In these Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ), you can find responses to many questions we receive on a daily basis. It is likely that your question is answered here.
It is important to mention that because the Miles4Migrants team is not working “on the ground,” we depend on a global network of partner organizations to identify and vet individuals in need of assistance.We cannot assist individuals directly. Only flight requests that come to us via our partner organizations are processed.
See more in the questions and their responses below:
To donate miles/points or cash, please head to miles4migrants.org/donate. If the type of points that you would like to donate is not listed on our website, that means that we do not currently accept it.
Can my donation go to help people from specific countries?
All points and miles we receive are used to support migrants around the world, not one specific location. However, if you donate to a specific campaign or program, those donations will go towards those efforts.
We accept points and miles from many major loyalty programs, airline, and credit card programs. Miles4Migrants partners directly with the following loyalty programs so you can transfer your miles directly into Miles4Migrants pooled accounts:
- United Airlines MileagePlus
- Air Canada Aeroplan
- Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan
- JetBlue TrueBlue
- Air France – KLM Flying Blue
Other commonly donated miles/points:
- Southwest Rapid Rewards
- Delta SkyMiles
Lufthansa Miles and More - American Express Membership Rewards
- Chase Ultimate Rewards
- Capital One Miles
- Citi ThankYou Points
Yes you can. We have pooled accounts with:
- United
- Alaska
- Flying Blue (Air France/KLM)
- Aeroplan (Air Canada)
- JetBlue
If you pledged miles to one of our pooled account partners…
You will receive instructions about how to transfer your miles to M4M’s pooled charitable account when you make your pledge on our website. Please check your spam folder if you do not see an email. Once you’ve successfully made the transfer, you’re done!
If you pledged points or miles from another program…
Someone from our team will contact you about the next steps. Your pledge will then be in our queue, allowing the flight booking team to match it with an incoming travel request. Our flight booking team finds the best award flight options, and then matches the flight with a corresponding donation.
We do accept cash check donations. For cash, please head to miles4migrants.org/donate to make a one-time or recurring donation. Cash donations help us cover the taxes and fees associated each bookings or the cost of a ticket that cannot be purchased with miles. Checks can be mailed to 3629 Laurel St. New Orleans LA 70115. Please provide us with your full name and email address so we can send you the receipt.
All contributions to Miles4Migrants are used solely to help refugees, asylees, and asylum-seekers. No funding or contributions are used to cover any personal costs of staff or volunteers, and under no circ*mstance is any donated money used for political activism or lobbying.
Miles that are donated to Miles4Migrants are not considered tax-deductible. Miles4Migrants is registered as a nonprofit 501(c)(3) charity, and monetary donations may be tax deductible. For further information, consult IRS Publication 526 and/or your personal tax advisor.
For each flight reservation made, Miles4Migrants determines the lowest cost reasonable itinerary for the number of people requested on the day that we scheduled a flight. We define “reasonable itinerary” as one layover or fewer and exclude low cost carriers because these flights often charge additional fees. We do not use the cost of the exact flight we have booked with points because it would often lead to an inflated cash value since cash prices do not always directly correlate with the award flight cost in miles.
For example, if we received a flight request to fly two passengers from San Antonio to Philadelphia, and we booked those tickets using United Airlines miles, it may cost 30,000 miles and $11.20 in fees. Then we’d find the find the lowest cash cost one stop flight from SAT-PHL. If the lowest cost option was a $400 Delta flight, we would record the cash value as $800 ($400 x 2), even if the particular United flight reservation we made cost $900 per ticket, since in any realistic situation where someone had to pay cash, they would purchase the $400 flight, not that particular $900 flight.
