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Comment by 40acres | Hacker News Reader

I think rewards and upgrades should actually cost less if airlines want to increase brand loyalty.

I signed up for Delta's frequent flyer program because i frequently took cross country trips and decided I needed to take full advantage of the fact that only one airline provided a non-stop route from my location to this destination. Being apart of this program led me to choose international flights with this carrier over others because I would earn miles.

Once another airline with cheaper fares took on this route I completely abandoned optimizing for miles and simply started optimizing for cost like many travelers do.

Miles take too long to earn for travelers who fly less than 5 times a year, especially if these flights are domestic. If I were guaranteed to earn at least enough points for pay for a round trip around 500-750 miles from my nearest airport in exchange for flying with one airline consistently I would definitely consider it.

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I think they're relying on the theory that a lot of people will drastically over value miles in their mind when calculating which ticket to purchase.

You're probably right, also, since most travelers optimize for cost it will take longer to earn enough points for substantial rewards.

It took me at least a half dozen cross country flights and at least two international flights to earn enough miles for a free one way cross country flight, the benefit just isn't there for normal travelers but I guess this is why it's called a "frequent flyer" program.

I honestly wouldn't bother committing to any single airline until you were traveling enough to qualify for some kind of reward tier somewhere - I go all-in on Delta/Skyteam when I can because the miles I earn get reward status that includes free checked bags and seat upgrades and other perks like that, being able to eventually redeem some miles for flights is an almost inconsequential perk for me.

I get waaaaay more value out of buying regular economy tickets and flying (most of the time) in at least economy plus, if not first class on small regional routes on the free upgrades than I could out of tickets purchased on miles.

(I'm typically around a couple dozen flights a year, so frequent enough to have basic status, but nowhere near frequent enough to get top-tier business traveler level status...)

I suspect it works well for business travellers though; they are not that price sensitive (as long as the fare is within the company policy).

Credit card signup bonuses earn vastly more miles than being a consistent customer.

Only if you churn -- signing up for a card, redeeming the signup bonus, then signing up for another, and so on.

And card issuers know about churning. The highest-value cards also have limits to how often you can churn. Chase's "5/24" rule (if you've opened 5 or more new credit cards in the past 24 months, anywhere, Chase will automatically decline you on any application for one of their cards) is one of the more well-known anti-churning tactics, but not the only one. You have to immerse yourself in the churning/manufactured spending world to really get much more than one or two free tickets from card signup bonuses.

On the other hand, if you already travel enough to reach at least mid-tier status with one airline, it's often worth it to do so; that's when you start getting into large RDM bonus territory. Combine with the airline's branded card and you can easily generate enough mileage to take a nice vacation every year.

Mostly agree — except you don't have to manufacture spend or know anything about that for it still to be well worth it vs points cards. And at the level of spend where you only get "one or two free tickets from card signup bonuses," you aren't getting even a single flight on a points card, so I'm not sure why that's relevant.

Yeah, the value is mostly there if you can redeem for travel annually. Cash redemptions usually require taking a haircut of some kind (to incentivize consumers keeping points in the inherently depreciative system).

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