Whose Air Miles Are They?

Prepared by M.L. MacInnis and D.T. Carter

Safe Harbour is a national charitable organization that offers shelter for battered women in several cities. Throughout the year, the organization sends representatives to conferences with other charities to share fund-raising and public service strategies. Roger Dean, CA, a full-time employee of Safe Harbour, has often acted as the organization’s representative. Typically, Dean arranges for his own travel and accommodations with the understanding that he will be reimbursed for any expenses. Due to their larger seats, Dean’s airline of choice is Best-Bet Airways. Over time, he accumulated enough air miles with Best-Bet so that he and his wife could fly anywhere in the world. Dean never questioned whether the air miles were rightfully his; he reasoned that they were issued in his name and were rewarding his loyalty to the airline, not Safe Harbour’s. The organization does not have a clear policy on air miles and has not dealt with a similar predicament before.

Safe Harbour learned of the air miles upon Dean’s return from an Australian vacation. As he was showing his photos to a co-worker, Dean mentioned that his air miles covered the two-thousand dollar flight. The co-worker, aware that virtually all of Dean’s flying was business-related, promptly notified Safe Harbour’s chief financial officer, Linda Squire, CA, of the situation.

What should Linda Squire do?

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