Many local shoppers are relieved that Air Miles acquired before 2012 are no longer set to expire on January 1st, 2017.

In 2011 Air Miles announced that on January 1st, 2017 any unused Air Miles that were acquired before 2012 would expire, however on December 1st of this year Air Miles announced the expiration policy was being cancelled and unused Air Miles would remain.

Local Sobeys Shopper Gwenda Olson says before it was announced that the expiration policy was being cancelled they were planning a trip to use up their Air Miles.

"When we heard that they were going to be cancelling the Air Miles we started looking into flights to get them spent before the end of December. We happened to postpone our purchase of the flight long enough, they cancelled the program, and we get to hang on to them."

Olson says her parents were not as lucky and purchased flights before the expiration policy was cancelled. She notes luckily it was a trip they were hoping to do anyway.

Local Shopper Sheryl Termeer says she did cash out before the deadline, but it doesn't bother her.

"I had just over 7,000 Air Miles and cashed them in and purchased a radio/CD player. That worked fine for me since I wasn't using my Air Miles to travel or anything like that, so the push to change them up was good for me."

Termeer says she has now changed her Air Miles card to a cash card so that she can use them on groceries every time she goes shopping.