. For the dates I needed, I was able to find a sAAver economy out, and sAAver business award with first class cabin on the two long legs after the 40 minute puddle jumper. Total point outlay = 75K. For the same itinerary in economy only, I was looking at $1298. If I wanted the same itinerary with the business return, $2044. Given the increased expenses over Christmas, and the absurd number of AA miles I'm sitting on, I figured what the hey.

 

[italdesign]

that's some crazy price for a domestic ticket, @haserfauld**. If I didn't have miles and wasn't on the west coast, I'd definitely consider driving, even if it requires an intermediate hotel night each way.

** but was that the cheapest flight you could find, period? If not, how much was the cheapest alternative?

 

[haserfauld]

that's some crazy price for a domestic ticket, @haserfauld**. If I didn't have miles and wasn't on the west coast, I'd definitely consider driving, even if it requires an intermediate hotel night each way.

** but was that the cheapest flight you could find, period? If not, how much was the cheapest alternative?

It actually was, yes, regardless of carrier unless I was willing to change route to a bigger airport (150 miles away). I could have saved may $75 a ticket by flying out of LAX instead of SNA, but I hate LAX, especially at Christmas time.