Introduction
SkyMiles is Delta’s frequent flyer program that allows members to earn miles when flying with Delta and its partners. SkyMiles members can use their miles to book award flights and upgrade seats. A common question is whether it’s possible to let someone else use your SkyMiles number when booking a flight. This article will examine if and how SkyMiles numbers can be shared.
Can You Let Someone Else Use Your SkyMiles Number?
The short answer is no, Delta does not allow SkyMiles members to let other people use their account to book award flights. According to Delta’s terms and conditions, SkyMiles accounts, membership cards, and mileage credit are non-transferable. Delta reserves the right to cancel any reservations made using miles from someone else’s account.
While you can’t directly let someone use your SkyMiles number, there are some legal ways to share miles with others. These include:
- Gifting miles – You can transfer miles to another SkyMiles member as a gift. There is a fee for gifting miles.
- Pooling miles – Up to 8 SkyMiles members, including the primary account holder, can pool their miles together into one account. This allows the group to redeem awards using the shared balance.
- Family pooling – Household members like spouses, domestic partners, children under 25, parents, and grandparents can pool miles together.
- Donating miles – You can donate miles to certain charities through Delta’s SkyWish program.
So in summary, while you can’t simply share your SkyMiles number with others to book flights, there are ways to legally transfer or pool miles with friends and family. Attempting to book travel under someone else’s name and SkyMiles number violates Delta’s rules.
What Name Needs to Match the SkyMiles Account?
When booking an award flight using SkyMiles, the name on the reservation must match the name on the SkyMiles account. Specifically, Delta requires the first name, last name, and date of birth to match exactly.
If there is any discrepancy between the name on the SkyMiles account and reservation, Delta may cancel the booking. This is to prevent situations where someone attempts to inappropriately use miles from an account that is not their own.
For example, if your SkyMiles account name is “John Smith” with a date of birth of 1/1/1980, any reservations booked with miles must have the exact same passenger name and birthdate. Nicknames like “Johnny” or different birth years would not be allowed.
Delta does make a few exceptions:
- Middle names – Your middle name does not need to be an exact match on reservations.
- Suffixes – Omitting a suffix like Jr, Sr, etc. is allowed.
- Spelling differences – Minor spelling differences are accepted.
But in general, Delta wants to see your first name, last name, and birthdate match exactly between your SkyMiles profile and any booking made with miles. This strict name policy helps Delta enforce the rule against transferring miles from one account to book flights for someone else.
Can Family Members Use SkyMiles for Each Other?
Within a family, there are a couple ways SkyMiles members can redemption flights for each other without violating Delta’s rules:
- Pooling miles – As mentioned earlier, SkyMiles supports household mileage pooling between spouses, domestic partners, children under 25, parents, and grandparents. Pooling combines miles into one shared account balance, which any member of the pool can then use to book award flights.
- Gifting miles – While you can’t directly book flights for family with your own miles, you can gift miles to their SkyMiles account. The recipient can then redeem the gifted miles for award flights under their own name.
Those are the compliant ways for family members to gain access to each others’ miles within SkyMiles. Attempting to book a flight for your spouse, child, or other family using your own miles and SkyMiles number would still be prohibited, even if you share the same address.
What About Booking Flights for Friends?
Booking award flights for friends with your SkyMiles account is strictly against Delta’s rules. Since friends are not immediate family members, you cannot pool miles with their accounts. And gifted miles still must be used for flights under their own name, not yours.
Some ways you could potentially get in trouble include:
- – Booking an award flight for your friend under your name with the plan to change the name later. Delta monitors changes like name corrections and is wise to this method of getting around the rules.
- – Having your friend book a flight under your name and miles, even if you supplied them with your SkyMiles login information. This reservation would likely get flagged and canceled when your friend shows up for the flight instead of you.
- – Transferring miles between individual accounts or attempting to combine balances. Delta does not allow direct member-to-member transfers.
While the motivation to help out a friend by using your miles is understandable, it violates Delta’s SkyMiles terms and could potentially get both accounts shut down. The only compliant options are gifting miles or having your friend earn their own miles for award travel.
How Does Delta Prevent SkyMiles Misuse?
Delta employs a number of measures to prevent the misuse and fraudulent transfer of SkyMiles accounts:
- Strict name matching – As discussed earlier, Delta requires an exact name/birthdate match between the passenger booked on an award ticket and the owner of the SkyMiles account.
- ID or passport checks – Delta gate agents or ticket counter staff may ask for a passenger’s ID and cross-reference that the name/birthdate matches the reservation.
- Account audits – Delta routinely reviews SkyMiles accounts for suspicious patterns like awards booked for non-members or under different names.
- Non-transferable miles – The basic non-transferability of miles prevents bulk account sales or transfers.
- IT system checks – Delta’s booking systems likely have fraud monitoring capabilities to flag high-risk reservations.
Attempting to skirt the rules often ends up getting flagged during the many identity checks throughout the booking and check-in process. Delta also reserves the right to cancel any suspicious award bookings even after tickets have been issued.
The bottom line is Delta has significant measures in place to restrict SkyMiles account sharing and catch questionable bookings in violation of its terms.
What Are the Risks of Letting Someone Else Use Your SkyMiles?
While it may seem tempting to bend the rules and let someone redeem your SkyMiles, there are significant risks to be aware of:
- Reservation cancellation – Delta may cancel any award reservations found to have been booked fraudulently under someone else’s miles and account.
- Forfeiture of miles – Delta can revoke the miles used for the fraudulent booking. In egregious cases, they may even claw back additional miles or forfeit the entire account balance.
- Account shutdown – Violating the SkyMiles terms can get your account closed entirely. This could result in the loss of any remaining miles in the account.
- Difficulty reopening account – Delta may ban you from reopening a SkyMiles account after closure for misuse.
- Legal action – Delta could theoretically take legal action for SkyMiles fraud depending on severity.
The potential account closures, mile forfeitures, and travel disruptions make it simply not worth attempting to bypass the SkyMiles rules. And those repercussions are aside from the ethical considerations of violating Delta’s terms of service.
Special Exceptions Where Delta Allows SkyMiles Transfers
Delta does make a few narrow exceptions where SkyMiles transfers or mileage donations are allowed:
- Mileage donations to charity – You can donate miles to participating nonprofits through Delta’s SkyWish program.
- Mileage transfers due to death – Delta allows a one-time transfer of miles to an account holder’s spouse if they become deceased.
- Hotel or car programs – Some hotel and rental car partners allow transferring points/miles to Delta SkyMiles.
- Purchased mileage transfers – Delta allows one-way mileage transfers to SkyMiles from certain non-airline partners like American Express (with transfer fees).
But those are narrow exceptions governed by specific rules and conditions. The normal prohibition on directly sharing or transferring miles between SkyMiles members remains.
Could Delta Ever Relax the Rules on SkyMiles Transfers?
Delta currently maintains strict rules against transferring SkyMiles and booking flights for anyone else for a couple key reasons:
- Prevent abuse – Limits on sharing prevent rampant account selling/sharing that could devalue the loyalty program.
- Business priorities – Delta wants to encourage members to earn miles by flying with Delta, not third-party transfers.
- Liability – Booking under the wrong name raises security and liability issues if something goes wrong.
However, some airline programs like United MileagePlus do allow transferring miles freely between household members. And back in 2010, Delta briefly tested allowing SkyMiles transfers before ending the trial.
So there seems to be some acknowledgement that mileage sharing with close family could make sense. But for now, Delta appears committed to restricting transfers and keeping close tabs on SkyMiles account use.
While they may eventually revisit their stance someday, it does not seem a policy change is imminent. Delta seems unlikely to loosen restrictions significantly in the near future barring a major shift in loyalty program competitive dynamics.
The Bottom Line
To summarize the key points:
- Booking flights for someone else with your miles violates Delta’s SkyMiles rules.
- The name on the reservation must match the account holder’s name.
- Pooling and gifting miles are the only compliant ways to book awards for family.
- Friends cannot use your SkyMiles miles or number for flights.
- Delta has methods to monitor and identify misuse.
- Getting caught could result in forfeited miles, account shutdown, and cancelled reservations.
- The only exceptions are charity donations and death transfers.
- Policy changes to allow transfers seem unlikely in the near term.
Rather than attempting to break the rules, the best approach is to stick to booking flights under your own name and miles or use mileage gifting/pooling if you want to enable family to redeem awards. Following Delta’s terms ensures you stay in good standing in SkyMiles and can continue enjoying the program’s benefits and flight awards.