How do you get so many miles?

I love reading the post on all the forums and eagerly await tips on collecting the Virgin miles. But some of the posts really do take my breath away, like the one posted earlier by Nemmie. Booking UC and using miles, how do you accumulate so many [?], perhaps it's me, as I can only afford to travel once, if I’m really lucky twice a year [:?]

Cheers

Trevor

[HighFlyer]

Hi Trevor

If you fly regularly you can easily keep your miles topped up, but for many of us it has gone so far beyond that, that are we are self confessed miles/points junkies.

Getting a miles/points earning Credit Card is the ultimate supplement to your account, then of course taking advantage of any other miles earning opportunities, plenty of which pop up for discussion in this section of the forum (like Texaco Stars, Wexas and Virgin Wines for example)

FC Au (and soon to be Ag) earn a very nice bonus on top of miles flown too, which helps top up the kitty.

For me, i never take full reward flights, choosing to buy an L or S fare and upgrade it with miles, that way im earning when im spending. I now have a very healthy miles balance - which has already been allocated to taking my family away this year. I think ill have about 10k miles when im done there [:(]

Thanks,
Sarah

It helps if you:
- Travel a lot on miles earning fares
- Travel a lot in Upper on miles earning fares
- Be FC Au
- Take advantage of promotions (eg triple miles)
- Take bumps onto later flights if offered (usually only in J)
- Follow up issues with customer services
- Have a miles earning credit card
- Use a miles earning hotel scheme (e.g. Hilton's "double dip")
- Use the Virgin online casino
- Use as many of the "Earning Miles" options as you can.

Of these, the most lucrative for me were the 2004 triple miles (which IIRC was extended through to May / June), a delayed J flight, with a companion ticket (I got the miles and 2*20k for the delay), and the bumps from VS046 to VS010 (50k in one go).

Might be a daft question, but what is......FC Au (and soon to be Ag) as mentioned in HighFlyer's reply to my post.

Cheers

Trevor

[preiffer]

FC Au = Flying Club Gold (50% bonus miles)
FC Ag = Flying Club Silver (25% bonus miles)

[HighFlyer]

No such thing as a stupid question Trevor

Au = Gold and Ag = Silver (refer back to your Chemistry days at school)

Check out the Glossary page for all the abbreviations we commonly use on the forum.

Trevor

Funnily enough, I've just been updating the FAQs with all the different ways of earning miles (just codeshares to do)

Cheers

Michael

[RichardMannion]

I think you will find many people on here will earn much less than 50% of their miles from flying (let alone VS).

There is an art to maximising your points earning (buying a McD's breakfast on a card just to earn miles is somewhat the pinnacle though!), and some great suggestions have been made already here and in other posts.

Overall with the partners Vs have for earning points, and the generous FC program it is possible for people that don't travel regularly to still build up a nice stash of points to use on a reward over time.

Thanks,
Richard

[preiffer]

^ some of us earn less than 50% of our miles through flying... [:p][ii]



Others among us actually sit in aircraft seats, time after time...

[Decker]

I was thinking "I wish" .

I am an AA PLT Elite member and rack up about 50,000 miles a year with them via the old fashioned bum in seat way. The perk is that I get a 100% mileage bonus which I can then turn 100k into 4 one way Buisness Class ticket from $400 fares.

On special occasions I like to fly Virgin so I carry an American Express card here in the US (as there isn't a Virgin credit card) which gathers points. I'm also lucky enough to qualify for a Platinum AMEX card so I signed up on a double points offer and get two for the price of one on many purchases. So, paying for everything from my mobile phone to petrol on my gas guzzling Audi, I amass enough miles in a year to make my Christmas flight a VS flight... well except for this year where I gave the miles to my girlfriend for an Econ to UC upgrade as early Christmas present. [:?]

But here's another tip. If your work makes you travel a lot sign up for EVERY mileage program you can. It's amazing how many points I've amassed on airlines I feel I never really travel. 20,000 on United, 10,000 on Delta, 50,000 Hilton Points, they all add up and with the advent of websites like Points.com you can build up enough points to transfer some programs into VS.

Lastly, don't just focus on airline programs and credit cards as good sources of points. Take a look at hotels, trains, etc. An example would be Marriott. I signed up for their points program (can't remember what it's called) and when I went on Holiday last year to the Carribean I stayed in one of their hotels for a week. As I wasn't getting any Marriott points but double airmiles I recieved 5,000 miles. Now, they don't support VS at the moment, but you could always put them into a program that allows transfers to VS via a site like the aforementioned points.com.

Hope this helps.

JC

[ChuckC]

Trev2283,
The above excellent posts are just a sample of the helpfulness you'll see on V-Flyer.

Have a look at the Cards Forum here for more on how to accumulate VS miles using various cards.

Regards,
Chuck-

[RichardMannion]

Originally posted by preiffer
^ some of us earn less than 50% of our miles through flying... [:p][ii]



Others among us actually sit in aircraft seats, time after time...

Me too, maybe just that you're not maximising your credit/charge card spend earn rate [:p]

Thanks,
Richard