How to retroactively credit flights to your frequent flyer account

We've all been there: You arrive at the airport, take your flight and realize you forgot to add your frequent flyer number to your reservation. Maybe it's your first time flying a new airline, or perhaps someone booked the flight for you. Regardless of the reason, you earned zero points or miles on your flight — or so you think.

Thankfully, you're not totally out of luck. Many major airline loyalty programs let you retroactively claim points or miles for flights. Even better, some let you do this even if you weren't a loyalty member when you flew.

That said, it can be difficult to claim these points or miles. Many airlines couch the process for retroactively crediting deep within their websites. So, in this article, we'll show you how to claim points and miles with major U.S. airline loyalty programs retroactively.

However, first, we'll walk you through some best practices to follow when booking flights. These will ensure that you earn points or miles for your paid flights and give you leverage for requesting credit after the fact.

Sign up for frequent flyer accounts before you travel

We recommend that points and miles newcomers sign up for accounts with all the major U.S. airline and hotel loyalty programs before traveling. Even if you don't have immediate plans to travel, this will make it easier to earn rewards when you eventually do venture out.

Additionally, you can credit flights on alliance partners to these accounts. So, if — for example — you find yourself booked on a Lufthansa flight, you can add your United MileagePlus number to the reservation and earn United Airlines miles on the flight.

On the airline side, you should sign up for accounts with the Big Three (American Airlines, Delta Air Lines and United Airlines) carriers and other major U.S. airlines. Here's a short list:

• American Airlines AAdvantage
• Alaska Airlines Atmos Rewards
• Delta SkyMiles
• JetBlue TrueBlue
• Southwest Rapid Rewards
• United MileagePlus

On the hotel side, we recommend signing up for accounts with Hilton Honors, IHG One Rewards, World of Hyatt and Marriott Bonvoy. There are other major hotel groups, but you're most likely to encounter these four when traveling in the U.S. and abroad.

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Add these account numbers to the Notes app on your phone, and refer to them whenever you book a flight or hotel room. This way, you'll never miss out on valuable points and miles when you travel for work or fun.

Related: These airline and hotel programs offer free points when you sign up

Regularly conduct frequent flyer account audits

We recommend performing a monthly audit on all of your frequent flyer accounts with a balance, even if you didn't earn points or miles in a given month. Doing this will alert you to any potential fraudulent activity, as you can see if points or miles mysteriously disappear from your account. Likewise, it will help you find out if you're missing points or miles from a recent flight or other activity.

Performing a mileage audit is simple. Just log in to each of your accounts and ensure the airline has posted the flights you've taken to your account. Additionally, check that all credit card spending, shopping portal purchases, dining rewards and other rewards you should have earned appear correctly.

If you see that you did not earn points or miles for a flight, follow the instructions for retroactively claiming points or miles later in this article. On the other hand, if points or miles from credit card spending do not appear, you may need to call your bank to ensure it has the correct frequent flyer number attached to your card.

Don't see points or miles in your account right away? Don't worry. Some airlines take at least 24 hours to post points or miles earned from flights to your account, though some are getting much faster.

Additionally, it can take even longer if you're crediting a partner flight from one airline to another (say, crediting a Cathay Pacific flight to American Airlines). However, if you don't see a flight post to your account after a week or so, you should request retroactive credit from the airline.

Related: What to do if you don't get miles for a flight

Save your receipts and boarding passes

Finally, it's in your best interest to save all your boarding passes, electronic tickets and receipts until the flight posts to your frequent flyer account. You'll need information from these documents if you request retroactive flight credit later down the line.

Digital boarding passes make this easy. Just save them to your phone's wallet app, and they won't disappear after the flight. You'll also want to save email confirmations with ticket numbers, as you'll often need this information for crediting points or miles after a flight.

Related: How to credit miles to a partner airline program

Retroactive credit policies for US airlines

Now let's move on to actually requesting retroactive credit for your past flights with U.S. airlines.

Each airline has a different policy around this. For example, some airlines require that you claim credit within a set period of time after taking a flight. Others require that your account be open for a specific amount of time before you fly, making our earlier point about creating accounts ahead of time important.

Here are the specifics for retroactively requesting points or miles from the major U.S. airline loyalty programs. In each section, we've included a link to the corresponding policy, how to request credit and other important details to bear in mind.

Alaska Airlines Atmos Rewards

Alaska Airlines and Hawaiian Airlines' joint loyalty program — Atmos Rewards — has one of the most restrictive retroactive credit policies. First, you must be a member at the time of travel to request flight credit.

To request flight credit, go to this page on Alaska's website, fill out your information and upload a copy of your boarding pass and ticket receipt. If you're requesting credit for a partner-operated flight, use the form on this page to claim points.

Here's what you need to know:

• When to submit: You must submit your request at least seven days after the Alaska Airlines or Hawaiian Airlines flight date or after 14 days for partner flights.
• Deadline for submission: Within 12 months of travel.
• Need to be a member at the time of travel?: Yes.

American Airlines AAdvantage

American Airlines AAdvantage members have a little more leniency when requesting retroactive flight credit. For flights on American Airlines itself, as well as most partner flights, you must enter your ticket number and your AAdvantage number on American's flight credit request site. You can request credit for flights even if you're not a member, but you must have flown within 30 days of your enrollment date.

Review the individual carrier's page if you're missing miles from a partner flight, as you may not be able to request some information online.

Here are the details:

• When to submit: You must submit your request at least three days after the flight date for American Airlines-operated flights or after 15 days for partner flights.
• Deadline for submission: Within 12 months of travel.
• Need to be a member at the time of travel?: No, but flights more than 30 days before your enrollment date are not eligible for mileage credit.

Delta SkyMiles

Like American Airlines, Delta makes it easy to request mileage credit for past flights using an online form. Of all the carriers, Delta has one of the more lenient policies regarding flights taken before enrolling. You can claim flights so long as your account was created within nine months of flying.

To request flight credit, log into your Delta SkyMiles account and click your name at the upper-right-hand side of the screen. Then, click "My SkyMiles" from the drop-down menu.

Click the "Request Mileage Credit" link on the left-hand side of the screen. You'll be redirected to a form where you can start the process of claiming your missing miles.

When claiming miles with Delta, make sure you follow these guidelines:

• When to submit: You must submit your request at least seven days after the flight date.
• Deadline for submission: Within nine months of the flight date.
• Need to be a member at the time of travel?: No, but the same nine-month submission window applies.

If you don't have your ticket number, fill out the "All Other Miles Requests" form on the same page where you'd otherwise request mileage credit. You'll need to provide additional details regarding your flight. You can also use this form to request mileage credit with other Delta partners like Starbucks.

Related: How to claim your missing Delta SkyMiles

JetBlue TrueBlue

JetBlue is another airline with a relaxed policy for retroactively requesting mileage credit. To claim mileage credit, log in to your JetBlue account and fill out the "Request Points" form. You can use this form to claim points from flights operated by JetBlue and its partner airlines.

Here are the criteria for these requests:

• When to submit: You must submit your request at least 14 days after the flight.
• Deadline for submission: Within 12 months of travel.
• Need to be a member at the time of travel?: This is not specified in the terms and conditions, so you should be able to request credit for all flights within the last year, even if you weren't a member at the time of travel.

Southwest Rapid Rewards

Southwest also has a great retroactive flight credit policy. To request credit, log in to your Southwest Rapid Rewards account and go to the "My Account" screen. Then, click the "Rapid Rewards" option in the blue banner at the top of the screen.

Look underneath the "Summary" box in the middle of the screen, then click the "Request past points" button. You can now enter your flight's confirmation number, and the points will be added to your Rapid Rewards account.

That said, your points request must meet these requirements:

• When to submit: You must submit your request at least 48 hours after the flight.
• Deadline for submission: Within 12 months of travel.
• Need to be a member at the time of travel?: No.

United MileagePlus

Finally, we have United MileagePlus. To request missing United miles, find your ticket number for your flight and sign in to your United account. Then, head to this page and enter your ticket number at the bottom of the screen. If the ticket number is valid in United's system, the airline will credit the miles due to your MileagePlus account.

Here's what to know when retroactively claiming United miles:

• When to submit: You must submit your request at least five days after the flight for United or United Express flights, seven days after the flight for most partner airlines and 14 days after a flight operated by Virgin Australia.
• Deadline for submission: Within 12 months of your flight date.
• Need to be a member at the time of travel?: New members can request credit for United-operated flights taken up to six months before their enrollment date.

Bottom line

There are several reasons why you may need to request flight credit retroactively. If you were new to points and miles, you might not have even belonged to a given frequent flyer program at the time of travel. Likewise, you may have booked a partner ticket and simply forgotten to add your frequent flyer number at the time of booking.

Fortunately, most U.S. airlines make it simple to request missing points or miles — and, in some cases, you might be able to request points or miles even if you weren't a member when you flew.

Make sure to always keep copies of your boarding passes and receipts so you can claim points or miles if they don't credit to your account automatically. Likewise, audit your loyalty accounts regularly to ensure you're not missing points and miles that you've worked hard to earn.