Why can’t there be an easier way to track miles?

Why can’t there be an easier way to track miles?

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I’ve been taking advantage of so many promotions lately, which means I’m owed lots of miles and points from loyalty programs. As we know, airlines and hotels love to take our money immediately, but when it comes to them owing us something, they take their sweet time, often well over six weeks. Well, right now I’m owed miles and points from 14 different sources through the various promotions I’ve taken advantage of, down from about 25 last week.

What’s rather frustrating to me is that I keep checking my various mileage/points balances obsessively, probably each a dozen times a day, to see whether the miles and points I’m owed have posted. I wish there were some service that tracked all my mileage balances 24/7 and emailed me the second my balance changes. I don’t even want to guess how much time that would save me.

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  1. Travel Too Much Guest

    Just recently I discovered AwardWallet.com, which I now use religiously. What impresses me most about the website is how many different programs it tracks, and also the ability to track multiple accounts of the same program, making it easy to keep track of the miles of family members.

    https://onemileatatime.com/travel-technology/

  2. Brian Guest

    Pageonce emails me every night while I'm cozy in bed with any postings. Like some of the others mentioned, it also keeps track of credit cards and bank/investment accounts. Unfortunately, I still obsessively check my accounts.

  3. Mark Guest

    another plug for yodlee.com it will track your entire financial/points life.

  4. Scott Guest

    take a look at www.acruw.com. it's a relatively new site that tracks points/miles for all of your travel rewards and even offers guidance on transferring points and calculators about whether to use points or dollars on your next purchase.

  5. Gary Gold

    More to the point though it would sure be nice if a program reconciled against my spreadsheet of miles that I'm owed!

    As it is, I have to see that miles have posted, log in to check the detail, and manually remove outstanding items from the spreadsheet...

  6. Gary Gold

    I use MilePort but they don't update the computer-based version frequently enough. I don't like the online version.

    MileageManager needs to be real-time.

  7. Ben Guest

    There's a loot of web 2.0 applications
    http://www.go2web20.net/#
    but nothing fancy for miles.

    points.com comes to mind

  8. Oliver Guest

    Just force yourself to check only once a week, say, on Saturday morning. That saves you a lot of time, too.

  9. DonDraper Guest

    There is nothing better than a free option that does everything that the $70 version of TripIt Pro does. Meet MileageManager:

    http://www.mileagemanager.com

  10. MechTeach Guest

    I thoroughly second imm2b's recommendation for www.yodlee.com . It's great to have all of my miles, investments, and bank accounts in one place. You can set up filters to only view certain accounts at a time, send alerts, etc.

  11. Ed Blankenship Guest

    I forgot to mention that TripIt Pro's Point Tracker also allows you to see what your next elite level is an how many points, segments, or miles you need to get there. Just click on the program name on the left to get the details. Very handy for doing the math for you.

  12. Ed Blankenship Guest

    I use TripIt Pro as well. It's like Mint.com for frequent flier miles (and hotel/car points too) :)

    Here's a nice blog post about it: http://blog.tripit.com/2009/07/getting-to-know-tripit-pro-point-tracker.html

  13. imm2b Guest

    I use http://www.yodlee.com and it works great for me. You can set email alerts when there's a change in the account. Also, it can alert you when you miles are about to be expired.

  14. Brian Desmond Guest

    TripIt Pro actually has a great interface for this. Ping me offline if you want a screenshot or something.

  15. George Smart Guest

    Surely you know about MilePort. It does all those things you want.

  16. Ed Guest

    I do that too. It's a disorder we have, I guess... :-)

    Even more valuable than what you describe would be a service that tells me when flyertalk readers have identified a new mistake fare from one of my home airports. I know people have tried this (using "pipes" and what not) but I have yet to see something easy to set up and use.

    Does anyone know of something here? (I know some people say to check out farecompare tweets, but that is so full of spam...)

    Ideas?

Featured Comments Most helpful comments ( as chosen by the OMAAT community ).

The comments on this page have not been provided, reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any advertiser, and it is not an advertiser's responsibility to ensure posts and/or questions are answered.

Travel Too Much Guest

Just recently I discovered AwardWallet.com, which I now use religiously. What impresses me most about the website is how many different programs it tracks, and also the ability to track multiple accounts of the same program, making it easy to keep track of the miles of family members. https://onemileatatime.com/travel-technology/

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I love AwardWallet.com! - One Mile at a Time Guest

[...] not much into technology if there’s an otherwise easy way to keep track of things. Last year I posted about my frustration with tracking miles and points. Little did I know there were sites out there [...]

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Brian Guest

Pageonce emails me every night while I'm cozy in bed with any postings. Like some of the others mentioned, it also keeps track of credit cards and bank/investment accounts. Unfortunately, I still obsessively check my accounts.

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