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The Chicago Seminars is the oldest and best conference of frequent flyer miles enthusiasts. This year it is again being held near O’Hare Airport at the Holiday Inn Elk Grove from October 14 – 16 and again features a great line up of speakers, including:

I’d make a special effort to see Drew, Tiffany, Daraius, and Stefan.

Scott and Daraius (Million Mile Secrets)
Me and Daraius (Million Mile Secrets) at Chicago Seminars 2012

I’ll speak twice on Saturday.

At 9:45 AM: AA Live Booking (Scott / MileValue) – A step-by-step live demonstration of a booking using American Airlines miles. Using an example routing, I will look at the award chart to find the price, consult the award rules to determine valid routings, find the useful partners, search for award space on the appropriate search engines (using advanced searching techniques when necessary), and call American Airlines to put the award on hold (if technologically feasible.)

At 2:30 PM: Award Chart Sweet Spots (Scott / MileValue) – Whether you dream of a huge, round-the-world trip or just want to find the best use for each of your mileage balances, you need to know the sweet spots on each miles’ award charts. This presentation will cover some sweet spots with United, American, Delta, Alaska, Singapore, Korean, Flying Blue and many more miles. Plus there will be example itineraries that string together several miles’ sweet spots into amazing trips.

And I’ll be around all weekend to swap travel stories, meet readers, and learn some things myself. The whole seminars have an informal air, and if you go, you are almost certain to meet anyone you’d like to meet and can probably grab dinner with them too on Saturday night when big groups go to local restaurants.

The event costs only $105, and tickets remain. If you’ve never been to a frequent flyer miles conference, I recommend you go to this one.

If you have any questions, leave them in the comments.

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