Airline Miles Programs | Points to Miles Programs

 

Registrations and Other Bonuses
Miles and Points Programs

Always check here first before signing up for an airline miles program or a program that gives you points convertible to miles. Both often offer easy miles or points for signing up for their programs, signing up for receiving your frequent flyer miles statements on line, and/or for accepting their email advertising and that of merchants affiliated with them.

Also listed here are some good deals that require registration with the airline or points program and then either flying with them or buying something from them or from one of their partners. Also listed are some means to access other bonus offers from the programs.

 

   
    

Airline Miles Programs

 
Many Airlines and Online Ticketing and Electronic Check In   Many airlines offer significant bonus miles for using their on line ticketing and check in process and their automated check in machines at airports. I list those I know about in the specific airline writeups below, but I am certain that my list in nowhere near complete. Check your airlines's home page for such an offer, and please let me know about it if I haven't already mentioned it. Thanks.

MileMaven maintains a huge list of bonuses for online booking for airlines worldwide. It is no doubt considerably more up to date than anything I list below.

 
Many Airlines and Bonus Offers

 

   Both MileMaven and Frequent Flyer Bonuses, the latter being part of the Rewards Canada Group, maintain huge listings of bonus offers for very large lists of airlines. Frequent Flyer Bonuses and PointMaven also maintain lists of bonuses for hotel chains worldwide, including bonuses very specific to country and/or hotel. Many of the non-U.S. airlines covered by these sites will probably never be mentioned on my website. Both are especially good at finding bonus offers from non-U.S. websites of airlines that are not listed on their U.S. sites, and both cover bonuses from non-U.S. airlines that will be covered lightly or not at all here. They are very good at finding bonuses for paid flights and paid stays at specific hotels. Always check with them before paying for either, as their listings for these will always be much more complete than mine. Registration for the bonuses is often required.

Rewards Canada features a very useful page for Canadians called Bonus Miles Promotion Directory, listing promotions for Airlines, Credit Cards, and Hotels. I suspect that Canadians will find these pages more up to date and complete than the Canadian offerings I list below.

 
Obtaining Elite Status

 

   On February 15, 2005, SmarterTravel published an excellent article on how to obtain elite status on airlines.

 
Exchanging Miles

 

   In September of 2003 SmarterTravel published an excellent article on exchanging miles between airlines and between accounts within the same airline. Usually you lose many miles for doing this, but sometimes you don't, and occasionally you actually gain miles.

 
United Airlines   Caution: Your United Airlines miles will now expire if there is no activity on your account for 18 months. Details.

Between June 25, 2009 and July 17, 2009, United Airlines is offering a special rebate exclusively for customers of the CLEAR Airport Verified Identity Pass. CLEAR customers are eligible for a one-time rebate of the purchase price of Premier Line. Premier Line is currently available at 16 airports with dozens more locations coming soon. It provides

  • Access to the priority security line,
  • Access to the Premier check-in line, and
  • Priority boarding with seating group 1.

United lists your participation and non-participation in various programs that earn miles in its My Mileage Plus section. Log in, then click on My Earnings Participation.

United lists award availability on specific routes for this month and next on its website.

United usually offers free train travel on SNCF French Rail, France's high speed rail service, when you fly to France on United. Read the article to find out how to get it. I believe the train trips are code shared with United, so you probably have to buy your ticket from North America to the final train destination. But I don't know how to get the "train coupon". Ask United about all of this.

United lists many mileage promotions of it and its partners on its Mileage Plus promotions page. But some of the very best ones are listed in its My Mileage Plus section. Log in and click on Partner Offers and United Offers.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and United maintain good lists of individual United Airlines bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation. I no longer intend to list these types of bonuses here.

 
Northwest Airlines   Link your Northwest and Delta Airlines accounts by July 31, 2009, to earn 500 Delta Airlines miles. Link pages (use either one - both give you Delta miles):
  • Northwest Airlines
  • Delta Airlines
  • On April 3, 2009, Delta credited me with a second 500 miles as a thank you for linking my account. I linked via the Northwest Airlines page.
  • Delta says "Linking your accounts allows us to ensure your mileage balance, membership status and account history are accurately consolidated when WorldPerks transitions into SkyMiles in late 2009."
  • Flyertalk discussion, wherein you should find the latest ideas on how to maximize use of this offer.
  • Interesting observation from a reader: "On the Delta site it says. 'Link your accounts and transfer your miles before April 30, 2009 and earn 500 bonus miles in your SkyMiles account.' Note the comment about transferring miles. The statement about 'and transfer your miles', only seems to appear on the Delta site as far as I can see and seemingly not in their 'Terms and Conditions' for this promotion."

    If you want to be super sure of the 500 miles, you might do a small transfer of miles between the accounts. But this is probably just a typical example of unclear writing on the part of Delta.

    The terms and conditions say "The linking of a WorldPerks and SkyMiles account will extend the mileage expiration date on which your miles expire in your SkyMiles account. The SkyMiles account expiration date will be updated 4-5 weeks after SkyMiles and WorldPerks accounts are linked." I think they do this by adding one mile to your Delta account.

Some thoughts:
  • This will allow immediate unlimited free transfers of miles between the two programs.
  • Remember that the two programs will merge sometime this year.
  • If you have only one of these accounts, go open the other right away, then merge them to get the 500.
  • This opens up the possibility of converting American Express Membership Rewards points to Northwest Airlines miles by first sending them to Delta Airlines. You still have time to get good bonuses on those AMEX cards and then do the transfer. See the Annual Fee Cards section of my Credit Card section (though most offers waive the annual fee for the first year).
  • Everyone should go for as many Northwest Airlines bonus offers as possible before they disappear after the merger into Delta. Those of particular interest appear on my Finance, Credit Cards > Annual Fee Cards > Northwest Airlines and American Express section (though the first year is free), and Other Programs I Like pages. Get to those pages, click on each (important), then do a word search on "Northwest Airlines". If you don't yet have a Northwest Airlines account, go get one right now.

Northwest Airlines offer and easy 500 miles for reading about its miles program and answering a few questions about what you read via these "courses". (You can't miss.) The whole thing takes just a few minutes. Please tell me when this offer expires and remind me that I have also listed it on both the reg and shopping pages. Thanks.

  • Complete the WP101: Introduction to WorldPerks course and quiz and earn 100 Bonus Miles
  • After completion, get EXTRA CREDIT MILES: Book and fly one paid, roundtrip itinerary within the next 90 days and earn an additional 2,000 Bonus Miles.
  • Then complete the WP102: My WorldPerks Number course and quiz and earn another 100 Bonus Miles
  • After completion, get EXTRA CREDIT MILES: Make two (2) qualifying purchases through the WorldPerks Mall within the next 60 days and earn an additional 1,000 Bonus Miles. A qualifying purchase is defined as two purchases at separate WorldPerks Mall merchants, each totaling a minimum of $25. The $25 minimum excludes shipping, service charges and applicable taxes.
  • Complete the WP200: A Global Perspective - SkyTeam course and quiz and earn 100 Bonus Miles
  • After completion, get EXTRA CREDIT MILES: Book and fly one paid, roundtrip itinerary within the next 90 days and earn an additional 2,000 Bonus Miles.
  • Complete the WP201: WorldPerks Mileage Parners course and quiz and earn 100 Bonus Miles
  • After completion, get EXTRA CREDIT MILES: Book and stay with a qualifying hotel partner in the next 90 days and earn an additional 1,000 Bonus Miles.

Earn 500 Bonus Northwest Airlines Miles for every $100 Best Western Travel Card purchase through August 31, 2009. I leave it to you to read the details.

Transfer your Hilton HHonors® points into Northwest Airlines miles through August 31, 2009 and get a 40% bonus.

  1. First, register for this promotion using your WorldPerks number.
  2. Then, transfer your points into miles by calling Hilton Reservations and Customer Care at 1-800-548-8690 (in the U.S./Canada) or 1-800-449-4155 (outside the continental U.S.).
  3. You’ll enjoy 1 mile for every 10 Hilton HHonors points transferred, plus a 40% mileage bonus.

Now through December 31, 2009, you will receive 1,000 Delta or Northwest Airlines bonus miles for each $1,000 Marriott VacationCard you purchase, or 2,000 bonus miles for each $2,000 VacationCard, for up to 10,000 bonus miles. Plus, you get 10% off with a savings up to $200 per card. I leave it to you to read the details.

Click here and log in to find out how to buy 2,000 miles for $20. If you don't hold a NWA Visa card, go get one with a great up front bonus, no annual fee for a year. See the Annual Fee Cards page of my Credit Card section.

WorldPerks Elite members can earn a 50% bonus for regular credited flight miles and Elite tier Bonus Miles. You must register first. Read the terms and conditions. (Thanks to View from the Wing for this information.)

Supershuttle offers 50 Northwest Airlines miles each way for its shuttles to and from various airports, or 150 miles each way for its private ExecuCar service.

Northwest Airlines lists its special offers in its promotions section. Be sure to click on the View All link at the bottom of the list for each category to see all of the offers.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and Northwest maintain good lists of individual Northwest Airlines bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation. I no longer intend to list these types of bonuses.

 
Delta Airlines   Link your Northwest and Delta Airlines accounts by July 31, 2009, to earn 500 Delta Airlines miles. Link pages (use either one - both give you Delta miles):
  • Delta Airlines
  • Northwest Airlines
  • On April 3, 2009, Delta credited me with a second 500 miles as a thank you for linking my account. I linked via the Northwest Airlines page.
  • Delta says "Linking your accounts allows us to ensure your mileage balance, membership status and account history are accurately consolidated when WorldPerks transitions into SkyMiles in late 2009."
  • Flyertalk discussion, wherein you should find the latest ideas on how to maximize use of this offer.
  • Interesting observation from a reader: "On the Delta site it says. 'Link your accounts and transfer your miles before April 30, 2009 and earn 500 bonus miles in your SkyMiles account.' Note the comment about transferring miles. The statement about 'and transfer your miles', only seems to appear on the Delta site as far as I can see and seemingly not in their 'Terms and Conditions' for this promotion."

    If you want to be super sure of the 500 miles, you might do a small transfer of miles between the accounts. But this is probably just a typical example of unclear writing on the part of Delta.

    The terms and conditions say "The linking of a WorldPerks and SkyMiles account will extend the mileage expiration date on which your miles expire in your SkyMiles account. The SkyMiles account expiration date will be updated 4-5 weeks after SkyMiles and WorldPerks accounts are linked." I think they do this by adding one mile to your Delta account.

Some thoughts:
  • This will allow immediate unlimited free transfers of miles between the two programs.
  • Remember that the two programs will merge sometime this year.
  • If you have only one of these accounts, go open the other right away, then merge them to get the 500.
  • This opens up the possibility of converting American Express Membership Rewards points to Northwest Airlines miles by first sending them to Delta Airlines. You still have time to get good bonuses on those AMEX cards and then do the transfer. See the Annual Fee Cards section of my Credit Card section (though most offers waive the annual fee for the first year).
  • Everyone should go for as many Northwest Airlines bonus offers as possible before they disappear after the merger into Delta. Those of particular interest appear on my Finance, Credit Cards > Annual Fee Cards > Northwest Airlines and American Express section (though the first year is free), this Registrations and Other Bonuses, and Other Programs I Like pages. Get to those pages, click on each (important), then do a word search on "Northwest Airlines". If you don't yet have a Northwest Airlines account, go get one right now.

Possibly receive Delta Airlines miles for signing up for e-mails. These offers are targeted, but go ahead and try them anyway. You will see a message if you are not qualified for them.

Now through December 31, 2009, you will receive 1,000 Delta or Northwest Airlines bonus miles for each $1,000 Marriott VacationCard you purchase, or 2,000 bonus miles for each $2,000 VacationCard, for up to 10,000 bonus miles. Plus, you get 10% off with a savings up to $200 per card. I leave it to you to read the details.

Earn up to 50,000 bonus Delta Airlines miles for on new international routes.

  • SkyMiles members who purchase qualifying Delta or Northwest round-trip flights and fly from or through the listed select international cities will earn 15,000 bonus miles in Business Class (or 10,000 in Economy Class).
  • Purchase your round-trip ticket using a Delta SkyMiles® Credit Card from American Express and earn an additional 35,000 bonus miles (for a total of 50,000 miles earned) for Business Class or 15,000 bonus miles (for a total of 25,000 miles earned) for Economy Class. See the Free Cards page of the Credit Card section of this website to get a Delta credit card.
  • Register by August 31, 2009, then book and fly by September 30, 2009. I leave it to you to read the terms and conditions.

Seekers of Delta Airlines miles should also seek Northwest Airlines miles deals, as the two airlines will merge into Delta, and many of the deals unique to NWA may disappear.

I rarely post offers for purchase of miles from airlines, because they are always too expensive. But this one might be useful to some. Northwest Airlines is offering a 100% bonus for transfer of its miles to someone else. It seems to me that it should be possible to use the linking of Delta and Northwest accounts mentioned above to effectively get this same offer for Delta miles.

Effective January 1, 2009, Delta Airlines miles now expire 2 years to the date after no activity in your account. I find the easiest activity is a Rewards Network (iDine) activity. See the Dining section of my Other Programs I Like page.

Effective May 15, 2008, SkyMiles members are required to redeem miles at the time of booking an Award Ticket reservation with a Delta representative. For your convenience, you can place a reservation on hold and avoid ticketing charges by booking and ticketing at delta.com.

  • A reader offer an exception to this rule:
    "There is an exception…if you have a Skymiles account that doesn’t have enough Skymiles to book the ticket they will make the reservation and hold it for you for 48 hours. This gives you enough time to transfer miles from somewhere else for example your American Express Membership Rewards or purchase the miles.

    "To do this you make the reservation yourself online with the Skymiles account (that doesn’t have enough miles) and then you will get a call “on-line” customer service message. You will also be given a confirmation number. They ask you to do this within 4 hours. At that time you tell them you need more miles, etc… they will oblige you and tell you that your reservation is on hold.

    "The trick is to be sure you use the “online” help phone number and not the general Skymiles number."

Post #4 on this Flyertalk discussion mentions a 6,000 mile bonus for people with addresses outside of North America enrolling and doing the first flight in economy, or 11,000 miles for enrolling and doing the first flight in paid business or first class.

Delta SkyMiles Medallion members are offered bonus miles for continuing to fly with Delta. I leave it to you to read the details.

Delta frequently offers bonuse for transferring hotel or American Express points to Delta Airlines miles. I will list them here as I find them. You must register first. Read the details, terms and conditions. If you are in no hurry to receive the miles, consider waiting until a bonus offer appears.

  • Register to receive a 30% bonus for transferring American Express points to Delta Airlines miles through July 31, 2009. I leave it to you to read the details.

You can earn a free 25 Delta Airlines miles for joining Points.com. Points.com allows you to move miles and points between programs, at a loss of a majority of those miles or points. Click on this page and do a word search on "points.com" to find better mileage or points offers.

Delta lists many of its bonus miles offers here and here. Be sure to click on the "See more limited-time offers" link for each category in the page of the first link. More offers for its credit card holders are listed here. (So get a free one already. See my credit card page.)

Delta's website has a page listing all of its mileage earning partners.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and Delta maintain good lists of individual Delta Airlines bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation. I no longer intend to list these types of bonuses.

 
Alaska Airlines

   Alaska Airlines Book Now

  If you plan to pay money for an Alaska Airlines ticket, you can help me at no cost to yourself by clicking on the button to the left to get to the airline's home page. Thanks.

Policy change: Effective April 1, 2008, accounts with no mileage activity for the previous 2 years will become inactive and the miles will be removed from the account. Any mileage earning or award redemption activity on your account will keep it active.

This post on Flyertalk indicates that Canadian residents will earn up to 3,000 Alaska Airlines miles for joining the program online. I am unable to find any mention of this on Alaska's website.

Here are Alaska's ongoing offers. Be sure to read and confirm each one before counting on them.

  • 500 miles for creating a profile with the Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan.
  • 1,000 miles for each purchase of a ticket at alaskaair.com. Details here.
    • Use your Alaska Airlines Credit, Debit or Business Card to purchase tickets at alaskaair.com and each traveler in the reservation will get an additional 1,000 Bonus Miles – in addition to the miles each traveler will already earn for their flights. If an Alaska Airlines Credit, Debit or Business Card is not used to purchase tickets at alaskaair.com, each traveler will not earn 1,000 Bonus Miles. However the purchaser will receive 1,000 Bonus Miles for the first ticket he or she purchases at alaskaair.com. Details.
  • 1,000 miles for the first time you redeem an award online. Details here.
  • 1,000 miles for first use of one of its airport kiosks to check in. Details here.
  • 1,000 miles for checking in online for the first time. Details here.
  • 500 miles for signing up for its newsletter.

On its New to Alaska Airlines or Horizon Air? page Alaska Airlines has some very good suggestions on how to earn easy miles for doing such things as buying your ticket on line, checking in on line, using an ITM kiosk, etc.

Alaska Airlines frequently offers awards at a discount to the usual number of miles required.

Starting August 1, 2007, awards booked through Alaska Airlines' reservation call center will pay a premium. I am told that premium will be 5,000 more miles. To avoid paying more miles, book online.

Purchase a $100 Best Western Travel Card through August 31, 2009, and earn 500 Alaska Airlines miles. I leave it to you to read the details.

Baggage arrival guarantee. Effective July 7, 2009: If your baggage is not at baggage claim within 25 minutes of your plane parking at the gate, you're entitled to a $25 Discount Code for use on a future Alaska Airlines or Horizon Air flight or 2,500 Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan bonus miles.

You can earn a free 50 Alaska Airlines miles for joining Points.com. Points.com allows you to move miles and points between programs, at a loss of a majority of those miles or points. Click on this page and do a word search on "points.com" to find better mileage or points offers.

I don't usually list miles promos for small businesses, but since this one is about Alaska kayaks, and since most all businesses in Alaska are small, I can't resist: If you are a current Folding Kayak Adventures customer and you refer a friend who purchases a kayak, you can earn 500 Alaska Airlines miles. Also, if you buy a kayak, the company will award Mileage Plan miles to your Alaska Airlines account at a rate of 1 mile per each $3 spent. No details are provided about how to do the referral. Ask.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and Alaska maintain good lists of individual Alaska Airlines and Horizon Airlines bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation. I no longer intend to list these types of bonuses.

On February 2, 2007, the terms and conditions of Alaska's program indicated that if an Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan account is inactive for longer than three years, you lose all of your miles.

 
American Airlines   Caution: American Airlines has changed its mileage expiration policy for the worse.
"AAdvantage members now must have mileage earning or redemption activity once every eighteen (18) months in order to remain active and retain their miles. Effective December 15, 2007, mileage balances will expire from AAdvantage accounts that have not had miles either earned or redeemed within the previous eighteen (18) month period. If the last activity in your AAdvantage account was prior to June 15, 2006, all miles subject to expiration will expire on December 15, 2007."
There are very easy ways to earn miles on American to keep your account alive. My favorite is to do a dine at an American Airlines Rewards Network (iDine) restaurant. See the Dining Section of my Other Programs I Like page for info. Making a purchase at American's shopping portal is also easy, and often a very good mileage deal. See the Shop On Line section of my Buying Stuff page. I automatically earn mileage monthly from my BankDirect account. See the Banking section of my Finance page.

Register, then use American Airlines' Fly Now, Pay Later deferred payment option to buy tickets at AA.com and earn 350 AAdvantage miles for each ticket of $350 or more that you charge to your AmericanAirlines Credit Card account. Earn the additional bonus miles on up to 12 qualifying ticket purchases for a maximum of 4,200 miles per AAdvantage account.

  • There are no interest charges or payments due for six months after purchase. But after that the interest rates are exorbitant.
  • Note that the AmericanAirlines Credit Card is not the same card as the American Airlines Mastercard, Visa, or Business cards described the Annual Fee Cards page in my Credit Card section. Instead, it is a separate charge card used only for purchase of American Airlines tickets, similar to the old oil company and department store cards. A link to the application for this card is on the offer page.

Earn 500 Bonus American Airlines Miles for every $50 Best Western Travel Card purchase through August 31, 2009. I leave it to you to read the details.

American Airlines offers 250 miles and a low price guarantee for booking your hotel through aa.com. I leave it to you to read the details.

  • Special offer: Book your hotel stay for 3 or more nights before July 31, 2009 and travel before December 31, 2009, and you can earn 1,000 miles on each eligible hotel stay.

You can earn a free 100 American Airlines miles for joining Points.com. Points.com allows you to move miles and points between programs, at a loss of a majority of those miles or points. Click on this page and do a word search on "points.com" to find better mileage or points offers.

  • Special offer for American Airlines Elite members: Get 150 miles for joining points.com. I suspect, but do not know, that points.com has no way of knowing whether or not you have Elite status.
  • Special offer for regular American Airlines members: Get 100 miles for joining points.com.

CNN article: "A back door to VIP status" on American Airlines.

American Airlines offers limited time, heavily restricted reduced mileage awards for holders of American Airlines credit cards. (You have one and got the free mega bonus miles for it, right? See the Annual Fee Cards page of my Credit Card section.)

American Airline's Code Share Partners Page lists some European railways in addition to a very large number of Airlines.

  • American Airlines offers miles for transportation on various SNCF TGV trains in conjunction with American Airlines operated flights to Paris/Charles de Gaulle International Airport, Paris, France (CDG). SNCF is the high speed train service in France. To qualify your rail ticket must reflect an "AA" coded flight number and you must travel between Charles de Gualle and the U.S. on American Airlines. If my link doesn't work, go to the American Airlines web site and use the search feature in the upper right corner to search on "SNCF".
  • American Airlines codeshares with Thalys Rail service between Paris, Charles de Gaulle Airport and Brussels, Belgium Midi Rail Station. American offers miles on American Airlines codeshare service operated by Thalys. Your ticket must reflect an "AA" coded flight number. If my link doesn't work, put "Thalys" in the search field in the upper right corner of most of American's web pages.
  • American Airlines codeshares with Deutsche Bahn train service in Germany between Frankfurt airport and Bonn, Cologne/ Koeln, Dortmund, Duesseldorf, Essen, Freiburg, Goettingen, Hamburg, Hannover, Kassel, Mannheim, Munich/Muenchen, Nuremberg/Nuernberg, Stuttgart and Wuerzburg. Your ticket must reflect an "AA" coded flight number. If my link doesn't work, put "Deutsche Bahn" in the search field in the upper right corner of most of American's web pages.

You may be able to earn more miles than you would from using your credit card to purchase tickets at American Airlines by instead purchasing an American Airlines gift certificate from GiftCertificates.com. See my description of this ploy in the GiftCertificates.com section of the Shop On Line section of my Buying Stuff page.

American Airlines' website now has a special offers page and a new offers page, which list Airline, Hotel, Car Rental, and Other bonus miles offers.

American Airlines allows you to acquire certain tickets with a combination of miles and money. The opportunities are listed here, but those interested should also call the airline to see if other similar opportunities are available that didn't make it to the web page.

Seekers of American Airlines miles should also read about the frequent offers of those miles by Cathay Pacific. My listing of those I know about can be found below.

American lists likely routes available for miles awards.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and American Airlines maintain good lists of individual American Airlines bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation. I no longer intend to list these types of bonuses here.

 
Continental Airlines   Caution: Most airline miles expire only if you have not had an activity in your account within the last 1 - 3 years. Continental advertises that its miles never expires. However, its terms and conditions say
"If no mileage is deposited in your account for 18 consecutive months, commencing after June 1, 2001, your membership will be cancelled, and your miles may be forfeited. To keep your account active, you can earn mileage with a variety of airline, non-travel and shopping partners."

100 miles for entering your Continental Airlines account number here through July 31, 2009. Promotion Code: 57063.

Many of Continental's non-U.S. websites offer 5,000 miles for signing up for the program and taking your first flight. Language change can be made in the upper right corner. These sites say nothing about where you must live to get the bonus, and links to a signup website that permits registration by people living most anywhere in the world. I wonder what happens if a U.S. resident signs up via a non U.S. website. Worth a shot. (Thanks to Frequent Flyer Bonuses for these links.)

Residents of the Mid Pacific, South Pacific, China or South Asia (excludes Japan) may earn 2,000 miles for signing up for Continental Airlines' miles program, and then an additional 5,000 miles by flying with them. All of this must occur between January 1 and December 31, 2009. Details. Read them. (Thanks to View from the Wing for this information.)

You can book a Standard Economy travel reward ticket to any destination within 1,500 miles for just 20,000 miles, with some restrictions. The discount is shown on Continental's award table.

Members of Veterans Advantage are offered a 5% discount on purchase of Continental Airlines tickets on Continental's website, plus 3,000 bonus miles for first purchased flight. Read the details. Continental says that registration is required, so I suggest you do that first before following the directions on the Veterans Advantage website. Find the registration info by looking for the offer on Continental's OnePass News & Offers page. Try the "All" tab. Use promotion code 56047.

Continental Airlines offers Base Miles, Elite Qualification Miles and Elite Qualification Point(s) for Amtrak travel to and from Newark airport to and from connecting Continental flights, and for Amtrak Metroliner and Acela Express travel between New York's Penn Station and certain points (no connecting flight required). Read the terms and conditions.

Continental offers actual miles or a minimum of 500 miles on SNCF TGV trains in conjunction with Continental Airlines operated flights to Paris/Charles de Gaulle International Airport, Paris, France (CDG). It offers a 50% bonus for travel in SNCF TGV first class. To receive mileage credit, you must provide your OnePass number when making flight reservations or at flight check-in. SNCF will not accept OnePass numbers.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and Continental maintain good lists of individual Continental Airlines bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

 
U.S. Airways   Receive 1,000 miles for simiply joining the U.S. Airways Dividend Miles program. This is a limited time offer, expiration date not specified. Please tell me when it disappears. Thanks. (Thanks to View from the Wing for this information.)

U.S. Airways Dividend Miles members will earn a 50% bonus on all Dividend Miles earned from hotel partners for qualifying stays, hotel transfers (points to miles conversions) and car rentals May 1 - July 31, 2009.

  • You must register first.
  • Note that this is a particularly good offer for transfer of Starwood point to U.S. Airways miles. 20,000 points should get you 37,500 miles instead of the usual 25,000.
  • You must be subscribed to US Airways e-Statement and Earn More Miles emails in order to earn the bonus. If you are not currently subscribed to such emails, we will automatically subscribe you using the email address you provide on the registration form.

If you have never flown with U.S. Airways, earn 2,000 extra miles for your first flight with them. Register, then book your first flight on U.S. Airways between April 22 and July 31, 2009 for travel between April 22 and August 31, 2009.

Supershuttle offers 50 U.S. Airways miles each way for its shuttles to and from various airports, or 150 miles each way for its private ExecuCar service.

You can earn a free 25 U.S. Airways miles for joining Points.com. Points.com allows you to move miles and points between programs, at a loss of a majority of those miles or points. Click on this page and do a word search on "points.com" to find better mileage or points offers.

U.S. Air lists available award seats 1 - 2 months out on its website. Click on Award Travel Suggestions.

Caution: Be sure to have at least one activity on your U.S. Airways account in all consecutive 18 month periods. Current policy, as of October 11, 2006:

Reactivation policy
Active membership status is based on having earned or redeemed miles within a defined period as stated below. To keep your account active, be sure to fly US Airways, apply for a US Airways MasterCard or Visa credit cards, or earn miles with one of our over 50 other partners. Learn more.

Effective January 31, 2007, active membership status is based on having earned or redeemed miles within a consecutive 18 month period. With our new Mileage Reactivation Policy, Dividend Miles members have an opportunity to reinstate their Dividend Miles accounts to active status for an additional 18 months for a $50 processing fee and reactivation fee of $.01 per mile. If members do not extend with this reactivation option, the Dividend Miles account will be closed and all miles forfeited.

Members who have no account activity for a consecutive 36 month period will have their accounts closed and will forfeit all miles in their accounts. Once forfeited, miles cannot be reinstated.

Prior to the above policy changes taking effect, 36 consecutive months of account inactivity will lead to account closure and forfeiture of all miles.

Both Frequent Flyer Bonuses and Milemaven maintain good lists of individual U.S. Airways bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation. I no longer plan to list these types of bonuses here.

 
Southwest Airlines   Ominous statement from Southwest Airlines: "Effective December 8, 2007, Southwest Airlines reserves the right to amend, suspend, or terminate the Rapid Rewards program at any time, with 30 days notice. This constitutes a revision of Rapid Rewards rule #27, which currently states: Southwest Airlines reserves the right to amend, suspend, or terminate this program at any time, with six (6) months notice."

According to this SmarterTravel article, you can extend the life of your SWA credits by paying them $50. Please tell me about your experience trying this. Thanks.

  • On January 8, 2007, a reader wrote
    "You asked about the extension of Southwest Rapid Rewards passes for the $50 fee. They now do this over the phone with a credit card but it takes 48 hours to post so don't cut the deadline close if you want to use the award in the next few days after extending, or so they just told me as I've never done it this way. My next pass expires in February of 2007. When I've done this in the past years by writing and sending them a check, it has worked out fine. They extend the voucher for another year past the original expiration date."

Super offer for college students between the ages of 18 and 23: Southwest Airlines offers 4 credits for signing up for its Rapid Rewards program and then double credits (4 credits for each round trip) for the next 24 months. Be sure to time your enrollment right. Remember that credits expire in 24 months. But you are a college student. So you can figure this out. Read the terms and conditions.

Southwest Airlines normally offers 2 credits for signing up for its Rapid Rewards program.

Rapid Rewards Members who fly 50 or more roundtrips (or receive 100 credits through flight and partner use) within a 12-month period receive a Companion Pass. A Companion Pass lets one person of your choice fly free when traveling with you anytime for an entire year. Details. Read them.

Southwest Airlines lists it Rapid Rewards promotions here. Note also the menu on the left side of this page for links to partners.

Both Frequent Flyer Bonuses and Milemaven maintain good lists of individual Southwest Airlines bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation. I no longer plan to list these types of bonuses here.

Caution: Southwest credits expire 2 years after they are earned. So be sure you can earn enough credits within that time to earn a ticket and can spend them within that time before you accept Southwest offers.

 
AirTran   Receive A+ Rewards Elite Membership when you earn 10 or more A+ credits flying AirTran Airways within any 90-day period or earn 25 or more A+ credits flying AirTran Airways within any 365-day period. I leave it to you to read about the details, and what Elilte Membership means.

The AirTran website has a separate page for its A-Plus Rewards special offers. Often double credits are offered.

As of July 21, 2004, it takes 16 credits to earn a round trip ticket within the U.S. There are options to use your credits for tickets to anywhere in the world on any airline. However, the program has the restriction that you must earn all credits toward the flight you want within a one year time span, so it is for frequent users of AirTran only.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and AirTran maintain good lists of individual AirTran Airlines bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

 
Frontier Airlines   Supershuttle offers 50 Frontier Airlines miles each way for its shuttles to and from various airports, or 150 miles each way for its private ExecuCar service.

You can earn a free 30 Frontier Airlines miles for joining Points.com. Points.com allows you to move miles and points between programs, at a loss of a majority of those miles or points. Click on this page and do a word search on "points.com" to find better mileage or points offers.

Frontier sometimes offers deeply discounted award tickets.

Frontier mileage, partner, and other offers are described on the airline's Specials page.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and Frontier maintain good lists of individual Frontier Airlines bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

 
Hawaiian Airlines  

You can earn a free 50 Hawaiian Airlines miles for joining Points.com. Points.com allows you to move miles and points between programs, at a loss of a majority of those miles or points. Click on this page and do a word search on "points.com" to find better mileage or points offers.

The Hawaiian Airlines website lists its special offers for miles and fares.

You can sign up for email telling you about specials. (Beats relying on me to get around to telling you about them.)

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and Hawaiian Air maintain good lists of individual Hawiian Airlines bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

 
Midwest Airlines   Register for the "Two for Won" promotion 24WON and get double flight miles when you fly on any day that the Brewers win a regular season game (triple miles for post-season wins). Regular season games are from April 7 through October 4, 2009. I love this offer.
  • You must register before your flight.
  • I leave it to you to read the terms and conditions.

For every three paid round trips on Midwest Airlines (or six paid one-way trips) that pets fly with their owners, they earn one free round trip. And owners who are Midwest Miles members can earn a free round trip for their pets by redeeming 15,000 Midwest Miles. (That's what it says - you interpret it.) I leave it to you to read the details.

You can earn a free 150 Midwest Airlines miles for joining Points.com. Points.com allows you to move miles and points between programs, at a loss of a majority of those miles or points. Click on this page and do a word search on "points.com" to find better mileage or points offers.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and Midwest maintain good lists of individual Midwest Airlines bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

JetBlue   JetBlue offers double points for booking online.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses and Milemaven maintain good lists of individual JetBlue bonus points offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

 
Spirit Airlines   Spirit Airlines regularly offers very short term e-mail special super discounts on its tickets, way too frequently for me to track here. I strongly recommend that you sign up for emails from the airline to read about the latest discounts.

Caution: FREE SPIRIT Miles will expire when an account becomes inactive for a period of 6 months or more. An “inactive” account is one that has less than 2,000 miles credited to it from any source during the preceding 6 months. This program appears to be truely for frequent flyers on Spirit Airlines only.

Milemaven maintains a list of individual Spirit Airlines bonus miles offers. Milemaven is particularly good at finding individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

 
Air Canada Aeroplan   Caution: Air Canada has changed its terms and conditions on expiration of miles to perhaps the worst policy in the industry:
Effective July 1, 2007: All mileage in an account expires if the Aeroplan member has not accumulated or redeemed Aeroplan Miles for a period of 12 consecutive months. Mileage may expire without further notice.

Effective January 1, 2007: Mileage in an account expires 7 years (84 months) after the date of accumulation. Mileage accumulated in an account prior to January 1, 2007 is deemed to have an accumulation date of December 31, 2006 (regardless of the actual mileage accumulation date). Mileage may expire without further notice.

If I were a Canadian, these changes would cause me to strive to accumulate my miles on another airline. Consider United Airlines or U.S. Airways, for example.

Bonus offer for conversion of hotel points to Air Canada Aeroplan miles. Register, then convert by August 31, 2009, to get

  • 1,000 Bonus Aeroplan Miles when you convert hotel loyalty points of any hotel partner for 5,000 to 19,999 Aeroplan miles, or
  • 5,000 Bonus Aeroplan Miles when you convert hotel loyalty points of any hotel partner for 20,000 Aeroplan miles or more.
  • One bonus per hotel partner.
  • Thanks to View from the Wing for this information.

Earn 500 Bonus Air Canada Aeroplan Miles for every $50 Best Western Travel Card purchase through August 31, 2009. I leave it to you to read the details.

Air Canada offers 1 Aeroplan Mile for every $1, $2, or $3 spent (depending on the type of ticket) for tickets booked at aircanada.com for travel within North America, and various bonuses for international travel.

Register to earn up to 40,000 Bonus Aeroplan Miles on flights within North America June 01 - September 07, 2009. I leave it to you to read the details.

Sobey's in Canada offers 500 miles for joining the program, plus 1 Aeroplan mile / $2 spent at their stores in Ontario, British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba.

You can earn a free 25 Air Canada miles for joining Points.com. Points.com allows you to move miles and points between programs, at a loss of a majority of those miles or points. Click on this page and do a word search on "points.com" to find better mileage or points offers.

Air Canada lists many of its miles earning and rewards offers on its Promotions Page. Click on the appropriate tab.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and Air Canada maintain lists of individual Air Canada bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

 
Grupo Taca   Buy Taca miles at the rate of 1.25 cents/mile, minimum 1,000 miles, no upper limit. I strongly recommend that you read this Flyertalk discussion on this offer to find out why this may be a very good or not so good offer. Apparently Taca miles can be used to get tickets on United, Iberia, Avianca, Taca Regional, and TAM Airlines. Taca is my favorite airline for getting around Central and South America. I used to use it extensively using American Airlines miles. (That opportunity is no longer available.) But I have never flown business class on it, and have no experience with its miles program.

Grupo Taca offers 2,000 miles for purchasing a ticket on line at its web site. On August 10, 2007, I received an email from Taca saying "It doesn´t matter your origin or destination, every time you purchase your ticket at TACA.com, you receive a 2,000 DISTANCIA bonus miles!"

I have an email from Grupo Taca dated March 29, 2004, that says

Get 1,000 DISTANCIA miles with online e-statements! Why wait to receive printed DISTANCIA account statements when you can have access to them online 24 hours a day from anywhere in the world? Order yours today and get 1,000 free bonus miles as well!.
I can find no mention of this offer on the Distancia web site.

The Grupo Taca website lists its specials:

Taca's website lists its Distancia partners.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and Taca maintain good lists of individual Taca bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

Grupo Taca is my favorite airline for getting around Central and South America. It's customer service desk at the San Jose, Costa Rica airport is the best I have ever dealt with. They were especially helpful when I was stranded in Peru, and then in Costa Rica, because of the 9/11 disaster.

 
LanPass (LanChile and LanPeru)   LanPass offers 1,000 kilometers for purchase of a ticket at LAN.com.

LAN offers a free shuttle bus between New Jersey and its JFK airport terminal for holders of LAN tickets. Details.

The LanPass program is described here in English. Note its membership in the OneWorld Alliance, which includes American Airlines, amongst others. If you find yourself flying on LanChile or LanPeru (perhaps a tour put you on it), ask for the kilometers or miles you deserve from the airline program to which you belong. (A planned internal flight within Peru on an organized tour motivated me to look at this program.)

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and LAN maintain good lists of individual LAN bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

 
AeroMéxico   AeroMéxico offers 4,000 miles for signing up for their free frequent flyer miles program. They offer an additional bonus of 4,000 Premier Miles for your first purchase of Tickets or Gran Plan Specials if you make them on line, and then an additional bonus of 1,250 Premier Miles every time you buy tickets or Gran Plan specials on line. It is possible that the 4,000 miles here is the same 4,000 offered for initial sign up, and you may not be able to receive the initial 4,000 unless you buy a ticket. Not clear.

Note: The first link I gave you works with Microsoft Internet Explorer, but not with Netscape 4.7. If anyone knows why, please explain it to me.

Aeroméxico offers 6,400 Premier Kilometers on your first online purchase at aeromexico.com and 2,000 additional Kilometers for each subsequent purchase.

Club Premier Familiar is Aeromexico's Frequent Flyer Program specially created for you and your family (Spouse and Children), where the designated beneficiary (Only Spouse) of the Family Account, can obtain 20% additional Premier Kilometers, over every flight each of his family members do, even if they don't fly together. Another benefit it the possibility of transferring Premier Kilometers from each individual in the family account, to the designated beneficiary account in order to obtain more Award Tickets easily.

By paying the full Clase Premier ("J" Juliet) fare, earn a 100% bonus on the Mileage flown on international flight and 50% on domestic flights. Pay the special Clase Premier ("A" Alpha) fare and earn a 50% bonus on the Mileage flown on international flight and 25% on domestic flights. Details.

Both Frequent Flyer Bonuses and Milemaven maintain good lists of individual AeroMéxico bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

 
Mexicana Airlines   Mexicana Airlines offers 2,500 bonus miles for purchasing a round trip ticket on line at its web site (1,250 miles one way).

5,000 mile bonus for certain trips between the U.S. and Mexico. Mention code GGFTAMTINT02. Read the terms and conditions.

AARP members are offered discounts of 10% - 12% for paid Mexicana flights originating in the U.S.

Mexicana Airlines lists its miles partners here.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and Mexicana maintain good lists of individual Mexicana Airlines bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

 
VARIG   VARIG (Viação Aérea Rio-Grandense SA) says you will earn You earn at least 1,000 miles on each VARIG or Pluna flight, no matter how short it is. "Some flights and fares have restriction for mileage accrual. In case of any doubts, contact the Smiles Service Center."

VARIG's website lists its partners (both airline and other).

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and VARIG maintain good lists of individual VARIG bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

 
British Airways   British Airways partners for the U.S. are listed here. To find British Airways offers for your country, click on USA at the top of the page, then use the pull down menu and click on your country. Navigate to Executive Club > Partners > Additional partners in your region. There are many offers for many countries.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and British Airways maintain good lists of individual British Airways bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

 
Virgin Atlantic   Virgin Atlantic offers mega miles for referring friends who then fly on Virgin in certain classes. Details. Read them.

The Virgin Atlantic website lists its mileage earning partners and many local partners in the U.K., U.S., Caribbean Islands, Asia, and South Africa at which you may spend your miles.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and Virgin Atlantic maintain good lists of individual Virgin Atlantic Airlines bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

 
British Midland Airways (BMI)   BMI regularly has some offer for joining, but it changes so frequently that I can't possibly keep up with it. Do not count on these offers lasting to the stated deadlines. Often the change is made to replace an offer that originally said it has not yet expired. This flyertalk thread does a pretty good job of tracking the offers. Just jump to the last pages to see the latest. Or go to BMI's website to see what is offered before joining.

Note that it is possible that BMI's miles program will be merged with that of Lufthansa - so those seeking miles of the latter should joing the former for the bonus.

BMI is a Star Alliance member, so it should be able to get you to most anywhere in the world on a mile award. Also, it has additional airline partners.

You can earn additional BMI miles from it various partners.

You should read about the BMI promotions Mile Maven and Rewards Canada know about. I will list some of the better ones I happen to come across occasionally, but I do not intend to follow this airline closely.

BMI seems to have rather strict expiration policies for the miles you earn. I leave it to you to figure out the rules. They are stated in the terms and conditions, and seem to require that you maintain various statuses year to year.

 
Lufthansa and Austrian Airlines Miles and More   Lufthansa's website offers miles promotions.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses and Milemaven maintain good lists of individual Lufthasa bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

 
SAS   SAS lists its many bonus offers here. Also note the link at the left of the page for Partners and Points, and the link at the bottom of the page for more EuroBonus offers.

Milemaven and SAS maintain good lists of individual SAS bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

 
Air France/KLM Flying Blue Miles Program   Flying Blue offers 5,000 miles for enrolling in its program and then taking one flight between the U.S. and Paris in your first 6 months of membership. Enter FB05 in the “Promotional code” box when you enroll.

Flying Blue regularly offers up to 50% discounts for selected award tickets. (Thanks to One Mile at a Time for this information.)

KLM offers 7 Flying Blue Miles per minute when you are traveling abroad and making mobile phone calls on the T-Mobile network in the UK, Germany, Austria and the Netherlands and the Mobistar network in Belgium. You must register first. Read the details, terms, and conditions.

KLM participates in two mileage programs, its own Flying Dutchman program, and Air Miles, a general purpose Dutch shopping program. Info on how to earn bonus miles on each of the programs can be found on any of KLM's European web sites. Here is the site for the Netherlands in English. Be sure to do the math before deciding in which program you want your miles. Sorry, I can't help here. I don't read the language of the Air Miles web site.

KLM lists its partners offers on its web site. After getting to the site via the link above, click on Flying Dutchman, then on Partners.

The bonus offers for Air France's frequent flyer miles program for U.S. residents are found by going to its U.S. home page, clicking on Frequent Flyer Programs in the left menu, then selecting Fréquence Plus. Then click on Earn Miles, then Other Partners to find lots of ways to earn miles without flying.

The French web site of Air France lists a card for young people from 2 to 24 years residing in France called La carte Fréquence Jeune which apparently offers miles and/or discounts at certain attractions and for certain purchases. The information is in French, and my French is almost non-existent. To read it, go to the web site, click on Voyageurs fréquents in the left menu, and select Fréquence Jeune.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses maintains a good list of individual bonus Air France bonus miles offers. It is particularly good for individual flight route bonuses, and hotel and rental car bonuses for specific hotels outside of the U.S. Many require registration, so always check this list first before making a reservation.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses maintains a good list of individual bonus KLM bonus miles offers. It is particularly good for individual flight route bonuses, and hotel and rental car bonuses for specific hotels outside of the U.S. Many require registration, so always check this list first before making a reservation.

 
SWISS International Airlines   Request your SWISS mileage balance on your mobile phone (SMS) while in Switzerland and receive 50 miles each day you do so. Instructions.

SWISS promotional offers are listed here. Note the menu to the left side of the page you get.

 
Alitalia   Alitalia offers 2,000 miles welcome bonus, that you will receive after your first flight with Alitalia or with one of its airline Partners, providing it is flown within 3 months from your enrolment.

Alitalia's website lists its miles bonus offers.

 
Finnair   I found the following Finnair offers by going to finnair.com, clicking on United States, then on Finnair Plus at the top of the page. This probably also works if you choose your country.
  • Finnair offers a 1,000 to 3,000 point discount for booking award tickets online. I saw the link to this at the top of the Finnair Plus page.
  • Finnair lists its partners at www.finnair.com > United States (or probably your country) > Finnair Plus > Partners (in left menu).

 
Czech Airlines   Czech Airlines offers a 2,000 mile bonus for joining its frequent flyer and doing your first activity.

Czech's website has a link to a page with its bonus offers, and another to its partners.

Rewards Canada lists bonus opportunities for Czech Airlines here.

 
SN Brussels Airlines   SN Brussels Airlines often offers bonus miles on selected international fights from Brussels. You must register first, so always check the page to which I link before flying.

The Promotions Page of SN Brussels Airlines' website lists and links to many miles promotions.

 
Singapore Airlines   Singapore Airlines offers a 25% discount on all award flights 1 February to 15 September 2009 and a 50% discount on selected flights. Remember that American Express Membership Rewards Points transfer to Singapore Airines, and that these points are readily available for almost free via its intital bonuses on its credit cards. Those bonuses and links to them can be found in my Credit Cards > Annual Fee Cards (though the first year is waived) > American Express section (near the bottom of the page). But be sure to read Gary Leff's comments in his View from the Wing blog before transferring those points.

Singapore Airlines's opportunities to earn miles are listed here.

 
Cathay Pacific   Residents of Malaysia can earn 3,000 bonus miles for flying round trip business class (J, C, D, I) or economy class(Y, B, H, K, L, M, V) Cathay Pacific's new non-stop flights between Penang and Hong Kong. You must register first. Read the terms and conditions.

You can earn a free 25 Cathay Pacific miles for joining Points.com. Points.com allows you to move miles and points between programs, at a loss of a majority of those miles or points. Click on this page and do a word search on "points.com" to find better mileage or points offers.

Cathay Pacific lists its special offers for U.S. residents here, and its mileage partners here.

 
Japan Airlines  

Japan Airlines offers numerous promotions, some of which require registration. To find them, click here, then on JMB Promotions to find a description of the program and link to the sign up page. Here are some of the offers of interest that I noticed last time I looked:

  • You can Redeem 10,000 JMB miles and get a 15,000 Yen JAL COUPON. This could avoid capacity controls on using miles directly for award tickets. I leave the math to you to figure out how much more expensive this would be for you to do.
  • American regional members of JMB flying with transpacific normal economy fare tickets can receive JAL Group International Upgrade Awards for fewer miles during this special campaign. Details. Read them.

 
All Nippon Airways   This newspaper article indicates that mileage obtained in ANA's frequent flyer program and points gained by shopping at Rakuten's on line shopping portal can be swapped by the first 10,000 people who sign up. Alas, it does not tell you how to sign up. On February 9, 2005, a reader sent me this link to info on the deal. Alas, it is in Japanese, so I can't read it to verify that this is what it is. He says a bit of a translation to English can be found here.

All Nippon Airways' website has a page dedicated to its mileage promotions.

ANA lists its partners here. (Thanks to Gary Leff from View from the Wing for this information.)

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, Milemaven, and ANA maintain good lists of individual ANA bonus miles offers. They are particularly good for individual flight route bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation. I no longer plan to list these types of bonuses here.

 
Asiana Airlines   Asiana Airlines offers 2 miles/$1 spent when you purchase your Asiana ticket with your Asiana Visa Platinum credit card. You may read about that card the Annual Fee Cards page of my Credit Card section.

 
China Airlines   China Airlines promotions are listed here.

 
China Eastern Airlines   Enroll in China Eastern Airlines' miles program and fly with them within 30 days and receive 500 miles.

 
Eva Air   Eva Air offers 1,000 bonus miles for setting up an online login and password for your Evergreen account. Thanks to Rewards Canada for this information.

Eva Air lists its bonus offers online.

Eva Air lists its partner offers online.

 
Caribbean Airlines (Formerly BWIA)   The Membership Guide of Caribbean Airlines says you will receive 2,500 miles to sign up for its frequent flyer program.

The Caribbean Ailines website lists its promotions and partners.

 
Qantas Airlines   Qantas website regularly lists discounted award tickets for

Qantas' website lists its mileage earning partners and many of its special offers. It has a nifty page describing current award availability. This service should be copied by all airlines.

 
Air New Zealand   Air New Zealand lists its partners with whom you can earn miles here, and its miles specials here.

 
Emirates Airlines   Book an Emirates ticket on its web site and receive miles bonuses of 20%, 50%, and 100% of flown miles for Economy, Business, and First Classes, respectively. Details. Offer valid until 31 March 2010.

Emirates lists its special offers here. They often list some very nice flight bonus miles deals and discounts on award travel. Many require registration, so always check that page before booking an Emirates flight.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses maintains a list of Emirates bonuses that will probably be more up to date than anything I post here. Many of the bonuses require registration, so always check that list before booking a flight on Emirates.

 
EgyptAir   EgyptAir offers 1,000 bonus points upon enrollment, plus extra baggage allowance and an unspecified number of extra points for flying with your family. (Perhaps this implies a family account. Nice.)

EgyptAir offers a 20% or 30% points bonus and access to its lounges in Egypt after accumulating certain numbers of points.

There is an amazing variety of discounts listed on EgyptAir's partner offers and special promotions pages on its website. Click on the appropriate links in its left menu. Offers include hospital and medical care, Radio Shack, eyeglasses, and lighting, lodgings, car rental, restaurants, and tickets on EgyptAir. I would not travel in Egypt without EgyptAir's frequent flyer points card, even if I do not intend to accumulate points on it.

 
Air Seychelles   Air Seychelles offers members of its Seychelles PLUS frequent flyer program 50 PLUS points for receiving their statements on line. No, I had never heard of this airline either, but a reader possibly more addicted to this stuff than am I introduced me to a geography lesson. If interested, start here. Its intriguing.

 
South African Airlines   South African Airlines lists its partners opportunities here. Click on the next arrow in the upper right corner to proceed to the details of each partner offer. The airline's entire frequent flyer mile program is explained here.

 
    

Points to Miles Programs

The details of and why you should join the points to miles programs I follow below can be found on my Other Programs I Like page in the Points to Miles section.

 
Best Western Rewards   Apparently Best Western Gold Crown Club has changed its name to Best Western Rewards.

U.S. holders of certain credit cards may convert their credit card points to Best Western Gold Crown Club points:

  • 1,000 American Express Membership Rewards points convert to 1,250 Gold Crown Club International points.
  • 1,250 Diners Club International® Club Rewards points convert to 3,300 Gold Crown Club International points.

Earn 500 Bonus American Airlines Miles for every $50 Best Western Travel Card purchase through August 31, 2009. I leave it to you to read the details.

Earn 500 Bonus Northwest Airlines Miles for every $100 Best Western Travel Card purchase through August 31, 2009. I leave it to you to read the details.

Earn 500 Bonus Air Canada Aeroplan Miles for every $50 Best Western Travel Card purchase through August 31, 2009. I leave it to you to read the details.

Purchase a $100 Best Western Travel Card through August 31, 2009, and earn 500 Alaska Airlines miles. I leave it to you to read the details.

Bonus Southwest Airlines credit:

  • Set your earning preference to Southwest Airlines® and provide your Rapid Rewards® number. Be sure to provide your Best Western Rewards® number at check-in as well.
  • Register and complete 2 separate qualified stays at any Best Western hotel(s) worldwide between June 21, 2009 and August 16, 2009.
  • Receive one bonus Rapid Rewards credit, a Best Western FREE night voucher, and a JONAS cinch pack.

Bonus Air Canada Aeroplan miles:

  • Set your earning preference to Aeroplan Miles and provide your Aeroplan number. Be sure to provide your Best Western Rewards® number at check-in as well.
  • Register and complete 2 separate qualified stays at any Best Western hotel(s) worldwide between June 21, 2009 and August 16, 2009.
  • Receive 2,000 Bonus Aeroplan Miles and a JONAS cinch pack.

Register and complete 2 separate qualified stays at any Best Western hotel(s) worldwide between June 21, 2009 and August 16, 2009 and earn a 1 FREE night voucher and a JONAS cinch pack. Maximum 2 vourchers. Also, book on BestWestern.com and earn 250 bonus points. Members of Best Western's clubs for AAA Members, Racing Fans, Motorcycle Enthusiasts and AARP Members should register at the pages linked to at the bottom of this offer to also receive discounts and points bonuses for stays.

AAA, CAA and AARP Members receive the lowest room rate available (minimum discount 10%). Anyone over 55 years old receives a discount of at least 10%. AAA Members who join the free AAA (American Automobile Association) or CAA (Canadian Automobile Association) Preferred Gold Crown International frequent guest program earn a 10% bonus on points for stays.

Members of the automobile clubs in Europe that participate in the Show your Card! program are offered a minimum 5% discount.

Best Western lists its special offers on its website. Sometimes these involve more miles or points for stays at specific Best Western properties.

You may read about and register for Best Western Special Offers by signing into your Gold Crown Club account, then clicking on REGISTER FOR SPECIAL OFFERS.

Frequent Flyer Bonuses, PointMaven, and Best Western maintain good lists of individual Gold Crown Club bonus points offers. They are particularly good for individual hotel and motel bonuses. Many of these offers require pre-registration, so always check these lists first before making a reservation.

Gold Crown Club points are convertible to miles. You may read a description of the program on my Other Programs I Like page in the Points for Miles section.

 
Priority Club - InterContinental Hotels Group   InterContinental Hotels includes Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express, InterContinental Hotels, Crown Plaza Hotels, Hotel Indigo, Staybridge Suites, and Candlewood Suites.

This post on the FrequentFlier.com Forum indicates the possibility of earning 250 - 2,000 Priority Club Points for opting into emails. No promises, but worth a shot.

Get a free night or double points. This is actually two promotions, of which you may choose one. View from the Wing gives a good explanation of this, and it is discussed on Flyertalk. Click here and log in to choose and register. Both offers are valid for stays May 4 - July 3, 2009. The free night offer requires you take that free night between July 3, 2009 and December 26, 2009.

  • Cautions:
    • There are restrictions on availability of that free night, so you may not be able to get it when and where you want it. The points never expire.
    • If you choose the free night offer, you will not earn points or miles for your stays.

Register, then stay at Crown Plaza April 27–August 19, 2009, and earn golf clubs. Plus, get 1,000 bonus Priority Club® points per night, up to 25,000 points, when you pay using any American Express® Card.

Book the Priority Club Rewards Bonus Points Package (whatever that is) and receive 1,000 - 5,000 Priority Club Rewards bonus points. If you have chosen to earn miles instead of points, the bonus points will be converted into your mileage earning preference when you deposit them into your Priority Club member account. Details. Read them. I suggest you book from the page you get to be sure to get the bonus.

Register to earn 1,000 bonus points, up to 25,000 points, when you pay for a stay at a Crown Plaza property using any American Express® Card April 27 – August 19, 2009. Plus, there is some sort of deal to earn golf clubs. I leave it to you to read the details.

Register to earn 2,000 bonus points for a stay at any Hotel Indigo worldwide between March 1 and February 28, 2010. The bonus applies to only one stay.

DHL acquired Airborne Express. Info here (at the bottom of the page) says that Priority Club Reward members earn

  • 4 points/$1 spent on purchases of Airborne Express products and services.
  • 1,000 bonus points upon first shipment on Airborne Express account
  • 1,000 bonus points upon initial order of Airborne's prepaid Flight-Ready packaging.
Account setup and Flight-Ready orders must be made through 1-800-MEMBERS or www.membersales.com/PCR.

You can earn a free 50 Priority Club points for joining Points.com. Points.com allows you to move miles and points between programs, at a loss of a majority of those miles or points. Click on this page and do a word search on "points.com" to find better mileage or points offers.

Priority Club's PointBreaks page lists opportunities to book award nights for only 5,000 points per night. Usually these are incredible deals, especially in places where the dollar is weak, like Europe. Always check this page before booking an award night. On June 16, 2008, a reader wrote:

"Literally an hour ago, I just booked 4 nights using 5k pts/night in the Latin Quarter of Paris, at PARIS-ST. GERMAIN DES PRÈS for a grand total of 20k points. The hotel rack rate is $108 EUR ~$164 USD right now. If I had paid for it, would've cost me $656. Instead, I used 20k points."
On June 24, 2009, a reader wrote:
"I just used 70,000 Priority Club Points from credit card offers, for my wife and I, for 10 nights in Paris and 4 nights in Toulouse, June 2009, with their Point Break program of 5,000/night. So, it is still working, but you need to check for Pont Break nights frequently. I just happened to check back the day after trying to book in May, 2009, unsuccessfully, and the next day, June 2009 came on line, and was gone in 2 days. "

You can buy Priority Club points for $11.50 - $13.50 per 1,000 points. This could be useful in acquiring expensive rooms via th