If you’ve spent time poking around the FlyerTalk forums or reading frequent flyer blogs, you may have seen the term “mileage” pop up from time to time. No, this is not an opportunity for travelers to engage in any physical activity on a long trip (unless you count the door-to-door walk). Instead, a mileage race is a very low-cost ticket that a frequent traveler books with the sole intention of earning miles or reaching the next elite level at the end of a calendar year.
When airlines mistakenly post super cheap fares or discount their tickets between unpopular city pairs, frequent fliers have the opportunity to earn a large number of miles without spending a lot of cash. These fees are generally lower than what an airline charges for miles purchased, and they also count toward elite status. If it all sounds crazy, it’s because it is. Many travelers book trips that don’t even have them out of the airport, and the most extreme travelers opt for multi-day international itineraries that would not be pleasant to fly even if they had plans at their destination.
Other more rational travelers book additional trips at the end of the year, taking vacations they might not otherwise have to reach the next elite level of the airline or hotel. If you’re Gold and you only need a few thousand miles or another two nights to reach Platinum status, for example, it might make sense to book another trip to reach that level, especially if you anticipate a lot of trips in the next calendar year. These trips may or may not be to destinations that you or your family want to visit (weekend fares to Alaska are cheap in February because leisure travelers normally wouldn’t want to travel there), but if you’re flying somewhere you’ve never been , it might be worth running a mile on your own.
However, more often than not, mileage brokers travel alone and on a single weekend day, so they can save vacation days for actual vacations. A popular route is New York to San Francisco or Los Angeles, where flights can be very competitively priced, especially when an airline is making a sale (and competitors choose to match the low fare). Passengers can accumulate many miles in a single day, and they can fly from one place to another without having to keep an eye on it (although a night on a plane is not unheard of during a mile race).
Elite members can even get a free upgrade, which makes the experience a bit more enjoyable, especially if you have some reading or movies to catch up on.
When it comes to mileage runs, frequent fliers often calculate the cost of each mile traveled. Let’s say you are paying $ 250 for a cross country ticket that would earn you 5,000 miles roundtrip. That reservation would cost you five cents a mile, making it a decent offer, especially if you are earning a bonus. However, if a frequent traveler is traveling just to earn redeemable miles, with no plans to earn elite status at the end of the year, the rate would need to be much lower to make sense as a mile race. Twitter is a great resource when researching deals, with sites like TheFlightDeal often posting discounted rates many times a day.
