Sorry, I can't figure out how to categorize these without making my index to the left too large. But some of the easiest ways to accumulate miles are on this page. For example, all of your credit cards should be registered with an iDine® program, and some of the surveys are very easy ways to earn free miles. And be sure to read the very last entry on this page.

Rewards Network (iDine®)

• How best to use the program
• Specific offers

Change in program for 2008: Each program has a link to a page that describes the changes, but in general you will earn

• 1 mile/$1 spent if you don't do any of the below.
• 3 miles/$1 spent if you elect to receive emails from the program. Everyone should do this.
• 5 miles/$1 spent if you elect to receive emails from the program and you have 12 or more qualified transactions in the calendar year. That's probably 12 dines before you earn the extra miles; that is, it is probably not retroactive, though this is far from clear. If you earned top status in 2007, you need only sign up for emails from the program to earn these miles throughout 2008.
• Be sure you have enough dines within one program to qualify for the maximum miles.
• Consider buying gift certificates at your favorite iDine® restaurant before the deadline in order to get 10 miles per $1 you will spend after the deadline.

Register up to five credit cards with one of the airlines' iDine® programs listed below. When you charge a meal to one of those cards at any of the 9,500 (and growing) restaurants in the U.S. and Canada, you receive up to 5 miles per dollar spent. You are already paying for this program through the price of the meal when you dine at any iDine® restaurant. So you should register the card you use to pay for meals with one of the programs below in order to get your money's worth from the restaurant.

Cautions:

• Restaurants on the iDine® program come and go very rapidly. Always check the list just before you go to the restaurant. Also, some restaurants are listed on only some of the airlines' iDine® programs. Always check the specific list of restaurants for the airline program for which you plan to earn iDine® miles.
• This FlyerTalk post cautions that an iDine® restaurant that accepts all credit cards may give iDine® miles for only some of them. Be sure you know which credit cards are listed on the iDine® posting of the restaurant.

SmarterTravel has a pretty good article on the iDine® program.

There is a forum on FlyerTalk dedicated to iDine®.

There are Android apps for finding iDine restaurants while you are traveling.

• From Google
• Home made by a Flyetalker

Some restaurants within chains of restaurants offer iDine® miles, while others within that same chain do not. Denny's and Lyons come to mind. This is possible because many chain restaurants are independently owned franchises and can offer whatever bonuses they like. Many of these restaurants issue gift certificates valid for all restaurants in the chain, even those which do not offer iDine® miles. Purchase of gift certificates on your registered credit card qualify for the iDine® miles. So do the obvious.

A special example of the above is a few TGI Fridays in New York City. Some are iDine® restaurants, but do not offer the usual Gold Points. This thread on FlyerTalk discusses how to get both.

Special note: iDine® sends out special offers for bonus miles, but only to those registered for a participating airline's program. Since I am not registered for all of the programs I list, I do not receive all of the offers. So I depend on you to tell me about them. Please send me a copy and paste of any iDine® offers you receive that I have not already listed (or just forward it with a note - no attachments, please, for security reasons).

Many airline iDine® programs are offering special bonuses. A reader who posts as Cornroaster on FlyerTalk posted an excellent summary on how to "game" these bonuses. I copy the post below with a slight amount of editing to make it relevant to current offers. It might be worthwhile to follow the thread to see if others add ideas.

Now we get to the ways to "game" iDine®.

1. When you register a credit card with any of the iDine® programs, make sure you establish a password and profile with the program. This automatically takes you to "middke tier" status, resulting in 3 miles per dollar per dine instead of only 1 mile per dollar. BE AWARE THAT A CARD ISSUED WITH AN AIRLINE FREQUENT FLYER PROGRAM AFFILIATION IS NOT AUTOMATICALLY ENROLLED IN THE IDINE® PROGRAM FOR THE AIRLINE. You still have to register the card with the iDine® site.

2. You can only register a credit card with one dining program. However, there are a number of no-annual fee credit cards you can apply for (such as Gold Points, Hilton, and Priority Club among others) which also will give you points, so you can double dip if you want to keep miles/points active in several programs.

3. Right now, all iDine® (Rewards Network) require is 12 charges in a calendar year to qualify for elite status for 5 miles per dollar plus the 5 mile bonus. There are ways to get to the 12 charges more quickly. Many restaurants allow multiple charges during a month up to a total of $600.00. If you and your husband are going to have a drink before dinner, stop at the bar, order separately, and each of you pay for your drink separately utilizing your own charge card. Then, when you are seated for dinner, ask for separate checks if the restaurant will allow it. Thus, with dinner and drinks for the two of you, you can have four separate charges of the 12 needed to reach elite status.

4. Hunt for some cheap places to eat occasionally where you can accumulate small charges until you reach elite status. For example, there is a burger and custard stand near our home that currently is on iDine®. My wife and I go there for a burger and each order separately and pay with a charge. Then, we go back for an ice cream cone for dessert. At $5 for the burger, fries and soda and $2 for the cone, we rack up 4 qualifying charges for about $14. There is another place where we can get breakfast (again with separate checks) for about $5 each.

5. Talk friends into going out to dinner with you who aren't into miles and points. Quite often, you will be able to get them to let you pay with your credit card and they will give you cash for their portion of the bill. This is great if you pay your credit card bill in full each month and don't pay interest charges. This will also work very well towards accumulating the $150 per month needed for some of the bonuses. If you have an upscale restaurant in your area, you may be able to get close to (or exceed) the $150 total to qualify for the 1500 mile bonus with only one meal.

6. Remember, try to pay the small charges on programs that you don't have status on, and pay the big charges with the program where you have status to get the maximum number of miles.

7. Be careful to be sure the restaurant you are going to offers miles on the day you are going there. Some restaurants don't offer miles on Friday or Saturday, so if you are going there on one of those nights, stop in during the week before and buy a gift certificate, using your charge to pay for the certificate. This can change a non-qualifying Saturday meal into a qualifying purchase on Tuesday or Wednesday. Also, not all restaurants are registered with all iDine® programs, so be sure to check the listings for the program you want to credit the miles to.

8. If you are at the end of the month and don't have enough charged to qualify for a bonus, buy a gift certificate this month for the difference and use it next month. Also, if you are going for a bonus similar to one requiring eight qualifying dines of at least $25 each, you can convert one $120 charge into four gift certificate charges of $30 each. One meal that would not qualify for the bonus is suddenly converted into a meal that earns 1000 bonus miles.

9. Finally, keep an eye on the forums for bonuses.

Good luck, and build up those miles. My wife and I have gotten over 70,000 combined miles in the last 4 years on American, British Airways, Delta, Northwest and United.

Although many restaurants restrict you to one iDine® visit a month, if you register different credit cards with different airlines iDine® programs, you can use each credit card once in the same month at such restaurants and still get the miles for each visit. This has been verified several times by folks posting on the various forums discussing frequent flyer miles. No, iDine® won't let you register the same credit card with more than one airline. You can't double dip.

Be sure to create an online profile for each of your iDine® accounts. I and others have noticed that this allows you unlimited iDine® visits to restaurants that otherwise restrict you to one visit per month.

Be sure to enter the information for Your Birthday, Add Birthday, and Your Anniversary in your account information. After logging into your account, go to the MY ACCOUNT CENTER > My Preferences section. The American and United Airlines programs currently offer special birthday month bonuses.

Owners of restaurants interested in participating in the iDine® programs should click here.

The following programs are operated by Rewards Network (formerly iDine®)

Neigborhood Nosh

• Rewards Network opened a new program, called Neighborhood Nosh. It offers 5% or 10% back for every $1 spent for dines at its restaurants. Register here

Delta Airlines Skymiles Dining

• New Member Bonus
  • Join by January 17, 2025, then within the first 30 days eat and spend $30 or more when you dine out or order takeout within your first 30 days and review your dining experience. Earn 1,000 extra bonus miles.
    • Even better, the bonus miles you earn are in addition to the 3 miles per $1 spent you earn as a SkyMiles® Dining member, and the 5 miles per $1 spent you’ll earn once you reach VIP status.
  • To understand the various levels of membership -VIP, Online Member, and Member, from the home page click on HOW IT WORKS near the top of the page, then on Membership Chart in the Membership Levels box. Attaining VIP status is highly recommended.

  American Airlines AAdvantage Dining
  Special offers:

  • New Member Bonus:
    1. Join the AAdvantage DiningSM program and register for the New Member Bonus.
    2. Earn 500 AAdvantage® bonus miles by spending $25 or more at any participating restaurant and completing an online review is required within 30 days of each restaurant visit to earn AAdvantage® bonus miles.
  • Be sure to enter the information for Your Birthday, Add Birthday, and Your Anniversary in your account information. After logging into your account, go to the MY ACCOUNT CENTER > My Preferences section. The American Airlines program currently offers special birthday month bonuses.
  • To understand the various levels of membership -VIP, Online Member, and Member, from the home page click on HOW IT WORKS near the top of the page, then on Membership Chart in the Membership Levels box. Attaining VIP status is highly recommended.

  United Airlines Mileage Plus Dining by Rewards Network
  Special offers:

  • New Member Bonus:
    • Sign up and register your credit and/or debit card by January 17, 2025, and then within your first 30 days
      1. Spend $25 or more on your first dine or online order in your first 30 days.
      2. Pay your check with your linked credit or debit card.
      3. Earn 500 bonus miles,plus another 500 with Premier status.

  Alaska Airlines MileagePlan Dining & Hotels by Rewards Network.
  Special offers:

  • First Dine Bonus
    1. Join Mileage Plan Dining for free and create a profile by January 17, 2025.
    2. Earn 500 bonus miles by spending $30 or more at any participating restaurant and completing an online review is required within 30 days of each restaurant visit to earn AAdvantage® bonus mile
    3. Complete your review within 30 days of dining. (The review link will be emailed to you and takes only a minute to complete.)
  • To understand the various levels of membership -VIP, Online Member, and Member, from the home page click on HOW IT WORKS near the top of the page, then on Membership Chart in the Membership Levels box. Attaining VIP status is highly recommended.

  Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards Dining by Rewards Network

  • New Member Bonus:
    1. Sign up by October 30, 2024, opt in to Rapid Rewards Dining emails, register your credit and/or debit card, and
    2. Within 30 days of joining the program spend a grand total of $100 or more in one visit or across multiple visits.
    3. Complete your review within 30 days of dining. (The review link will be emailed to you and takes only a minute to complete.)
    4. Receive 1,000 bonus points.

  jetBlue Dining

  • Earn 500 TrueBlue bonus points in your first 30 days

  IHG® Rewards Club Dining (Priority Club)
  A not very impressive number of points per $1 spent. But click here to see how to earn more.
  Bonus offers:

  • Eat, Earn, Repeat Bonus
    1. Join IHG® Rewards Club Dining for free by December 31, 2024,and create an online profile.
    2. Spend $30 on a single dine at a participating restaurant, bar or club within 30 days.
    3. Complete your review within 30 days of dining (The review link will be emailed to you, and it only takes a minute to complete)
    4. Earn 2,000 bonus points
  • To understand the various levels of membership -Elite, Online Member, and Member, from the home page click on HOW IT WORKS near the top of the page, then on Membership Chart in the Membership Levels box. Attaining Elite status is highly recommended.

  Hilton HHonors Dining
  Bonus offers:

  • New Member Bonus
    1. Join Hilton HHonors Dining for free by January 17, 2025.
    2. Dine at any participating location and spend $25 or more – including tax and tip.
    3. Complete your post–dine review within 30 days of dining at the restaurant, bar, or club.
    4. Earn 500 Hilton HHonors bonus points.
  • To understand the various levels of membership -Elite, Online Member, and Member, from the home page click on HOW IT WORKS near the top of the page, then on Membership Chart in the What You'll Get box. Attaining VIP status is highly recommended.

  Marriott Eat Around Town
  Bonus offers:

  • New Member Bonus: Sign up by December 31, 2024, register at least one credit or debit card, and within your first 60 days dine at a participating restaurant and pay with your linked card to earn:
    • First dine: 1,000 bonus points
    • Second dine: 2,000 bonus points
    • Third dine:3,000 bonus points
    • To earn these bonuses, you must spend at least $30 each qualifying dine (including tax and tip.
    Completing an online review is required within 30 days of each restaurant visit to earn bonus points, and you must remain opted in to Eat Around Town emails.

  Choice Privileges® Eat & Earn
  Bonus offers:

  • New Member Bonus.
    • Link your credit and/or debit card through November 30, 2024,.
    • Dine and spend $25 or more—dine in, takeout, delivery or order online through the Eat & Earn site—within your first 30 days. Review your dining experience.
    • Earn 1,500 extra bonus points.

  Other Dining

  The following programs are not operated by Rewards Network (formerly iDine®).

  Free Spirit Dining

  • 5 Spirit Airlines Miles/$1 spent.
  • New member bonus:
    1. Set up your FREE SPIRIT Dining online profile by January 17, 2025.
    2. Dine at any participating location and spend $30 or more – including tax and tip – with your registered credit or debit card.
    3. Complete your post-dine review within 30 days of dining at the restaurant, bar, or club.
    4. Earn 500 bonus points.

  Swagbucks local dining program

  • Swagbucks has a local dining program. Many restaurants are listed for my location. Many of those are also listed on Rewards Network (iDine). I wonder if we can register one card for both programs. Or perhaps Rewards Network is running the Swagbucks program. Most of my restaurants offer 7% back. Some list 10%, and some 6%. This is paid in Swagbucks, normally worth 1 cent each, but sometimes more if you spend them right. (Amazon gift cards come to mind.) 100 SBs are offered for linking your first credit card.

   

The e-rewards program offers mega credit for doing surveys. Credit earned can be used to buy miles or points from many airlines or hotels, or gift cards from various merchants. Here is the list.

"Joining e-Rewards is FREE and by invitation only. Our Partners send invitations to their customers inviting them to join the program. If you've provided your email address to one of our Partner companies, you could receive an invitation to join e-Rewards."

Caution: Joining through an airline invitation will probably cause your redemption opportunities to be restricted to that airline. It is not clear to me if a similar restriction is place on enrollments via hotel invitation. But such an enrollment may increase redemption opportunity to once per quarter, rather than once per year. Read this Flyertalk discussion for the latest on this.

These pages describe how you can get an invitation:

E-rewards now has a European wesbite.

• One Dollar Fares On Megabus are Available Now Through March 11 2024 — But Hurry.

Earn Double SkyMiles With Lyft on Airport Rides in the United States.

Miles Earn and Burn says you can earn 235 American Airlines miles on a $15 Uber ride, one time.

Business Programs

• Business travel programs
• Business meetings
• Offering miles to customers
• Accepting credit cards
• Services for Webmasters
• Other programs for businesses

• American Airlines AAdvantage Business™ program.
• Delta Airlines SKYBONUS, and SmarterTravel's comments on the program.
• United Airlines Perks Plus
• United Airlines MileagePlus Small Business Network.
  • Note that miles earned through this program are separate from your regular miles account and are separate from your PerksPlus account.
• Southwest Airlines SWABIZ.
• Alaska Airlines EasyBiz
• America West Airlines Corporate AWArds
• Air Tran a2b
• Hawaiian Airlines Preferred Affiliate Program
• Frontier Airlines Business Travel Program

• British Airways On Business
• Virgin Atlantic Flyingco
• Alitalia Alicorporate
• Lufthansa PartnerPlusBenefit. Best I can tell, this seems to be a program for businesses not in North America.
• Air France Voyageur Rewards. Click on Frequent flyer programs in the left menu and select Voyageur Rewards.
• SAS SAS Payback.
• Iberia Plus Empresa.
• Finnair Corporate Solutions. After you get to your country, click on the Corporate tab.
• Virgin Express Virgin Express for companies
• Hi Fly (Portugal) Corporate Flyer. Click on Collective Cards.
• Olympic Airlines The Icarus Corporate Flyer Program.
• Air Moldova Corporate Member.
• Air Malta KManager.

• Aeromexico Corporate Club Premier.
• Aerolineas Argentinas Corporate Plan.
• LAN LANCORPORATE.
• AeroSur (Bolivia) Club AeroSur Corporations.
• Aires (Colombia) Plan 15x1.
• Qantas QBizLink.com
• Etihad BusinessConnect

• Hilton eAdvantage
• Starwood Preferred Business and Preferred Planner.
• Intercontinental Hotels Group IHG Business Rewards
• Amtrak Guest Rewards for Business.

Low-Rate Zone Fares

For incentive travel of 10 or more, we will guarantee economical fares from different geographical zones of departure to your destination. Domestic zone-fare discounts range from 40% to 70% off full, unrestricted Coach rates. Zone fares require no Saturday-night stay, so they're ideal for mid-week meetings. Zone fares are valid for travel originating in the United States or Canada for meetings in North America, Europe, the Caribbean, Latin America and the Pacific.

I believe most airlines have similar programs. If you find one, please tell me about it. Thanks. If no one tells me about one, I will assume no one read and cared about this section, anyway.

Hyatt Hotel's Meeting Dividends program offers points for holding business meetings on their properties. Click on the Terms and Conditions link to get the details.

Marriott Hotels Rewarding Events offer up to 15,000 miles on a large selection of airlines or up to 50,000 points for each group, event or meeting, plus 10 Elite nights toward your Silver, Gold or Platinum Elite status for each qualified group or event.

• American Airlines orderAAmiles.
• United Airlines Reward Miles.
• Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan Partner Miles.
• Delta Airlines SkyMiles Incentives.
• Frontier Airlines Company Miles.
• Air Canada AeroNotes.
• Lufthansa Several programs, I think. Ask.
• Priority Club Rewards Incentive Program
• AirIncentives. Sells miles from 6 U.S. Airlines. Caution: This program is run by Points.com, so it is probably very expensive.

• Vantage Card Services. This appears to be a really good place to start, as the website offers lots of information on accepting credit cards. Vantage says that benefits of its program include
  • Earn Vantage Points for accepting credit cards. Vantage Points are redeemable for great rewards from distinguished program partners like: American Airlines, Marriott, Hyatt, Staples, The Home Depot, Starbucks Coffee and more.
  • Direct bank Interchange pass through (no non qualified surcharges).
  • A true month-to-month agreement without any early termination penalties.
• United Bank Card. Offers a free terminal.
• Merchant Accounts Express
• Paynet Systems
• Accept the American Express Card. This offer is direct from American Express.

• NetworkSolutions offers 1,000 miles on American, Delta, or United Airlines, or US Airways for purchase of domain name registration, transfer, or renewal, orpurchase of an email address or web site space. It offers 10,000 miles for a Pro E-Commerce Web Site. It is not clear whether or not you may accept more than one offer for miles.

  NetworkSolutions offers up to 15,000 miles when you buy a Do-It-For-Me Web Site.

  Prices seem expensive to me. Also, you may want to consider this discussion on FlyerTalk before doing business with this company.

• Skyhound offers 1 Alaska Airlines mile per dollar spent on web design, database programming, or e-commerce services, or on web hosting services if you pre-pay with its annual plan.

American Express OPEN for small businesses offers up to 30,000 Membership Rewards points for signing up and using its wire service for foreign exchange currency.

• 15,000 points when you activate your FX International Payments account and an additional 15,000 points when you make 3 FX transactions within 90 days of account opening.
• 1 point per $30 in eligible FX transactions.
• OPEN Cardmembers enjoy no transaction fees on eligible international wire transfers for the first 6 months, then $10 per transaction.
• The exchange rate can be locked in up to a year in advance. Beware of that rate. This is where American Express can make a lot of money at your expense.
• If you do not have an American Express business card, ask if you need one before you can receive these points. Take a look at the card offers with mega bonus points on my Credit Cards > Annual Fee Cards page, in the American Express section near the bottom of the page.

TR Cutler, Inc., a public relations firm for the manufacturing sector, offers 25,000 American Airlines miles at the conclusion of each 90 day Manufacturing Media PR Blitz program.

FedEx offers 1 Hawaiian Airlines mile/$1 spent plus some discounts for shipping with them.

FedEx offers: 500 miles Delta Airlines miles for your first and fourth shipments and 1 mile/$1 spent on eligible FedEx shipments.

As a Delta SkyMiles member, you can earn 100 miles for each FedEx Express® shipment using FedEx One Rate, up to 10,000 miles. FedEx One Rate offers simple, flat rate shipping with the reliability of FedEx. It lets you know up-front exactly how much you’ll pay — no weighing or measuring required.

Miles for Conference Calls: Forget about flying to an expensive business meeting. Just do a conference call, and use your miles for an international vacation instead. I list miles opportunities for conference calls in my Telephone section.

Trusted Translations offers American Airlines miles for its services. You must sign up for its premier program and buy translation services from them. To earn the first time 1,000 bonus miles, the minimum value of the translations must be $500. Premier clients will earn 1 mile/5 words translated. Read the details of the offer.

Booking.com is my main resource for finding these accommodations. It does not have it's own points program (but see the next paragraph), but its listings are hugely extensive world wide. They include home stays, farm stays (fun!), guest houses, hostels (many with private rooms - fun, especially for the young), resorts, apartments, inns, campgrounds, luxury tents, villas, country houses, lodges, boats (yes, you can stay on a boat), condo hotels, chalets, and even motels. Booking.com books directly with the property booked. The booking is immediate - the property owners know who you are immediately after you book, so you can contact them directly to confirm that your booking was actually made. To my knowledge this is the only third party booking company that does this. With others, the property owner may not know who your are until a day or two before your arrival.

Accorhotels is my favorite hotel chain for the cheapest lodging, mainly because of its Motel 6 and Ibis chains. Since I don't travel for the purpose of spending time in my room, all I need is a clean bed and bathroom. So a low price for same is very attractive to me.

The A|Club loyalty program offers points for stays. Points vary with the chain. Alas, they are not available for Motel 6. Points are convertible to miles at various ratios on Delta and Singapore Airlines, U.S. and British Airways, Air France, Lufthansa, and Quntas. Partner offers are promised soon.

Accor offers miles for stays at some of the Motel 6, Sofitel, Pulman, Novotel, Mercure, Suitehotel, Adagio, Ibis, All Seasons, Etap, Forumle 1, Studio 6, and Accor Thalassa properties worldwide. Best I can tell, all you have to do is show your frequent flyer card number at check-in, but ask to be sure. Eligible rates and countries vary with the airline program. Generally 150 - 500 miles per stay are offered.

• Non-Asian Airlines: Huge list, including American and Delta Airlines.
• Asia Pacific Airlines: Qantas, Cathay Pacific, Ansett, Thai Airways, and Air Calin.

Thayls and SNCF passengers are offered discounts on some stays at some Accor hotels.

• Thayls` discounts.
• SNCF discounts.

Alas, I have been unable to find miles offers for Accor's Motel 6 chain. However, clicking through the banner to the left gets all of them in your area of interest listed.

I have found Priority Club points to be expecially valuable for booking rooms in Europe.

IHG Rewards Club's PointBreaks page lists opportunities to book award nights for only 5,000 points per night. Usually these are incredible deals, especially in places where the dollar is weak, like Europe. Always check this page before booking an award night.

Points can be earned by staying at InterContinental Hotels Group properties at the rate of 10 points/US$1 (or local currency equivalent) spent on eligible charges, acquiring and using its credit card (see the nice bonus offer on the Free Cards page of my Credit Card section), and via bonus offers, many of which are listed on my Registrations and Other Bonuses page. For stays, there is the option of earning miles instead of points. The number of miles varies by airline and hotel property.

Gold Crown members have the option of earning 250 miles per stay instead of points. Since 10 points are worth 2 miles, and $1 spent gets you 10 points, mileagewise your stay would have to cost over $125 to justify choosing points over miles.

Gold Crown Club lists other opportunities to earn points, as well as special discounts on rooms, on its Special Offers page.

• Choice Privileges is the loyalty points program of Comfort Inn, Comfort Suites, Quality, Sleep Inn, Clarion and MainStay Suites hotel in the U.S., Canada, Caribbean and Mexico, and Econo Lodge and Rodeway Inn hotels throughout Canada. You may also earn points for acquiring and using its free credit card, which you may read about on my Free Cards page of my Credit Card section.

  Points expire on December 31, two years after the year in which they were deposited into your account.

  Points are convertible to miles on many airlines, or for free stays. Caution: A stay is required before you can transfer points to miles.

  When staying at a Choice property, you may earn either 250 miles per stay (not per day), or 10 points/$1 spent. Since points convert at 1,000 miles for 5,000 points, the points are a better deal if you plan to accumulate 10,000 of them (remember that they expire), and if your stay will cost over $125.

  Note that you can earn mega-points by acquiring and using once Choice's free credit card. You may read about the card on the Free Cards page of my Credit Card section.

   

The Starwood Hotels Starpoints programs offers points staying at its hotels, using its credit card, and doing other things, many of which are listed on my Registrations and Other Bonuses page. Starpoints can be converted to airline miles rate of 3 Starpoint to 1 airline mile on most major airline carriers. Plus, when you transfer 60,000 Starpoints you get an additional 5,000 airline miles. Starpoints can also be used to obtain other goodies, such as free stays at Starwood properties.

Note that it is possible that your Starpoints will expire after year of inactivity. Be sure to use them or convert them to miles or add points before this happens. From the terms and conditions of the program:

You must enroll in the program before you can acquire points. Look on my Registrations and Other Bonus page to see if there is an enrollment bonus.

Points can be earned by staying at Marriott Hotels, acquiring and using its credit card (see the nice bonus offer on the Annual Fee Cards page of my Credit Card section), and via bonus offers, many of which are listed on my Registrations and Other Bonuses page.

An account may be closed at Marriott's discretion if no points or miles are accrued during a 24-month period. All points in the account will be forfeited at that time.

The free Hilton HHonors program can be most useful to seekers of miles, even if you do not ever intend to stay at a Hilton property. There are several reasons for this:

Second, there are lots of ways to earn Hilton HHonors points by staying at its hotels, and by other means that can be quite lucrative. For example, you can get an easy minimum of 20,000 points by applying for both of the free, no annual fee Hilton credit cards, described in the Credit Card section of this web site. That's at least 3,000 or 2,000 miles . I regularly obtain points from my use of the e-rewards program I describe on my Miles for Clicking page of this web site. MyPoints is described on my Click for Miles, Money, and Good Causes page of this web site. Check out this extensive list of ways to earn more Hilton HHonors points other than by staying in Hilton Hotels.

I list this program on this web site because the points convert to miles, and they are held by a business that seems to be more financially stable that most of the airlines. But those who actually stay at Hilton properties say the points are more value when used to buy stays in Hilton's high priced rooms. Some of the Hilton resorts seem to be especially favored.

I list special Hilton HHonors point offers on my Registrations and Other Bonuses - Miles and Points Programs page.

Special cautions:

• If you don't earn points on your HHonors account in any 12 consecutive months, your points could be lost. See items 12 and 13 of the General section of the Terms and Conditions page. However, it is easy to earn point via the e-rewards or MyPoints programs described on my Miles for Clicking page.
• The list of airlines, especially U.S. Airlines, from which you can obtain miles via Hilton changes frequently. Airlines come and go.

Be sure to check my Registration and Other Bonuses page for bonuses for this program.

You may instead receive 250 miles on the above airlines, or 600 Southwest Airlines points per stay. You must choose points or miles when you check in, so do the math.

Read the terms and conditions. Note that

• Members who do not have any stay activity within a 12-month consecutive period will be removed from the program and all accrued points will be forfeited.
• Points earned will be issued as of the date of check-in and will expire 24 months from the check-in date.

• If you choose points, earn 5 Gold Passport points/eligible $1 spent at Hyatt. Platinum members earn a 15% point bonus and Diamond members a 30% point bonus. Points may also be earned by doing business with Hyatt's partners: Stays at AmeriSuites, Hawthorn Suites, and Summerfield Suites earn either 3 points/$1 spent or 300 miles per stay. Car rentals from Avis and Sixt Rent-A-Car earn 300 bonus points for each qualifying rental.
• If you choose miles, Earn 500 miles per stay at your chose of a large number of airlines when you present your frequent flyer account number at check-in. Note that this is per stay, not per night.

You may combine your Gold Passport points with any Gold Passport member to redeem an award. Apparently there is no charge or loss of points for doing this.

A member's Hyatt Gold Passport membership may be discontinued at Hyatt Gold Passport's discretion if a member does not record Hyatt Gold Passport points or Airline miles activity during any consecutive 12-month period. All Hyatt Gold Passport points in the account will be forfeited at that time.

Be sure to read about special offers for this program in the Hotel and Other Points Programs section of my Registration and Other Bonuses page.

Wyndham offers a credit card that earns points up front and for purchases. You may read about this in my Credit Cards > Free Cards section.

Be sure to read about special offers for this program in the Hotel and Other Points Programs section of my Registration and Other Bonuses page.

Be sure to read about special offers for this program in the Hotel and Other Points Programs section of my Registration and Other Bonuses page.

Be sure to read about special offers for this program in the Hotel and Other Points Programs section of my Registration and Other Bonuses page.

This post on FlyerTalk tells you how to get 500 points for receiving your statements online. Since I am not a member of the RediCard program, I cannot verify this offer or tell you when it expires.

Red Roof Inns are Accor Hotels properties, as are Motel 6's and other inexpensive lodgings worldwide. If find a similar program for other Accor properties, where the points convert to airline miles, please tell me about it. A Motel 6 points program would be really nice.

The Hotels.com Welcome Rewards® program offers credit towards a night's stay of the value of the average of you 10 nights paid stays. You must register to participate.

Hotels.com is listed on the Chase Ultimate Rewards shopping portal. This means that if you own one of the excellent Chase cards that earn Ultimate Rewards, you not only earn the extra points from the portal (up to 4/1$), I believe you also earn the double points for travel and hotels from the Chase Sapphire Preferred (SM) Card, Ink Bold® Business Card or Ink Plus® Business Card.

• If you book via the Chase Ultimate Rewards shopping portal and are not logged into the Welcome Rewards® program, the FAQs of the latter say

  Welcome Rewards nights are stored in your Hotels.com account. If you weren't logged in when you booked your reservation, you need to attach your hotel reservation to your account to earn your Welcome.

The Faqs also say

If you join the Welcome Rewards program after booking and your hotel stay has not been completed, you can still earn nights.

Greenpoints is entering the services market. They have introduced a dining program, offers from Verizon, and a program for aviators. I expect that list to grow.

S&H greenpoints offers a free Visa Credit card with a 10,000 point up front bonus, which you can read about in my Credit Card page of this web site.

S&H greenpoints allows you to give points to another Greenpoints member, apparently for free (Hint: I am a Greenpoints member...), and to donate points to selected charities.

S&H reserves the right to terminate any membership if that member has been inactive for a period of 24 consecutive months. A member shall be considered "Inactive" for such time as the member has not engaged in either any greenpoint earning or spending transaction. Upon termination of an inactive account, the accrued greenpoints will be cancelled.

Current Amtrak Guest Rewards Select or Select Plus Members may redeem up to a total of 50,000 Amtrak Guest Rewards points per calendar year for Choice Privileges, Hilton Honors, and Audience Rewards points combined (cannot be combined with cardholder redemption limit below). Current Amtrak Guest Rewards Select Executive Members are exempt from these point redemption limits.

Current active cardholders of the Amtrak Guest Rewards® World Mastercard® issued by Bank of America with an annual Net Retail spend on the card of $20,000 or more per calendar year may redeem up to a total of 25,000 Amtrak Guest Rewards points per calendar year for Choice Privileges, Hilton Honors, and Audience Rewards points combined (cannot be combined with Select/Select Plus member redemption limit above).

Caution: From the terms and conditions of the program:

"Point Expiration. Subject to these Program Terms and Conditions, points earned under the Program will not expire as long as the Program continues and the Member’s Program account is active. “Active” means that the Member earns and/or redeems Program points using his or her Membership Number within a 24-month period. If no Member initiated qualifying activity is recorded or reported within 24 months, your points will expire. You can view all point and travel activity in the "My Transactions" section of My Account on this site."

Amtrak Guest Rewards is a useful points program for those who travel on Amtrak.

• Points are transferable to the Choice Privileges and Hilton HHonors and Wyndham rewards programs, but again only if you meet certain qualifications (see above). 5,000 Amtrak points get you 15,000 Choce Privileges points or 10,000 Hilton HHonors points.
  • Caution: The Amtrak to Choice Privileges offer is constantly changing. Read this Webflyer article.
  Points are earned by
  • Traveling on one of Amtrak's trains.
  • Obtaining and using it's free credit card - one point per dollar spent, plus a good up front bonus usually. You may read about it in my Credit Card section on the Free Cards page.
  • Staying in hotels.
  • Buying stuff.
  There's a standard 500 points bonus for signing up for Amtrak Guest Rewards if you take an Amtrak trip within 90 days of signup.

  Amtrak lists it special deal for members of its Guest Rewards program here.

  Caution: Amtrak is currently running a huge deficit, and is always asking Congress for more money, which it may not provide. Bankruptcy is possible, in which case you may loose any points in your account. I strongly suggest you convert points to miles or otherwise use them whenever you can.

   

My utility company, WPS (Wisconsin Public Service) does take credit cards, but charges $3.50 for each transaction. The trick is that you can charge up to $750 and still incur only the $3.50 charge. So this is an opportunity to prepay several months with a credit card (charging the maximum of $750) for only the $3.50 charge.

This seems to be a growing company. Please tell me about additions or changes to the Energy Plus offers. Thanks.

The company says you will save up to 15% on your electricity bill. It offers an all wind power option.

For comparison, the Energy Plus home page lists cash back and education offers.

I have given up keeping up on the details of each offer. This flyertalk discussion seems to keep up with them. I provide the links to the ones I know about. Read them carefully.

• United Airlines offer.
  • Special offer: 10,000 MileagePlus award miles as a special bonus after your second month as an Energy Plus customer plus 2,500 more if you have United's credit card.
• American Airlines offer.
  • Special Offer - 12,500 American Airlines miles. This one is for PA residents, but try modifying the URL for your state (MD, NY, NJ, etc).
  • Special offer - 10,000 miles.
• Special offer - 7,5000 miles.

• American Airlines. Enter Promo Code XT3081.
• United Airlines. Enter Promo Code XA00WN..

• 1 mile/$1 you spend on your Bounce Energy bill as long as you pay your Bounce Energy bill on time.
• Sign up for the American AAdvantage 12 or American AAdvantage 24 plan to earn an additional 1,000 miles once you pay your 1st 3 bills on-time.

• 10,000 United Airlines miles
• 10,000 American Airlines miles
• 10,000 Southwest Airlines points, plus 2,500 more if you hold its credit card.
• 10,000 Marriott points
• 10,000 Hilton HHonors points
• 10,000 Amtrak points

• 1 mile/$1 you spend on your Bounce Energy bill as long as you pay your Bounce Energy bill on time.
• Sign up for the American AAdvantage 12 or American AAdvantage 24 plan to earn an additional 1,000 miles once you pay your 1st 3 bills on-time.

Caution: The terms and conditions say "This offer must be presented at the time of inquiry, before a SunPower proposal for your home is generated; so, please be sure to notify your SunPower installer that you may qualify for this offer during your free solar evaluation." This indicates to me that the miles offer will cause your price to be higher.

Here are my favorite blogs. I read them daily.

• Doctor of Credit. Excellent info and insights into credit cards earning miles and points. Often finds stuff no other blogger finds. Frequently referenced by myself and bloggers. You can subscribe via email.
• Gary Leff's View from the Wing is a blog listing almost daily short comments on flying and travel, often mentioning miles offers. His emphasis is on business travel and high class hotels, but he covers most everything about miles and good travel deals. I recommend subscribing to its email list. Caution: Gary now refuses to list credit card offers better than the ones for which he earns a commission. Sad. Check my website to find the best offers.
• Million Mile Secrets is an excellent blog, but it occasionally goes too far and gives recommendations that are unethical and/or will get you in trouble. Read it carefully, and wait for readers to comment on a post before using the info. And caution: His Credit Cards list often does not mention the best offers. I recommend subscribing to his email list.
• The Points Guy is a blog frequently offering excellent ideas for acquiring miles and points. But caution: His Credit Cards list often does not mention the best offers. The blog is the author's primary business, so he doesn't list offers that are better than the ones that pay him a commission.
• MommyPoints is a well written blog from the point of view of, well, a Mommy. Apparently it has merged into the blog of The Points Guy, so not sure if we will find anything on her blog that is not also on his.
• PointsCentric frequently finds offers that nobody else finds.
• The Gate. Really interesting and well written articles about travel from a guy who has traveled quite extensively. Best I can tell, he does not tout for or earn commissions from anything.
• The Military Frequent Flyer. Lots of good ideas unique to military personnel.
• Blog from Rewards Canada - a must read for Canadians.
• Australian readers will find these blogs to be useful
  • Point Hacks
  • The Australian Frequent Flyer
• European readers may want to follow four blogs:
  • Frequent Flyer Italia. Most Italian offers are available to all Europeans, and often to everyone, though perhaps not advertised outside of Europe. Click on the appropriate flag for your preferred language.
  • Head for Points is a British Centric blog, doing a pretty good job of following Avios and Virgin Atlantic.
  • Points to be Made is a "European blog on maximising loyalty programmes".
  • euflyer.

Randy Peterson runs the informative Web Flyer web site which offers information some of which is not published in his newsletter. He has probably been an expert on frequent flyer miles longer than most anyone else. Check out his Frequently Asked Questions section. It is quite useful, though it can be quite a bit out of date. (He doesn't mention the Hilton credit cards when appropriate, for example. So don't believe him when he says something doesn't exist.) \

Rewards Canada is a useful site for Canadians who are frequent flyers. The webmaster posts regularly on The FrequentFlier Forum as superdawg. Rewards Canada has free newsletter very useful to Canadians. It also features a Frequent Flyer Bonuses page, a compilation of bonus offers for airline and hotel programs from around the world. This page links to a nice bonus by route feature.

• Tim Winship writes the biweekly newsletter "The FrequentFlier Crier." Click here to subscribe.
• Randy Peterson writes "MilesLink". Click here to subscribe (free).
• SmarterTravel offers several very worthwhile weekly e-mail newsletters, including Mile Alert and Deal Alert, mentioned above.
• Frequent Flyer Bonuses does a good job of finding the most miles when you actually fly. It has a weekly newsletter.
• Rewards Canada has a free newsletter very useful to Canadians.

This reddit thread frequently lists miles offers not seen anywhere else - well, at least not until the rest of us copy it.

Milepoint is another discussion board on miles. Please tell me if you find anything of interest there. Thanks.

Canadians will be interested in the Rewards Canada Frequent Flyer Forum.

Australians will be interested in The Australian Frequent Flyer Bulletin Board.

Also see my list of charities which allow you to simply click on a link for free to cause sponsors to donate money to them. It is found on my Click for Miles, Money, and Good Causes page.

• American Airlines. Earn miles for making donations. On March 13, 2014, the charities included National Foundation for Cancer Research, United Service Organizations, Inc (USO), U.S. Fund For UNICEF, and Komen.
  • You can donate your American Airlines miles to various charities. On March 29, 2013, those charities were Operation Hero Miles and Miles For Kids.
• United Airlines. Donate miles to various charities. On January 11, 2014, the list of charities was very large.
• Delta Airlines. Donate miles to several charities via Delta's SkyWish program.
• Hawaiian Airlines.
  • Donate miles to various charities. At the end of the year, Hawaiian Airlines will match up to half a million miles to each participating charity.
• Lufthansa. Donate miles to various charities .
• Cathay Pacific. Donate miles to various charities.
• Hilton Hotels
  • Hilton Hotels allows you donate points to provide dollar contributions to various charities. Every 10,000 points equals a US$25 contribution.
  • The Global Soap Project collects discarded soap from hotels and reprocesses it into new bars that are given to vulnerable populations throughout the world. Partnering with organizations that have existing operations in these communities, the Global Soap Project ensures the soap is distributed to those in need, with the goal of improving health through personal hygiene. Hand washing with soap is among the most effective and inexpensive ways to prevent diarrhea and pneumonia, which together are responsible for more than 3.5 million child deaths each year. A lack of soap can be a barrier to hand washing at schools, community health clinics and refugee camps in developing countries, which rarely have soap or appropriate hand washing facilities. Your donation of 2,000 Hilton points sends 33 bars of soap to refugees, orphans, birth attendants, teachers, students and vulnerable populations around the world. (Thanks to Noob Traveler for this information.)
• S&H greenpoints allows you donate points to United Way, Food For All, and American Forests' Global ReLeaf program as of January 11, 2014.
• American Express allows you to donate Membership Rewards points to the American Red Cross.
• You can earn Swagbucks for contributing to some well know charities. If you are going to donate to these anyway, might as well get some Bucks for it. Swagbucks is a very easy way to earn a few dollars by doing almost nothing special. Please read my full write-up on the program.
• Please read my section on Amazon.com to find out how your purchases there can cause a donation to your choice of a large number of charities.
• Greyhound Adoption Kennel. Scroll down to the banner about a third of the way down the page, or do a word search on "Amazon". It shows with my IE browser, but not with my Firefox.
• Please tell me of any similar offers you find from good causes. Please include a link to the offer, so I can list it here. Thanks.

Frequent-flyer partner database promises to maintain lists of partner airlines

• On which you can use your miles for award flights, and
• On which you may credit your flight miles.