Paul_from_Dublin The short answer is "Yes, they can be that complicated to understand and use." :ugh:

If you can do something simple to exten the life of points about to expire AND you have a fair certainty of increasing them in the future - then it's worth considering. But discount delas of carriers/hotels/car hire will usually beat them.

Once again, the internet is your friend!

I built up 120k miles over a couple of years on the US Airways Dividend Miles scheme, flying across the pond on US and elsewhere in the world on Star partners. I used those 120k miles for, plus $150 in taxes, a business class return from Europe to New Zealand. Retail price of what I did? £5k+. Can't really argue with that.

Yes indeed kingston_toon, the larger amount the better the reward. Most folks don't get that far, or want to use them for short haul holidays. They may find they don't have enough to take the whole family, or that the taxes now charged overbalance the scales.
I recall some years ago cross checking Air Miles (the old UK BA scheme) and a direct pricing of the same BA flight LGW~AMS rtn. Buying direct was cheaper and it was cheaper still to use EZY, which we did. It was obvious that Air Miles had weighted the 'taxes and charges' to get more cash.

As is often said: Buy a long haul ticket in Economy, use miles to upgrade to a higher cabin - at the time of purchase.

There are web sites dedicated to people who go utterly bananas on this subject.

My son and I are using our Virgin miles to fly out to Hong Kong and back from Shanghai. Its cost us just over £500 each and that is Upper Class each way.

If we paid normal price it would have been over £2000 each.

The amount we paid was for taxes only and over £300 of that was paid to our Govmt to get out of this country!

I got lots of miles on Qatar airways on my twice yearly flights UK-Manila in Busines. Tried 3 times for redemptions on flights, NEVER available whichever way I tried.
I just thought stuff it, walked into Duty Free in the Oryx lounge and redeemed the points on a free iPad and a galaxy tab for £40.....
Bad side dropped from Gold, well, actually plummeted! Oh well back again in November.

Mine is with the airline that shall not be named, but is also linked to my credit card, through which I pay a lot of monthly items including into my pension savings plan. It racks up fairly quickly. In this instance the full reward flight works out to be better value than upgrades.

Way better than my Miles & More experience in the past, which has gone to hell as a scheme.

Airlines have no control over taxes, but you are being very naive if you think airline mileage programmes are there simply for your benefit.

They are a loyalty programme, and just like similar programmes you see in supermarkets and elsewhere. Their sole purpose is to provide the business with another source of data they can analyse.

The bonuses and perks provided to you through the programme are nothing more than a carrot being dangled in front of your nose to keep you incentivised to carry on pushing data into the programme for them.

No problem with taxes, fees and charges imposed per passenger by third parties. But I consider charging you the 'fuel surcharge' to be criminal. If you follow the airline's logic why aren't you paying a aircraft parking charge supplement, or a cost of your pilot's salary charge, etc. etc.

When I earned those miles on revenue tickets I didn't get extra when I paid my fuel surcharge, so why do I have to pay for fuel when I'm using my miles.

I think one large British Airline was fined by the US DOT for doing so, but I haven't seen that prohibition extend to other origins.

mixture I agree that is an important aspect but they also hope that your trip will involve:

• buy duty free onboard (at a minimum
• buy another ticket/s for cash on the same flight
• buy connecting flights with them or a partner airline for cash
• like your experience and choose them again
• tell your friends so that they choose the carrier