Airline points

I had accumulated 8405 aeroplan points before. Assumed there wasn't enough for anything, didn't pay attention, they all expired. But today I actually looked at what these points were worth. Turns out 6000 aeroplan points will get you a $50 gift certificate at a variety of places. Pretty nice actually. Too bad I didn't realise it before. I'll have to pay more attention from now on.

That is, if I can figure out how other things work. Especially the "star alliance" and "one world" things. I think somehow many programs are inter-related... so since I have "asia miles" with cathay, a one-world member, I can collect more "asia miles" on my british airways flight instead of collecting whatever british airways rewards they have... so rather than having a few points with several different ones, you can just collect with a few. But are they worth just as much? Is it a pain in the butt to do? Should I use British airways flights to collect asia miles, or should I use Cathay flights to collect British airways miles, or does it even matter? It seems just messy.

I remember Scott Adams writing about the airlines and their reward programs, and I'm starting to see what he means.

I've got aeroplan miles, asia miles, skymiles, skywards miles, and enrich miles.

Now onto the hotels, I have Hilton HHonours, La Quinta Returns, Marriott Rewards, and Starwood Preferred Guest.

At least for car rentals I only have emerald club.