Managing frequent
flyer miles can be a pain, especially when you're ready to use your miles
before they expire and need to go through the lengthy
process of checking airlines and looking for frequent flyer award seats. There
are a few websites that make the process much easier and allow you to
consolidate and manage your frequent flyer balances, while others help you book
seats or swap miles. Here's a look at some of the best online tools for managing
your frequent flyer miles, where free version of the services can be considered
operational.
Note that the
Airlines become concerned with their customers accessing Frequent Flyer
Accounts through the third parties, and started to change their arrangements
with the former partners.
Consolidate & Manage Your Miles
If you want to
consolidate and manage your frequent flyer miles, here are the websites that
can help:
Award Wallet
This free website
is easy to use and includes an online forum for discussions.
Cost: Free for the regular account, and consumers can name
their own price for AwardWallet Plus.
AwardWallet advantages in sync capabilities with hundreds of
rewards programs (even retail stores and credit cards, in addition to travel
programs) and its operational experience associated with fact that it is one of
the oldest programs (founded in 2004). Both the regular AwardWallet account and
AwardWallet Plus track reward balances for an unlimited number of programs and
track rewards for family members. The regular account sends up to three
expiration notifications, but AwardWallet Plus offers unlimited notices.
As of December 2012, United and Delta canceled their
partnership with Award Wallet. Which does not change the fact that AwardWallet
still supports more than 500 other loyalty programs.
Website: http://awardwallet.com/
UsingMiles
Cost: Free
(Premium membership-temporary)
Usingmiles.com is
offering a free lifetime Premier membership for a limited time. You can take
advantage of this limited time offer that is worth $30 per year. Usingmiles.com
keeps track of your various frequent flyer miles and other loyalty points in
addition to a number of other services such as discovering more opportunities
for you to earn additional points and showing you when your various loyalty
points are about to expire.
Use the
promotional code/link LFLYER to sign up for your free lifetime membership
through LufthansaFlyer or use the promotional code/link MIL1CLICK to sign up
for your free lifetime membership through MilitaryOneClick (if needed).
Website: https://www.usingmiles.com/
MilePort.com/MileTracker.com
Cost: Free
MilePort.com and
MileTracker.com are basically the same application--the difference is that
MileTracker is affiliated with USA Today and MilePort with FrequentFlier.com.
If you register at one of the two Web sites, your login and password will work
for the other one as well. MileTracker used to be available only as a
downloadable software program. The service went online in 2008 but continues to
provide the downloadable application. Members who have been using the desktop
application and sign up for the online version can easily import their
information. Both the online and downloadable versions will track your miles
and provide account summaries and recent activity.
Also free, this
website offers an intuitive system for managing various loyalty and frequent
flyer programs at once and alerts you when your miles will expire.
Websites:
GoMiles/Traxo
Cost: Free
Founded in 2010, this free site tracks hotel and airline
rewards programs, as well as daily deal sites like Groupon and car rental
programs. Users can check bonus offers to earn more miles, and its search
engine capabilities show mileage redemption options. Joel Coffey, an accountant
in Seattle, uses GoMiles' expiration date tracking to "see which miles are
close to expiring without having to log in to each of the individual airline
websites." (He's lost miles in the past due to account inactivity.)
Although he and his wife don't log thousands of miles each year, Coffey says
it's still useful for casual flyers to participate in mileage programs and
track their miles using a single website like GoMiles.
Since 2012, GoMiles was acquired by Traxo, and now miles
manager is a part of their Digital Travel Vallet.
Website: https://www.traxo.com/
Points.com
This website
works like a bulletin board and allows you to list requirements or see what
other people are looking for. If you find a match you can swap. While the site
works with most airlines, you'll need to pay very high fees to your airline.
Fees can be as high as 2 1/2 cents per mile, which is more than most miles are
worth to the average person. Each person swapping must pay this transfer fee,
along with the transaction fee paid to Points.com.
Stay away from
trying to sell your miles, which violates the rules of every airline and may
result in canceling of accrued miles, legal action and more.
Sources and Additional Information:
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