People who value cheaptravel options, such as cheap airplane tickets, and cheap vacation packages,would be wise to select and do as much business as possible with those airlinesthat offer the best loyalty programs.
CardHub, a credit card analysis and comparison site, has reviewedthe rewards programs of the largest domestic airlines with the aim of identifyingwhich airline offers its brand loyalists the most attractive perks in 2016.
The 10 largest U.S. airlines were analyzed for threedifferent types of travelers: the frequentflier, the average flier, and the light flier to determine which programprovides the best flying experience for each group.
Airlines were compared to each other using 23 differentpoints of measurements including:
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Numberof destinations served by individual airlines and its participating alliancepartners
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Howlong it takes for miles to expire
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Thenumber of blackout dates during which miles redemption is unavailable
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Bookingfees for last minute reservations
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Penaltyfor transferring miles between accounts
JetBlue came in first for 2016s best rewards programprovider for frequent fliers, with Delta coming in first for average and lightfliers. These two airlines were the onlyones of the big ten whose miles do not expire during periods of inactivity. Airlines who miles expire the quickest areSpirit and Frontier, whose miles expire after only three and six months ofinactivity, respectively.
The study found that seven of the 10 airlines are membersof a global alliance that permit miles to be redeemed on partner airlinesflights. Six of the 10 airlines havemoved away from traditional mileage rewards programs to new, spending basedsystems that are generally regarded as unfavorable for budget minded fliers.
JetBlue was the first airline to reward fliers based on thecost of each ticket with Delta later instituting the same policy. Clearly moving to a revenue based rewardsprogram did not hurt these airlines ranking.
A company called the Points Guy does a monthly valuationof miles and credit card points that ranks Delta below all of the top 10 U.S. airlinesin this study except for Frontier, possibly because Delta frequent fliers oftenexperience problems when trying to redeem miles for tickets.
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