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Buying StuffHow to get the most miles for the buck you are going to spend anyway.First, if I can't make a deal for a cash discount, I always use a credit card that gives me frequent flyer miles whenever I can. Next, I receive extra miles for using the services below. And sometimes, using gift certificates, I can triple dip. (See the GiftCertificates.com section to see how this can works.)
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Shop On LineNever go directly to a store's on line shopping web site. Always check to see if that store is listed with one of the on line shopping portals below. The portal gives miles, and you usually are offered the same price.Find the best portal
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| Find the Best Portal |
You don't have to check each portal to see if your store is listed. There are web sites that do this for you. Since offers change so frequently, they are almost always out of date (as is my website), so you might miss an occasional miles earning opportunity by relying on them. Use them only as a starting point for finding the best deal, and please send the webmasters info about any errors you find. They all seem quite serious about trying to keep their info up to date. Here are the websites:
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| Cash Back Portals |
Below I list some of the better cash back portals, the ones that seem to me to offer the highest amounts of cash back. I suggest that you first use one, or better, all of the three cross reference websites I list above to find the best rebate. Then sign up for the rebate program. If the program you want to use is listed below, please use my link and/or instructions to sign up. By doing so, you help me at no cost to you. Thanks.
"Once you've logged in to the mall via the airline's website, you need to make sure to start and finish shopping in the same window if you wish to collect miles. If you open another window to comparison shop, or go to another site and then come back, you may lose your connection with the mileage mall and forfeit your chance to earn miles. When in doubt, re-enter the online store through the airline's site before adding items to your shopping cart, so you can be certain that your frequent flier number was captured and you'll be eligible for miles."
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| Airline Shopping Portals |
Some of the airlines have their own shopping programs.
United Airlines Mileage Plus Shopping.
JetBlue.
British Airways QANTAS.
Here is some info on Woolworths ezbanking debit card: Grupo Taca.
All Nippon Airways.
EgyptAir. Click on Our Partners in the left menu.
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| Hotel and Amtrak Shopping Portals |
Some of the hotel chains have their own shopping programs.
The ChoicePrivileges Mall offers Choice Hotels points for purchases. Points convert to miles on many airlines. GiftCertificates.com is one of the merchants listed here. See my writeup below on how to use these certificates to triple dip on miles. You may read about the ChoicePrivileges program in the Points to Miles, esp. Hotels, section of my Other Programs I Like page. The Marriott Rewards Mall offers Marriott Rewards points for purchases. Points convert to miles on many airlines. GiftCertificates.com is one of the merchants listed here. See my writeup below on how to use these certificates to triple dip on miles. You may read about the Marriott Rewards program in the Points to Miles, esp. Hotels, section of my Other Programs I Like page. Intercontinental Hotel's Priority Club offers the Priority Club Rewards Shopping Mall. Most merchants offer 2 to 6 points per $1 spent, and a few offer more. Priority Club points convert to miles on many airlines. You may read about the Priority Club program in the Points to Miles, esp. Hotels, section of my Other Programs I Like page. Hilton Hotels lists two places for shopping online that earn Hilton HHonors points: Wyndham Hotel's Wyndham Rewards has a shop online page featuring a few familiar merchants. The program offers only 1 point/$1 spent. You could do better most anywhere else.
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| Other Online Shopping Programs |
Be sure to read the information in the GiftCertificates.com section on how to double and triple dip.
The SkyMall program lists a large number of merchants listed nowhere else. It is much more than the offerings you see in the magazine onboard your flight. All of the Miles for Clicking programs, described in the Click for Miles, Money, and Good Causes section of this web site offer points for shopping. MyPoints is particularly good.
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| Ultimate Rewards Shopping Portal |
If you are earning Ultimate Rewards points from cards earning Ultimate Rewards Points, be sure to check out the shopping deals on the Ultimate Rewards website in its shopping section. Log in, then click on Earn Points in the menu to the left, then on Shop the Ultimate Rewards Mall. People rave about the mega extra point given for shopping at certain popular merchants. On January 25, 2012, I saw on deal for 25 extra points/$1 spent, a few for 15 and several 10 points extra, and a very large number of merchants with extra points for purchase. The number of points from specific merchants vary over time.
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| GiftCertificates.com |
Note: For comparison purposes, GiftCertificates.com is a member of the Citi Dividend Merchant Network, offering 4% cash back on purchases last I looked. You may access this network by acquiring a Citi Dividend Platinum Select MasterCard, which you may read about in the Cash Back Cards section of the Free Cards page of my Credit Card section.
Here is a way to earn miles in two and possibly three places for one purchase. It is also a way to receive the most miles for your purchase for some vendors.
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| SkyMall and American, Delta, United, Alaska, or Southwest Airlines, U.S. or AirTran Airways, or Goldpoints or Marriott |
Skymall is a portal for a large number of online retailers. (Use the pull down menu to the right and click on View all stores). Last I heard, it guarantees that it's price will not be higher than that on the retailer's website.
Often Skymall has airline miles offers, and sometimes these offers are better than those of any other portal offering miles of use to you. And Skymall may be the only portal offering miles for the retailer of interest. So if you know which retailer from whom you want to buy a specific product, be sure to see if it is a SkyMall retailer. Then add the airline offers below to your list of portals for comparison. Note that the Skymall catalog that is in the pocket in front of your airline seat always lists the name of the retailer. However, there are many more retailers in SkyMall than are listed in that catalog. Get-Coupon-Code.com, RewardsDB and Ev'reward maintain a list of SkyMall offers. Between them and me, we might have all of them. But please tell me about any you know about not listed below. Please provide the link to the offer. Thanks.
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| AirMilesMart and Delta Airlines, U.S. Airways, and Starwood |
AirMilesMart usually offers 1 point per dollar spent, sometimes more, occasionally less, on a large list of familiar merchants, including GiftCertificates.com, Best Western, and Hotels.com.
The points are convertible one for one into the miles of Delta Airlines, U.S. Airways, and into Starwood Starpoints. Minimum conversion amount is only 500 points, which is quite impressive. They are also convertible into $25, $50, and $100 gift certificates at a list of familiar stores at the rate of 1 cent per point. Apparently the points do not expire. I have had points in my account since 5/29/2002. Be sure to check out their Trial Offers section. Free miles for trying things, getting quotes, etc. According to this flyertalk discussion, the company's customer service response is terrible, but the miles or points do get posted, eventually.
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| Thanks Again and United, Delta, or Alaska Airlines or U.S. Airways, or 2% or more cash back. |
Register 1 - 5 credit cards with
Cautions:
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| S&H greenpoints |
The S&H greenpoints shopping portal has resumed offering miles as rewards again. 11,900 Greenpoints gets you 500 miles on Delta Airlines. (Search rewards for "miles".) This represents a devaluation from 8,900 points for the same thing earlier in 2007. Since Greenpoints has shown a willingness to devalue it points without warning, I recommend conversion of those points as soon as you have enough for what you want. For comparison shopping, 1 mile costs 23.8 points. Most of the merchants seem to be offering 20 points per dollar spent, which gets you a not very impressive 0.84 mile per dollar spent. The list of merchants is large and familiar. Posting of points and rewarding of miles has been reliable in the past. This company has been around for a long time. Your parents probably remember S&H Green Stamps at their grocery store. (And in fact, you still can earn greenpoints at some grocery stores.)
You may read about the Greenpoints program in the Points to Miles section of my Other Programs I Like page.
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Newspaper and Magazine SubscriptionsNewspapers are now starting to offer miles for subscriptions, and you can buy both newspapers and magazines with miles, which could be a good use of orphan miles about to expire. I will list the offers I know about, but I rely on your with your local knowledge to tell me about the offers, especially from newspapers in your area. Links, phone numbers, and/or offer codes appreciated. Thanks.
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I do not intend to check these links regularly, and will list offers only as they come to me without much effort on my part. Please tell me about dead links, changed offers, and new offers. Please provide links and/or phone numbers for the latter. Thanks.
You can earn or redeem United Airlines miles for purchase of newspapers though its Reader Miles program. Over 50 newspapers are claimed. On February 27, 2007, the newspapers included
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Please tell me of any offers you know about that offer miles for subscribing to magazines.
Alaska Airlines's MileagePlan Shopping lists ValueMags.com as one of its vendors. 1,200 magazines are claimed. On June 15, 2004, they were offering 8 Alaska Airlines Miles per $1 spent. Hawaiian Airlines's magazine mileage awards offer a minimum of 240 miles per paid subscription. A large number of magazines are offered. MyBonusCenteroffers Delta Airlines miles for magazine subscriptions. Rogers Magazine Service offers up to 1,000 Air Canada Aeroplan miles for purchase of magazine subscriptions. The Priority Club online mall lists ValueMags and Magazines.com as two of its vendors. On April 25, 2005, ValueMags was offering 22 points per $1 spent, and Magazines.com was offering 24 points per $1 spent. Hilton's online shopping portal offers Hilton HHonors points for magazine purchases. Lufthansa has a large number of offers for subscribing to or referring others to magazines. The referral offers are particularly lucrative, and often do not require that you be a subscriber. Many are for German residents only. Goldpoints offers 5,000 or 10,000 points for subscriptions to The Economist. My link is to the UK offer. Use the pulldown menu to find your country. SN Brussels Airlines offers miles for subscriptions to The Economist for new subscribers resident in Continental Europe and the Middle East and Africa. ACP Publishing offers 100 Qantas Frequent Flyer points for annual subscriptions less than A$80, and 200 Qantas Frequent Flyer points for annual subscriptions of A$80 and over, for a large number of magazines. Varig's promotions page is beginning to list miles offers for magazine subscriptions. AMANHÃ MAGAZINE was listed on February 25, 2005. Japan Airlines offers miles for subscriptions to a few magazines.
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Redeem Delta, American, Midwest, or Hawaiian Airlines, or U.S. Airways miles or Amtrak points for magazines or the Wall Street Journal or other newspapers through their Magazines for Miles programs. (Note: the same outfit services most of these airlines. This promises to be a growing thing. Please send me the links of similar programs for other airlines. Thanks.)
Milepoint allows redemption of miles on lots of airlines for magazines and the Wall Street Journal. Delta, American, and other airlines allow redemption of miles for a subscription of the Wall Street Journal. (800) 961-8702 (from an old post on FlyerTalk. The offer code is VNF. 64 issues for 1,000 miles. This number is for Delta Airlines, but they can handle other airlines or can give you the number for them. Another old post on FlyerTalk said that the number for American Airlines is (800) 961-8669. If these numbers don't work, try 800-250-3525. You may have to call these numbers several times until you get what you want. Please tell me whether or not any of these numbers still work. There is not enough time in my life to personally check them out. Starwood StarPoints allows redemption of points for a Wall Street Journal subscription. Note: A reader tells me you can receive a year for 8,750 points if you call them, instead of the 9,450 point listed on their web site. Hilton HHonors allows redemption of points for a Wall Street Journal subscription. Many of Lufthansa's magazine and newspaper offers allow you to redeem miles for subscriptions. MyPoints. MyPoints offers free business magazines from FreeBizMag, and offers MyPoints for doing so. (Earn Points > Quick List by Merchant > FreeBisMag). Occasionally I am offered a free Wall Street Journal Subscription after signing up for business magazines. You may read about the MyPoints program on my Miles for Clicking page. An old post on FlyerTalk said "Sign up for a trade magazine (he was referring to freebizmag.com) and use 1,300 FF miles to get 3 months of the WSJ. They accept most major airlines, but no Alaskan Air". On June 7, 2007, a reader told me this still works for United Airlines miles. Please tell me if this still works. A very old post on FlyerTalk lists the following phone numbers for redeeming miles for magazines. Please tell me which numbers still work. There is not enough time in my life to try them all. (Note: On September 10, 2004, a helpful reader told me that they all still work.)
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Automobile Purchase and ServicesWhen I bought my Subaru Forester in 1999, I found many programs that offered mega-miles for buying through their referral services and for obtaining a loan for that purchase. However, none of them gave me a price that close enough to the lowest price I could find to make them worthwhile. Maybe you can be more lucky. Or perhaps you could negotiate a lower price or lower loan rate by offering to give up the miles. In April, 2002, a sales manager for a VW dealer told me that the 10,000 miles offered by the United Airlines program cost her $400. Wow! So offer $400 less to forgo the miles. See my section on Value of Miles to see why the 10,000 miles are nowhere near worth $400.When I purchased the VW, I was able to put a substantial part of the price on my mileage producing credit card. I asked to do this after I negotiated the price, of course. Please tell me about any particularly good miles producing auto buying, loan, or services programs you find. Thanks. Note: Automobile loans and insurance offers can be found on my Finance page.
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| Automobile Purchase |
You can usually find the programs through the web site of your favorite airline. Look for the partners of its frequent flyer program. Here are the programs I know of:
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| Thanks Again for Auto Repair and Service and Many Airlines |
For automobile repair and service Thanks Again offers 2 miles/$1 spent on United, Delta, or U.S. Airways. In August, 2008, the repair shops seemed to be limited to the Denver/Colorado Springs area, but more dealers were promised.
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| Select Warranty and U.S. Airways |
Select Warranty offers 15,000 U.S. Airways miles for signing up for its extended warranty program, and then 2,500 miles/month, up to a total of 25,000 miles.
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| Albina Automated Fueling (Pacific Pride) |
Albina Automated Fueling offers an unspecifed number of American or Alaska Airlines miles for purchase of gasoline at its Pacific Pride automated stations throughout the U.S. and Canada.
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| Air Canada - Esso, Exxon, and Mobil |
Air Canada offers 1 mile/$3 spent with your Esso Speedpass at Esso stations in Canada and Exxon or Mobil stations in the U.S.
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| Cathay Pacific and Gasoline |
You can earn Cathay Pacific's Asia Miles for buying Esso or Mobil gasoline in Hong Kong and Singapore. Details.
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Asiana and SK |
A card offering Asiana miles for purchase of gasoline at SK was listed on Asiana's website on July 20, 2008.
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| Lufthansa and Automobile Clubs |
Lufthansa's website lists offers for automobile club membership in ADAC (2,000 miles) and Automobilclub von Deutschland (4,000 miles).
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| Top Service Team and Lufthansa |
See the Top Service Team - Lufthansa tire offer described below.
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I rely on your with your local knowledge to tell me about the offers from grocery stores in your area. Thanks.
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| Safeway |
This flyertalk thread discusses getting miles or points from a large list of airlines and hotels by having groceries delivered from Safeway. Apparently there is a minimum delivery is $60. and offer valid for new customers only. Not valid with any other offer, which may or not mean you cannot use offer code EASY7 to get free delivery on your first order.
The Points Guy tells us how to get 1,000 British Airways Avios points for a $50 purchase at Safeway. Please tell me when this offer disappears. Thanks.
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| Peapod |
This flyertalk thread discusses getting miles or points from a large list of airlines and hotels by buying groceries from Peapod.
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| Groceries in Alaska Airlines' Markets |
Register, then shop at Safeway locations in Alaska and you can earn 125 Mileage Plan Miles for every $250 you spend.
Alaska Airlines lists SeaMart in Alaska (Sitka) and Sentry in Oregon, and perhaps others, as grocery stores at which you can earn its miles.
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| Greenpoints and D’Agostino, Foodtown and SHOP 'N SAVE groceries. | 10 Greenpoints/$1 spent can be earned at D’Agostino and Foodtown, and SHOP 'N SAVE in Hubbard, OH. I leave it to you to read the details.
Greenpoints can be converted to miles on various airlines. See the Points to Miles section of my Other Programs I Like page for details.
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| Sobey's (Canada) and Air Canada Aeroplan | Sobey's in Canada offers 1 Aeroplan mile / $2 spent at their stores in Ontario, British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba.
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| Star Markets and Hawaiian Airlines | Star Markets in Hawaii offer 1 Hawaiian Airlines mile / $2 spent at their stores.
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| Hi Lo Food Stores (Trinidad) and Carribean Airlines | Caribbean Airlines' Caribbean Miles page says "Trinidad residents earn extra miles when shopping in Hi Lo food stores." Apparently this is via conversion of the store's Smart Shopper points. I have no further information about this.
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| Gift Cards and Grocery Stores | Some grocery stores are now offering gift cards for other merchants. Since the Starwood American Express card essentially gets you 1.25 miles per dollar spent, consider buying the gift card for the merchant you want at the grocery store rather than paying the merchant directly for your purchase.
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| PetFoodDirect and U.S. Airways |
PetFoodDirect offers 500 - 10,000 U.S. Airways miles for purchase.
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| LasikPlus and U.S. Airways |
LasikPlus offers 1,000 U.S. Airways miles for getting a free exam and 24,000 more miles for doing the proceedure. The small print says:
This offer cannot be combined with any other offers or discounts except for 5% discount to Managed Care patients. If you register using your Dividend Miles account, your miles will post to your Dividend Miles account 8-10 weeks after your appointment. Offers void where prohibited by law. Offer not valid if treatment occurs in the state of NY, VA, or TX. Other states may also have limitations. The 1,000 and 24,000 mile offers will only be awarded once per member regardless of account credited. LasikPlus reserves the right to terminate this offer at any time and refuse or recover any promotion award if LasikPlus determines that it was obtained under wrongful or fraudulent circumstances. To receive 1,000 miles for the LASIK Vision Exam (a.k.a. pre-op appointment), customer must complete the entire exam, including dilation to determine candidacy for laser vision correction. Customers are eligible to receive 1,000 miles for one LASIK Vision Exam, and 24,000 miles for one treatment only. Customers that have previously attended a pre-operative appointment or treatment at LasikPlus are not eligible to receive miles for attending a new LASIK Vision Exam, or treatment. The 25,000 miles represents 1,000 miles for completing one LASIK Vision Exam, and 24,000 for completing treatment. To receive miles for an appointment of any kind, the patient must submit their US Airways Dividend Miles number and signed HIPAA consent form before that appointment begins.Tjhis may have changed, and there is more, which I leave it to you to read.
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| Performing Arts and Sports Tickets |
Audience Rewards offers U.S. Airways miles, Delta Airlines Miles, . Starwood Preferred Guest points, or Amtrak points for purchase of performing arts events in an increasing number of cities. Sometimes you can use miles or points to purchase those tickets.
You can earn miles or points for U.S. Air, Delta, Starwood, and Best Buy for answering trivia questions from Audience Rewards. They change sporadically. Two miles or points each (sometimes 20), for five or so questions which change irregularly. You may participate in all of the programs if you have a different Audience Rewards account for each. Just use a different email address for each. If you have multiple programs in the same Audience Rewards account, see post number 547 on this Flyertalk thread to fix this. Else, you will not be able to answer the same question in multiple accounts. In addition, you earn 2 ShowPoints per question. This post on flyertalk says "If you have 2500 Show Points you can exchange them into miles at Points.com. As we all know the ratio is not great, but if you're never going to use the Show Points it's the best way." When you sign up for each program, use different email addresses, and be sure to record your Audience Rewards account numbers. Then, for the Delta questions, log in using your Delta account number in the upper left corner before answering the questions. For the U.S. Airways, Starwood, and Best Buy questions, first answer the first question, then click on the very bottom link of the pop up to log into your Audience Rewards account using your Audience Rewards account numbers, not your account numbers for U.S. Airways, Starwood, and Best Buy. If this doesn't work, your cookies probably say you are logged in. Go to https://www.audiencerewards.com/redeemcenter/index.cfm and log out. Then click on the appropriate link below. Get a Best Buy account number here. Click on GET STARTED in the yellow box. Best Buy points can be converted to miles via Points.com. Update: Post number 630 on this flyertalk thread says that Best Buy Reward Zone no longer lets you transfer points out to other programs on points.com. However, a reader told me he transferred Best Buy points on September 29. Please tell me if you can confirm or deny this. Thanks. When I post answers here I will mention that I have done so on my What's New page. To be notified of the new answers simply subscribe to the service mentioned on that page that sends you an email whenever I post something to that page. Note: The author of the blog InACents says he intendes to keep up with the questions and answers on his blog. His answers are usually correct, but not always. However, if an error is found, it is promptly corrected. I suggest you wait a few days after his post before using his answers. I actually check my answers by entering them into the contest before posting them here, but I will not be posting them while I am traveling. Be sure to log out at https://www.audiencerewards.com/redeemcenter/index.cfm before going to the next program. Do not answer any of the Showpoints-only questions until after you've done all the 2+2 partner points questions. Once a Showpoints question has been answered in one program, you can't go back and answer the same question as a 2+2 question in another program. If you're not seeing the 2 Miles + 2 Showpoints questions, go back to the original page, then at the bottom of the page and futz with the slider bar above "Page 1 of X". You should see the 2 Miles + 2 Showpoints questions on a subsequent page. You can find the questions for each program here.
Answers to questions for all programs as of June 18, 2013.
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| LifeShield Home Security System and U.S. Airways |
LifeShield offers 100 U.S. Airways miles/month up to 25,000 miles for its home security system.
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| Bose QuietComfort headphones, Bluetooth headset, and American, Delta, and United Airlines and U.S. Airways |
Bose offers miles from American, Delta and United Airlines, and U.S. Airways on purchase of its QuietComfort headphones and Bluetooth headset. I list these offers because Bose's agressive marketing makes them ubiquitous. However, though I am no audiophile, it is my understanding from those who claim to be that other noise cancelling headphones do the same thing at considerably less cost. On December 12, 2008, I bought the Philips Full Size Noise Canceling Headphones from Walmart for $32. I also considered the Noisebuster NB FX Noise Canceling Headphones for around $52 from many merchants.
Caution: Although Bose is a listed merchant on Skymall, the terms and conditions of the Skymall pages usually specifically exclude Bose from the offer.
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| Satellite TV Service |
American Airlines miles for activating new satellite TV service from DIRECTV. You can find the current standard offer at AA.com. Hover over AAdvantage and click on Earn Miles. Then click on Home Services in the More Non-Travel Participants section.
U.S. Airways special offer: 5,000 miles for Dish Network. U.S. Airways 3,100 miles for DIRECT TV. Find it at U.S. Airways Dividend Miles Storefront. AirTran offers 3 A+ Rewards Credits for activating new satellite TV service from Dish Network. Look in the left menu for the link to the offer. Amtrak offers 7,500 points for Dish Network.
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| Home Improvement programs |
Improvement Direct offers 3-5 United Airlines miles per $1 spent at any of the home improvement stores in its network.
e-counters.com offers 1 Delta Airlines mile/$1 spent (after rounding down to the nearest $100) on installed countertops. Home Hardware, Home Building Centre, Home Hardware Building Centre and Home Furniture offers 1 Air Canada mile/$2 spent.
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| Dry Cleaning programs |
American Airline's Miles4DryCleaning Program offers 1 mile/$1 spent. You must register first. Read all terms and conditions.
Special bonuses. If my link doesn't work, use the one on the page you get from the Miles4DryCleaning Program link above.
Delta Airlines' SkyMiles Clothing Care is an exclusive group of dry cleaners that provides you one mile for every dollar spent. Just register a credit or debit card and use it to pay the bill at participating dry cleaners. It works like the iDine programs.
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| Wine Programs |
Many of the airline and points shopping portals list wine offers.
I intend to list non-portal offers, especially those offering bonus miles or points for signup. Minimum price per bottle seems to be around $10 plus shipping. I have no idea if the prices are competitive. I refuse to learn to be a wine connoisseur - too expensive. I would never pay $10 for a bottle of wine. Bulk wine tastes fine to me. Hartwick and Grove Wine Merchants offers 500 bonus United Airlines miles for joining the Hartwick & Grove Wine Club and 10 miles/$1 spent. You may have to click on the United Airlines link at the bottom of the page to see this offer. Vinesse Wine Clubs offers miles or points for joining any of its wine clubs.
Taste Explorer Wine Club offers 4,000 U.S. Airways miles.
Wine Insiders
The Hawaiian Wine Club offers 100 Hawaiian Airlines miles for each bottle in your Hawaiian Wine Club shipments. Virgin Wines offers 500 Virgin America Elevate points for joining its Virgin Wines Explorers Club. Virgin Wines offers 500 Virgin Atlantic Flying Club points for joining its Virgin Wines Explorers Club. Laithwaits Wine offers 2,000 jetBlue True Blue points for joining its program. 800Wine.com offers 1/2 AirTran credit/$100 spent. Barclay's Wine Experience, formerly Beverage Bistro offers Amtrak points for joining and purchases.
Quintessentially Wine offers 1,000 Avios just for signing up, 1 Avios point/$1 spentand up to 8,000 bonus Avios on your first purchase (Spend $999 or under and earn 3,000 Avios. Spend $1000 or over and earn 8,000 Avios). The program is for North American residents. The offer expires January 31, 2012, but it was still online April 1, 2013. Ask.
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| Gyms |
Earn 2,000 United Airlines miles for joining a gym. They have offers from Anytime Fitness, Bally Total Fitness, Curves, 24 Hour Fitness, New York Sports Clubs, and more. I no longer see an expiration date for this offer. Please tell me when it changes or disappears. Thanks.
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| My Coke Rewards and Southwest Airlines and Priority Club |
My Coke Rewards offers points from codes located in the cap and in the boxes of Coca-Cola Coke, Zero, Diet Coke, Sprite, DASANI, POWERADE, Minute Maid, Fanta, Barq's, Fresca, Pibb, Mello Yello, NESTEA, and Seagram's, 3 points per cap and 10 to 20 points per box. Points are covertible to Southwest Airlines discounts, Priority Club points (160 points = 500 Priority Club Points), and lots of other goodies. Useful if you drink this stuff anyway. There is a large flyertalk thread and a Milepoint thread on this subject.
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| Aquasana water filters and Delta Airlines |
Aquasana offers 680 - 10,000 Delta Airlines miles for purchase of its water filters. I use a much less expensive Teldine Waterpick on my kitchen tap to filter chlorine taste out of my otherwise quite safe tap water - beats the much more expensive bottled water in environmentally terrible plastic containers. Brita also sells similar inexpensive filters. I list the Aquasana offer here in case you determine that they have significant advantages over the less expensive ones, and to encourage you to use some sort of filter instead of buying bottled water.
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| U.S. Airways and DHL | DHL Express offers 2 U.S. Airways miles/$1 spent spent on ShipReady prepaid envelopes, and 750 bonus miles with your first DHL purchase. Plus you get two free envelopes with your first order.
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| Hawaiian Airlines Off Line Shopping Opportunities | Hawaiian Airlines offers 5 bonus HawaiianMiles per dollar when you use your Hawaiian Airlines Visa Cards at any participating HawaiianMiles Supercharged Merchant. There are a large number of these merchants in Hawaii. You can read about the Hawaiian Airlines Credit Card on the Annual Fee Cards page of my Credit Card section.
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| Alaska Airlines and Folding Kayak Adventures | Folding Kayak Adventures offers
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| Alaska Airlines Off Line Shopping Opportunities | Alaska Airlines lists a huge number of off line merchants in its market area (Alaska, California, Oregon, Washington, Arizona, Idaho, Illinois, Canada, Mexico, and nationwide) who offer its miles for patronizing their businesses. I do not intend to keep up with this list, but it is well worth a look if you live in these areas. Grocery stores, fuel, lodging, and many other types of businesses are listed.
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| EBay - MyPoints offers |
EBay offers 100 MyPoints for registering and making your first purchase, and 2 points/$1 spent on eBay purchases. On your MyPoints home page, use the Select by Merchant pulldown menu to find eBay.
You may read about MyPoints and what it has to do with miles on my Click for Miles, Money, and Good Causes page.
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| Asiana Airlines Off Line Shopping Opportunities |
Asiana lists a few off line merchants, mostly in Korea, who offer its miles for patronizing their businesses. I do not intend to keep up with this list, but it is worth a look if you live in Korea. A card offering miles for purchase of gasoline was listed on May 30, 2006.
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Sealy Posturepedic Beds - American Airlines
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Sealy Posturepedic Beds offers 1,500 to 12,500 American Airlines miles for buying one of their beds. Details. Read them.
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| Sam's Club | The only credit cards Sam's Club accepts are Mastercard and the Discover Card. But Sam's Club does accept Wal-mart gift certificates. So to earn miles shopping at Sam's Club using a miles earning Visa or American Express card, first buy a gift certificate at Wal-mart using your miles producing credit card, and then use the certificate at Sam's Club. Sam's Club also accepts debit cards for PIN based transactions, only. A very few of these cards earn miles for such transactions (Bank of America comes to mind), though usually at a lesser rate than do miles producing credit cards.
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| Top Service Team - Lufthansa Tire Offer | If you lease a car in Germany or Austria, you probably qualify for this Lufthansa offer for purchase of tires from Top Service Team. The number of miles offered is not specified, but is described as "fantastic".
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| All Nippon Airways Off Line Shopping Opportunities | All Nippon Airways lists a off line merchants in Japan who offer its miles for patronizing their businesses.
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| FlyBuys for Residents of Australia | The Fly buys shopping loyalty program for Australia looks very good. It is absolutely free, and offers points for any purchase over $5 at a large number of popular merchants in Australia. Also, you can link a National Credit Card to your Fly buys account and earn points for every purchase. The points you earn are convertible to airline tickets and other goodies, or can by turned into dollar credits to your National Credit Card.
Since the program is free, and its cost is already built into the prices you would pay anyway, there is no reason to not join the program. There is an ongoing discussion on the Fly buys program on The Australian Frequent Flyer Bulletin Board.
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| Air Miles for Dutch shoppers | A reader writes: "Air Miles is a general Dutch points for purchase program in which ELM participates, but it's owned by a 3rd party. You can earn Air miles at major banks, shops, gas stations, etc. Typically you earn 1 air mile per euro spent and the typical value is 1 cent. Double dipping and offers may approve the value at times."
I am unable to evaluate this program, since its website is in a language I am unable to read. I know that KLM offers different numbers of miles on this and its own programs for its flights, so do the math before you decide which. |