Q & A
Please warn travelers about problems they may have in getting their full mileage benefits from American's AAdvantage program. One is led to believe that if flying on American, or a partner carrier in Oneworld Alliance, like British Airways, one gets the same number of miles for the flight. But on a recent round-trip flight on British Airways from London to Tokyo, I got only 25 percent of the miles I should have received. American told me I should have checked with British Airways beforehand. American refuses to reimburse me for the 9,000 miles I lost. -- Archer Adams, London
Frequent-flier programs are rife with rules and abstruse exceptions and exclusions buried in the small print. Remember that airlines are competing with one another within the alliances: Oneworld (eight carriers, including American, British Airways and Qantas) and Star Alliance (25 carriers, including Air Canada, United, US Airways, Air New Zealand, Thai, Singapore Airlines and Swiss). While you can normally earn and redeem miles with each partner, there can be exceptions, especially when it comes to upgrades and mileage bonuses. And some miles may be more equal than others because every program has different rules, like award levels or the category of fare that earns miles or 'elite' status.
The Web site aa.com/aadvantage states: 'Earn a minimum of 500 AAdvantage miles each time you purchase and fly on a published eligible fare ticket on British Airways, except for miles earned on eligible Discount Economy Class Fares, which will be 25 percent of the normal minimum (125 AAdvantage miles). British Airways' trans-Atlantic flights to/from the U.S. are not valid for AAdvantage mileage accrual or redemption.' (To get to this takes much searching. From hwww.aa.com/content/aboutUs/codesharePartners/BA--Codeshare--Partner.jhtml, click on 'View more information on redeeming miles on British Airways.'
You can check the status of 150 frequent-flier programs and compare the benefits at Global Flight Management in Germany (www.globalflight.eu), which charges 129 euros, or $168 at $1.30 to the euro, to join for a year. Matt Bennett, a self-styled 'Mr. Upgrade,' is an authority on United States-based premium travel ticketing strategies, especially how best to use miles for upgrades. Mr. Bennett is editor and publisher of Firstclassflyer.com, a monthly newsletter ($97 a year). Inside Flyer, edited and published by Randy Petersen (www.insideflyer.com, $45 a year), is a great source for fliers trying to make better use of frequent-flier programs.
ROGER COLLIS