Frequent flier miles - many people get excited when they heard those words. How many of you have signed up for credit cards or shopped in certain places just to get an extra 500 to 1,000 points? A lot of you, right? But, did you know that even though you have bought and paid for these frequent flier miles, you cannot sell these miles.
Confused? Then, letBs get you some background on the subject. The frequent flier mile programs were first created as rewards for customer loyalty. These miles could be turned into discounts or credits for airplane tickets. But, soon this changed from just a customer loyalty program into a commodity that could be earned in different ways, including buying from a certain store or using a certain credit card.
Basically, you began to pay to get those loyalty miles. And, in turn, airlines began to make a profit off of these sales because of their relationships with the vendors. As the profits grew bigger from these sales, the airlines began to put more and more restrictions on how you could use your miles and when. The rise of the blackout periods took over.
So, consumers had a ton of miles that they couldnBt use or were getting ready to expire. Now, with panic setting in, they decided to do the next best thing. Sell those miles, get some cash and finally get some benefit out of their miles. Frequent flier brokers began popping up to service this segment of the market and help out the frequent flier in need.
Yet, the airline industry couldnBt just leave this well enough alone. Fearing that this simple exchange of goods would threaten them, they began intimidating their most precious commodity: the consumer. They would disable accounts or take away miles from anyone who dared to sell what was rightfully theirs.
The right to buy and sell frequent flier miles continues to be fought on many grounds, including the courtroom (check out the Delta SkyMiles case from a few years back). There are proponents and opponents on both ends of the spectrum. But, Web sites like www.Flyhub.com have been popping up on the side of consumers to help them buy and sell their frequent flier miles.
And, the fight will continue for many years to come.
