Orphaned points can be the bane of your miles collecting, or they can be a way to get an incredible multiple on future spending. The basic reasoning is that orphaned miles are worthless, but they might be close to something worthwhile.

Here's an example. I currently have 7,640 Virgin Atlantic miles. Those miles might go orphaned. But I still have my Virgin Atlantic credit card for the next few months that earns me one mile per dollar.

Tropicana Las Vegas Rebranded as a DoubleTree hotel

According to this thread on FlyerTalk and this article in USA Today, the Tropicana Las Vegas is being rebranded as a DoubleTree hotel. This change finally allows Hilton HHonors members the ability to earn and redeem points while staying on the Las Vegas Strip. Previously, the only Hilton options were the Hilton Grand Vacation Suites and the Grand Vacation Suites at the Flamingo.

Update: Oops, the normal Hilton card gives only Silver status. Thanks for the correction. The offers in this article are expired.

Here are some of the day's hot topics being discussed on the message boards at FlyerTalk and milepoint.

50,000-60,000 HHonors Point Sign up Bonuses with American Express HHonors cards

A poster in this FlyerTalk thread has come across big-number sign up bonuses for the two different American Express Hilton credit cards.

This is another post in my Anatomy of an Award series, in which I take a real award I’ve booked and break it down step-by-step to elucidate the award booking process. If you have a real award you’d like to write up in a similar post, please contact me, and you can write a guest post.

Yesterday, I talked about transferring 10,000 Hawaiian Miles to 20,000 Hilton points.

Hawaiian Airlines Miles transfer to Hilton points at a ratio of one Hawaiian Miles to two Hilton points. This is the same ratio as Virgin Atlantic miles transfer to Hilton points.

While I recommended transferring Virgin Atlantic miles to Hilton points--I personally transferred 45,000 Virgin Atlantic Miles to Hilton points last month--because of the huge fuel surcharges imposed on Virgin Atlantic awards, I don't generally recommend transferring Hawaiian Miles.

Hawaiian Miles are valuable because Hawaiian releases incredible amounts of award space on its flights and flies to more mainland destinations from Hawaii than any other carrier.

Hey there, you're reading an outdated post! The updated series from April 2015 can be found here.

Hey there, you're reading an outdated post! The updated series from April 2015 can be found here.

This is the second post in a monthlong series. Each post will take about two minutes to read and may include an action item that takes the reader another two minutes to complete.

Fact: I check eight frequent flier blogs daily. (Just dropped a ninth...)

One of those eight is Mileage Saver by Paul Walia. I love it because his posts take, on average, 10 seconds to read, and he covers all the easy ways to earn miles. The other day, he had a post on how to earn 400,000 Hilton Points in Five Steps.

Some of the cards mentioned in his post are Hilton cards, but some just feature miles that can be transferred to Hilton points.