The Evolving Ways Airlines Open Award Seats, Which Changes The Points Game

Feels like this continues until demand drops off from a recession and the awardseat flood gates open back up. Hope I'm wrong.

Good to see a miles and point topic on the blog. Had been thinking the name "onemileatatime" needed to be changed.

Probably also partially driven by seats.aero and friends. I imagine they will start to incorporate a special search method for these fares as well. The UA change has helped me dramatically this year.

Pro tip: If a single person you know has the UA CC or status, you should be able to make a milage pool, and then all pool members can search for that special availability, and then put miles in the pool as needed. Keep in mind you can only book UA metal through milage pool.

You need to make your mind up on the value of status- in one post you're writing that it's worth less than it used to be, in the next you're saying that airlines drive engagement by increasing the value of status through making more awards available to elite members. While different airlines will have different approaches and value propositions, you can't really claim that the industry trend is to simultaneously increase and decrease the value of being an elite member!

At least for United, the bar for "loyal" to get expanded access to seats is so trivially low that it shouldn't factor into consideration of who you fly with much.

I have MileagePlus Silver and haven't taken a revenue flight with United in years as it comes with Bonvoy status. Or you can just have a credit card for it.

An interesting follow up would be which airlines are furthest along in implementing this strategy and which aren't.

We're seeing this already except it's for economy awards US-Europe especially has never been lower or more available in the 2nd half of 2025. I'm also seeing US-Australia premium awards available for the first time in ages.

Excellent points! This trend of airlines gatekeeping premium awards behind their own programs, elite status, or cards is definitely reshaping the game, and it's tough for those of us who loved the old partner sweet spots.

It's most pronounced in the big alliances, but non-alliance carriers like Philippine Airlines offer an interesting contrast. Since PAL isn't in a global alliance, they avoid some of those inter-program reimbursement headaches. Mabuhay Miles still uses a pretty straightforward zone-based chart (no obvious dynamic pricing), and awards are mostly booked directly through PAL – often needing a call or visit to a ticket office, though verified members get some online access.

In practice, though, PAL prioritizes its own loyalists too as earning miles is hardest without flying them (no big transferable points partners in the US), and partner redemptions (like old ANA bookings on PAL metal) have always been spotty or restricted. It subtly pushes you to build direct loyalty if you want reliable access to their seats.

That being said, I so get why airlines are doing this, loyalty programs are profit machines now, and protecting inventory for actual customers makes business sense. But it'll probably kill off a lot of the fun arbitrage. Curious if independents like PAL will stay relatively open or start adding more elite/card perks too.

I’m curious how transferable currencies come into play here. If the airlines make more money from loyalty to their own programs and credit cards, and transferable currencies (the Amex, Citi, Chase, etc., ecosystems) are widely available such that points are pretty easy to come by, then what incentive do airlines have to sign up as transfer partners? Do the respective banks pay the airlines for participation?

Agreed. Off late, Ben has been distracted with flying etiquette, fringe airlines (no more Global Airlines stories, please) etc.

Are these changes not inevitable as airlines and hotels learn of the sweet spots and the way consumers have exploited the gaps? Heck, all they need do is to have a staff dedicate a few hours of their time to these blogs and trawl utube and SM to learn what gaps to plug.

That’s a lot of words to write so little information.
Suggest writing your essay.
Edit.
Publish.

This post reads like the introductory paragraph of "How we should change our approach". What is one to do?

Are we back into the sordid business of earning top status in multiple programs? And in addition, earning points in multiple programs?

Wanna fly Emirates First? Need Emirates status and points.
Wanna fly Air France La Premiére? Need Flying Blue Status and points.
Want access to Cathay Pacific Business/First? Need AsiaMiles.
Want to get meaningful value from Aeroplan, avoiding cancel fees? Need high status.

And on and on.

+1

The annoying thing here is when the re-ticketing team does not do the re-ticketing timely. I almost got stranded in Tokyo because suddenly a Narita flight opened up and I switched my booking but I got the airport and the Japan airlines team say well I can see your booking on this flight but American airlines is yet to re-ticket it

Agreed. Today's stories about bed bugs and a lady stumbling off of a plane were particularly low points

There's just no reason to participate in an ecosystem where a one way business class flight to Europe costs 300,000 miles plus $800 in cash. It costs less to just pay cash and buy a ticket. Why jump through all of the mileage hoops?

Airlines have sucked all of the value out of their programs. I fortunately can still spend points on flight from, idk, Uzbekistan to Indonesia but most people aren't traveling this way.

I understand why airlines do this. Overall I don’t love it. And for selfish reasons, especially so because the airline I’m “loyal” to is Delta and they sure don’t offer me much, other than 15% off with my CC… but I truly believe they’ve crept the prices up since announcing that so now I’m paying what I used to pay pre discount. If they gave diamonds or platinums actual good discounts on mileage tickets like united does, it would maybe sway me back to being 100% with them as opposed to splitting my status.

Indeed. I've had status with AF/KL for twelve years, and will be Platinum for Life in ten days.
I'm also on my first FB award ticket. In the past, whenever I looked, there was no availability, or 300k one way for business class.
Then Flying Blue started testing more availability for Platinums, and suddenly I can fly.

The other part of the equation is that US credit cards have these piles of transferable points, and so the award seats went to Americans with a low-activity* Flying Blue account who transferred points for a purchase. That's great, but not encouraging loyalty for your primary market.

*Those who create a Flying Blue account and immediately transfer points in usually get a rude surprise.

Airlines need to be careful here... They make a huge amount of $$$ selling their points to Amex, Chase etc... if only X airline's elite members can book reward seats, those sales will fall off a cliff...

Yes a follow-up of “where do we go from here” would be useful.

I think it makes strategies needing to be more "personalized" to one's travel habits and future goals. Most advice has been generic and "one size fits all" but that clearly isn't the case now.

Where we go from here is to just paying for J and F. There is no need to be loyal to any airline and, if you do the math, you’ll see that it comes out ahead. Stopped running on the points and status hamster wheel a few years ago and couldn’t be happier with that decision.

While Ben subtly sides with the airlines here, justifying their changes with the equivalent of an ‘it’s just business, nothing personal’ quip, I’d certainly fight back harder on this, if I were you, sir. Like, the push from a consumer side should be to recognize that we have an severe power-imbalance as users within these programs, regardless of status or what cards we have. So, the solution is not to just shrug and accept the negative changes (because, these are indeed ‘nerfs’ to these programs); we should be pushing for regulation that ensures a baseline value for points/miles, and clear terms (at the very least ‘notice’ for material changes to the programs), and ideally, ensuring awards remain available. The shift from charts to dynamic pricing really burned us all; and, the exclusion of top classes (First) from many programs is further upsetting. Ultimately, voices like Ben can make a difference by continuing to advocate for us, rather than throwing hands up and just ‘taking it.’ Then again, Ben’s gotten his over the years, so maybe do as TPG has done, and shill for the big boys instead. Hmm… the telltale sign of that would be when comments sections go away…

Yup, ‘credit cards with wings.’ Yet, they still gotta fly (and provide something for those points/miles). That’s the thing, Paul. These programs are nearly completely unregulated. Other than consumers ‘voting with their wallets’ in the aggregate (unlikely to happen), the best hope for ensuring availability is these big banks. If airlines continue to devalue their programs, the banks are the ones that need to call them out, ensure a baseline value is maintained, otherwise, they’re getting screwed as are we.

Regulating points/miles is a great way to nerf the programs. Sweet spots still exist that can be used by those who are paying attention (like us) precisely because a lot of consumers use their points for poor value. Regulate these programs more heavily and they all become Skypesos with a low, fixed or semi-fixed value.
And aside from talking to industry execs when he gets a chance, Ben doesn't have a big enough megaphone to materially change these industries.

I think the way programs have been evolving makes sense. Holding international first for your own elites is probably a good policy. Some of the more robust programs having better premium award space for elites (and/or cardholders) makes sense. And American programs are in a unique position of wanting to keep their own co-branded portfolio from being undercut by international partners and their partnering bank's own transferable currency. The people most harmed are elites of the international partners (like Flying Blue or Miles & More) that cannot get any premium space on Delta or United coming to the US.

From my perspective, this doesn't matter. I don't feel entitled to international first class. I so far have not had a problem finding adequate award space, as there are plenty of lesser known international airlines that have extra space in business or PE at reasonable prices. Product chasers are getting shut out of the most elite experiences, but that should not be how we define award space quality.

The trend I really despise is bigger programs adding tons of YQ to award tickets, and in BA's case, trying to force other programs to pass that cost onto the consumer as well.

The scary thing is that this all mirrors DJT's America First policy. Is it possible to rationalize it for miles & points and not politics?

But then one must transfer in MNL & that's a deal breaker.

It depends on what you want out of status. Not as many domestic F or extra-legroom Y upgrades nowadays but waived fees, access to saver awards, and other perks will be valuable to many elites too, plus long-haul upgrade certificates if you have the highest tier status.

@1990, you're right! Ben sometimes writes as he if were an airline executive or interviewing for a top position at an airline. We have to call this getting-worse-every-year shift in award availability for what it is: it sucks 100% and it's almost like false advertising.

Sadly non-American frequent flyers are basically now third class citizens. We are not allowed US airline credit cards and the ones that existed are gone (AA and AS had Canadian cards but both have gone away).
Last year I was able to concoct a Business trip from YLW to BKK and DPS through Air Canada for about 115,000 points OW pp. This involvved one leg with Polaris and 5 other legs on various carriers (UA, Swiss, TK, Oman, SQ, LH, AC). With UA now dynamic I am booking for cash as it is cheaper than buying ridiculous numbers of points. The days of AS ticket on CX First are sadly very much history.

you must be new here

Lucky,

In all honesty, you single handedly are the one to blame for these changes. You have helped thousands (if not tens of thousands, if not more) of people book these amazing awards, published the loopholes, and this whole thing has gone mainstream. Too many undesirables are now filling business and first class seats. My last flight on EY first class a few weeks ago was amateur hour. I couldnt believe it. Some dude walking around the cabin in a wife beater, some 18 year old kid sipping fine champagne and video chatting to his friend (without earbuds), and then some other undesirables in the cabin. I couldnt believe it! I cant even begin to imagine how bad J or Y was on this flight!!!

We're seeing this already except it's for economy awards US-Europe especially has never been lower or more available in the 2nd half of 2025. I'm also seeing US-Australia premium awards available for the first time in ages.

Agreed. Off late, Ben has been distracted with flying etiquette, fringe airlines (no more Global Airlines stories, please) etc.

Agreed. Today's stories about bed bugs and a lady stumbling off of a plane were particularly low points

At least for United, the bar for "loyal" to get expanded access to seats is so trivially low that it shouldn't factor into consideration of who you fly with much.

I have MileagePlus Silver and haven't taken a revenue flight with United in years as it comes with Bonvoy status. Or you can just have a credit card for it.

It depends on what you want out of status. Not as many domestic F or extra-legroom Y upgrades nowadays but waived fees, access to saver awards, and other perks will be valuable to many elites too, plus long-haul upgrade certificates if you have the highest tier status.

+1

But then one must transfer in MNL & that's a deal breaker.

you must be new here

Yes a follow-up of “where do we go from here” would be useful.

I think it makes strategies needing to be more "personalized" to one's travel habits and future goals. Most advice has been generic and "one size fits all" but that clearly isn't the case now.

Where we go from here is to just paying for J and F. There is no need to be loyal to any airline and, if you do the math, you’ll see that it comes out ahead. Stopped running on the points and status hamster wheel a few years ago and couldn’t be happier with that decision.

Indeed. I've had status with AF/KL for twelve years, and will be Platinum for Life in ten days.
I'm also on my first FB award ticket. In the past, whenever I looked, there was no availability, or 300k one way for business class.
Then Flying Blue started testing more availability for Platinums, and suddenly I can fly.

The other part of the equation is that US credit cards have these piles of transferable points, and so the award seats went to Americans with a low-activity* Flying Blue account who transferred points for a purchase. That's great, but not encouraging loyalty for your primary market.

*Those who create a Flying Blue account and immediately transfer points in usually get a rude surprise.

Yup, ‘credit cards with wings.’ Yet, they still gotta fly (and provide something for those points/miles). That’s the thing, Paul. These programs are nearly completely unregulated. Other than consumers ‘voting with their wallets’ in the aggregate (unlikely to happen), the best hope for ensuring availability is these big banks. If airlines continue to devalue their programs, the banks are the ones that need to call them out, ensure a baseline value is maintained, otherwise, they’re getting screwed as are we.

Regulating points/miles is a great way to nerf the programs. Sweet spots still exist that can be used by those who are paying attention (like us) precisely because a lot of consumers use their points for poor value. Regulate these programs more heavily and they all become Skypesos with a low, fixed or semi-fixed value.
And aside from talking to industry execs when he gets a chance, Ben doesn't have a big enough megaphone to materially change these industries.

@1990, you're right! Ben sometimes writes as he if were an airline executive or interviewing for a top position at an airline. We have to call this getting-worse-every-year shift in award availability for what it is: it sucks 100% and it's almost like false advertising.