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Signing up for credit cards to get airline bonuses and flying more are good options to earn miles. With an average redemption/valuation of 1 cent/mile or maybe 1.2 cents/mile why would it make sense to buy airline miles at 1.7 or 2 cents/mile?

perennial_noob
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4 Answers4

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Your experience might vary depending on the mileage program, but in most cases, buying extra miles is a waste of money.

Some legitimate uses:

  1. If you are close to a redemption value you want, there's no other reasonable way to get the miles, and you're able to buy the amount you need without going over too much.
  2. You have a lot of miles saved up, and your miles expire based on the last activity in the account. In this case, buying a small amount of miles can reset the expiry date for all the miles. Redeeming a small amount (e.g. a small charity donation) might also work in this case.
  3. Buying miles could help you maintain or upgrade your "status" in the airline. This might unlock enough discounts and free perks to be worth it in some cases.

Edit: Added more scenarios mentioned by Stian Yttervik and RobV where buying miles might make sense.

Earth
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    Some airlines also count purchased miles as regular miles (not "bonus" miles) - usually "bonus" miles do not count towards your status. I once bought a couple of thousand miles to keep my gold status in KLM's skyteam elite. Having gold means you can purchase certain seat options at half the price (or was it 75%?) which really matters on the long haul flights. Having a good seat makes the difference between business and economy flight only a glass of champagne. Avoiding that glass could save you or your company several thousand dollars. – Stian Apr 18 '19 at 10:49
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    Another legitimate use -- if you have a particular multi-city itinerary that is insanely expensive to buy, but uses a chain of 1-way rates when using miles. I had to book a 6 city ticket and was able to get close to 10 cents/mile used, so if I needed to buy some extra at 2 cents a mile, it would still be worth it. – tpg2114 Apr 18 '19 at 11:08
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    Your last paragraph stands on it's own as the best answer to, "why would it make any sense." If my miles are about to expire, and I'm just below having enough miles for a trip, buying a few more can make a huge difference in my favor, regardless of the per mile cost. I did this the last time I redeemed miles. I bought $200 in miles to redeem with my balance for an $1800 flight and avoided losing the $1600 worth of miles that would have expired in a month. So I paid $200 for a flight that would have cost $1800 otherwise. "Mile cost" for that $200 aside, I won out. – dwizum Apr 18 '19 at 13:51
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    I've seen people sneak miles through expense reports and get reimbursed by their companies. – Bort Apr 18 '19 at 19:41
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    @schadjo I don't think anything that should fall under the fraud heading should be classified as a legitimate use. – Dan Is Fiddling By Firelight Apr 18 '19 at 20:28
  • @StianYttervik I feel like that comment should be an answer... – Alex M Apr 18 '19 at 21:15
  • @alex-m Maybe, but I was hoping that the answer would get updated with what was in my comment, so as to make 1 more complete answer rather than two. Especially since it was already accepted. – Stian Apr 19 '19 at 08:03
  • @StianYttervik I think a different answer with a new perspective is okay. I'll upvote your answer, should you carve it out as an answer. – perennial_noob Apr 19 '19 at 15:52
  • @StianYttervik I don't know that an answer "it's a huge waste of money" can be improved by describing a legit scenario where it's a good idea - the problem with this answer 'already' being accepted is that it probably shouldn't have been accepted to begin with. – Alex M Apr 19 '19 at 16:16
  • @StianYttervik I guess the best course would be for someone to write an answer laying out all the scenarios where buying miles makes sense; between your comment, this answer and another good one there appear to be 3 discrete good reasons to buy them. IMO that answer, which does not yet exist, would be the correct one. I'm new to this stack though so I don't know if that kind of thing is generally done. – Alex M Apr 19 '19 at 16:19
  • I accepted the answer because I had two responses which were nearly the same in terms of confirming that it is usually not a good deal. The answer by @StianYttervik brings to light some scenarios which are very particular. Even in that scenario, you're actually overpaying in order to get better privileges, which may not apply otherwise. So IMO the accepted answer may miss out some details but it doesn't seem like a wrong answer. That still shouldn't prevent others from adding answers (or does SE block new answers?) – perennial_noob Apr 19 '19 at 17:57
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The most practical (though not necessarily cost effective) reason for buying miles is to reset your mileage expiry date.

Most programs have some some of expiry built into them so that if you don't earn/buy any miles for a certain period of time you forfeit your accrued miles. Buying miles will generally count as activity on your account and reset the expiry date. As buying the minimum amount of miles can be much cheaper than taking a flight, particularly with a long-haul airline, paying to keep your accrued miles can be worth it especially if you have a high balance.

As a concrete example me and my wife both have mileage with Virgin Atlantic. We used to fly frequently transatlantic as we lived in the US for work so racked up plenty of mileage. However after moving back home to the UK she rarely flies transatlantic anymore (and if she does it's usually by spending our accrued mileage balance from when we did fly frequently) so hasn't earned any miles in years. Virgin Atlantic mileage expires if you have no earning activity in 3 years and costs £30 (including transaction fees) to buy the minimum amount of miles (1000) so costs £0.30 per mile which is quite expensive BUT it's worth keeping the account active so that when we next want to take a big trip we still have our mileage balance to spend.

RobV
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    This becomes less relevant with the airlines using 'sliding' expiration, e.g. any miles you accrued have a lifetime. –  Apr 19 '19 at 07:55
  • Good point. I've used the mags for miles strategy. A magazine subscription for 600 miles. Sometimes that deal is worth more than 5 cents a mile. Depending on the Magazine/paper. – JTP - Apologise to Monica Apr 19 '19 at 15:26
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It makes a lot of sense for the airlines, obviously.

If you are very near to a free flight, it might make sense to buy a small amount, but generally, it is a very bad deal for the buyer. Not everyone realizes that, though.

Aganju
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There are some rational reasons, I will provide one example. Please edit in if you have other good scenarios, we can make it a wiki answer.

Some airlines count purchased miles as regular miles (not "bonus" miles) - usually "bonus" miles do not count towards your status. I once bought a couple of thousand miles to keep my gold status in KLM's skyteam elite. When you qualify for a status you keep it for an entire year.

Lounge access for a year is worth the price of a couple miles. Having gold also means you can purchase certain seat options at half the price (or was it 75%?) which really matters on the long haul flights. Having that good seat makes the difference between business and economy flight only a glass of champagne. Avoiding that glass could save you or your company several thousand dollars.

So there are cases where it is a winning bet.

Stian
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