Last year I called American Airlines to book a flight to Spain, using my AA advantage account; but I cancelled it because they gave me an itinerary with four airports, and I have to spend the night in London and take the next flight in the morning to Barcelona; so I declined. Since than, I never contact the Company. I flood many years with them and other airlines. More the half millions airmails points with them. I don't find very rewarding how they treat me; especially I couldn't get the emails send to me.
Thanks Mike for your feedback
I think you are missing the point of a “Frequent Flyer Loyalty Program”… its for frequent flyers…
Loyalty Programs are a way a company thanks its most loyal customers. If your miles expired Dec-06, it means you have done no business with AA for over 4 ½ years !
Miles are subject to expiration only for those who are no longer bringing business to AA. Any normal flyer, (not necessary a frequent flyer) can hold on to its miles for many many years. The point is that you are not a Frequent Flyer, not even an Occasional Flyer…
Now, IMHO AAdvantage is one of the best loyalty programs. Its full of advantages for its users, you could even never fly and have tons of miles than could be renewed from its expiration date almost for ever. But you should at least be aware if the program and its rules to take advantage of this.
There is even a way to recover your miles; $1700 bucks and you are there!
Programs: AA PLT 1.42 MM, DL GLD, UA Prem, BW Diamond
Posts: 638
Quote:
Originally Posted by marti8
Yeah. I realize that I was negligent. I want to use first the air miles on Aeroplan from Air Canada. I almost lost them too.
Back in my head I heard that they could close your account and archive it; but never loose the right to your air miles in reality. They are your property. Maybe I'm wrong.
Best advise from one tread, to write a nice letter to them, and explain the problems I went through with my hard disk, maybe they are nice and allow me to reopen my account again.
Thanks, I was wrong, it's $100 for 10.000 miles, looks better already. Very useful info.
Felling better. I was a little depressing at first and I didn’t tell my wife yet, afraid that treats me as a stupid.
Marti8
You are wrong they are not your property, read your AAdvantage T&C.
If they were your property you could, "legally", sell them on E-bay etc.
I'd recommend people not reply to the OP, as this was over a year ago!
Someone revived the topic a bit, but I am sure the OP has given up or paid up by now.
Actually, the current OP (see post #23) posted just today. Either this thread was merged with an old one (if so, thanks mods) or the OP searched and found a suitable thread to post to (in that case, thanks kneusel).
__________________ "Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something." Plato
as a reasonable practice american air should have to send policy re: expiration via standard mail, not just email. this applies especially to those of us not signed up for email content or for closed accounts. the june 2007 change in policy was an unreasonably short amount of time esp for those that do not fly american.
there has to a threat of legal action that others have made to have exceptions made. any one know of such a case ?
alternatively, we should mount a grassroots campaign to contact them / take legal action and boycott the airline. any one in ?
Congratulations. On your first post, you managed to regurgitate a thread from over a year ago. If you want help with expired miles, contact AA and see what you can work out. Otherwise, before suing, I suggest you read the terms of the program, which permits AA to change the program.
Just wanted to share my experience RE: expring miles.
My dad's account got inactive and I tried to save it with a Shutterfly purchase of some pictures. Miles didn't post in time and I got:
04/18/08 EXPIRED MILES 0 -9,278 -9,278
I immediately acknowledged defeat and reminded myself to take better care next time.
Then today the miles posted and the expired miles were unexpired:
Programs: HH Diamond, AA Platinum, Delta Silver, Hertz Gold-Five Star
Posts: 223
Quote:
Originally Posted by sjefenole
Just wanted to share my experience RE: expring miles.
My dad's account got inactive and I tried to save it with a Shutterfly purchase of some pictures. Miles didn't post in time and I got:
04/18/08 EXPIRED MILES 0 -9,278 -9,278
I immediately acknowledged defeat and reminded myself to take better care next time.
Then today the miles posted and the expired miles were unexpired:
Programs: AA EXP 1MM, Asiana Club Silver, KE Morning Calm, HH Blue, Hyatt Gold, SPG Gold, Amtrak Select
Posts: 1,562
Quote:
Originally Posted by sjefenole
Just wanted to share my experience RE: expring miles.
Can I ask you a question?
You said you "saved dad's account" by shutterfly via AA eshopping.
Does that mean you went into his account, entered Shutterfly through the eshopping portal and bought some pictures with your credit card and address? I thought it was only possible if the account holder him/herself was the one doing the purchasing
The reason I'm asking is because I have a best friend living abroad who really isn't into miles yet has 30,000 miles due to expire in August.
Pretty simple answer to that question....anyone one can get miles posted to another account eshopping is one of them.
In the case of your friend with the expiring miles just sign him up for Advantage Dining, register one of your own credit cards (you can remove the card after the miles post) to the above account.
Dine at a listed restaurant and pay with the card ......and bingo.
I'll admit to being caught by this inactivity in the last week as well.
I look after a number of family & friends accounts with AA. In ~Oct 06 I found a Bose 100 point offer from FT and kept their accounts active. Two of them (my mother-in-law and Mrs QF WP's best friend in UK) haven't flown since and I've been slack in not looking for additional bonus point offers for them.
I had forgoten about them and happened to check their accounts by chance a couple of days ago. Both of them lost their miles on 14 March As it was my mistake, I've had to come up with the reactivation fee (one had 46K and the other 54K miles ). An excellent lesson for me (always check the AA Forum and AA website to find ways to get points into their accounts). We live and learn.
__________________
Flown 585 sectors totalling 821,765 miles since March 03, 1988 (ba97.com)
Having read most of the posts on this subject and the comments by the moderator, I feel there is one very important point everyone is missing.
The intent of the program in the first place was to woo and reward frequent flyers. Since then it has transformed into a money-making situation for AA through deals with partners and credit cards. It is no longer a pure frequent flyer program.
With this in mind ( regardless of the rules ....which most people don't read and/or understand ) ... YOU PAID A.A. dearly for those miles, either by purchasing flights or using their c.c. or paying their partners. For every one of those transactions, A.A. gets a kickback ( percentage ) thereby making even more money. There should be no such thing as expiring miles.
Miles which the airlines " expire " is nothing short of " STEALING " your money
and there should be a Federal law prohibiting the practice.
Now with the excuse of higher fuel costs and maintenance costs ...... read that as corporate greed and terrible mis-management, start looking for AA and the other ailnes to not only raise prices, but to begin instigating even more stringent rules to avoid paying out on their f.f. programs. It was great for them in the beginning to get new customers, but now it's just a scam, and to think they have the nerve totell you that you should pay them to get back your own miles. The audicity is amazing
That's o.k. if you are the sole flyer in the family, but what about the family members who also have f.f. accounts but don't have individual Citi cards to earn the 500oo miles. Even though the family all sign on the card, the points only go to the card holder........ why is that ?
Programs: AA EXP 1MM, Asiana Club Silver, KE Morning Calm, HH Blue, Hyatt Gold, SPG Gold, Amtrak Select
Posts: 1,562
Quote:
Originally Posted by rioesmarex
Miles which the airlines " expire " is nothing short of " STEALING " your money
and there should be a Federal law prohibiting the practice.
Prime example of looking at the tree without looking at the forest. FFP is a marketing tool and FFP are not the same as banks.
Besides if you ask me, US carriers have one of the most lenient FFPs compared to other countries' carriers.
Take for instance, JAL or ANA which have no expiry extensions like US carriers. You only get to use your miles for three years. Once those three years are up, you kiss your miles collected three years ago good-bye. Trying to book a 50,000 mile award ticket? Expecting that you should have enough because of all the miles that you “saved up” so far? Guess again, because you only have 20,000 miles because the 30,000 miles that you “earned” before 2005 are lost.
In comparison, US carriers are generous enough to extend the expiry date of your miles provided that you have one transaction within every 18 months. Your miles in pre-2005 are never lost as the expiration date gets extended. All one needs to do is dine out once every 18 months (respective rewardsnetwork dining programs) and problem solved!
People didn’t get their miles “stolen,” they chose to let them expire.
It was great for them in the beginning to get new customers, but now it's just a scam, and to think they have the nerve totell you that you should pay them to get back your own miles. The audicity is amazing
Methinks we have a new member who has just lost some miles and needs to vent. Welcome to FT
Prime example of looking at the tree without looking at the forest. FFP is a marketing tool and FFP are not the same as banks.
Besides if you ask me, US carriers have one of the most lenient FFPs compared to other countries' carriers.
Take for instance, JAL or ANA which have no expiry extensions like US carriers. You only get to use your miles for three years. Once those three years are up, you kiss your miles collected three years ago good-bye. Trying to book a 50,000 mile award ticket? Expecting that you should have enough because of all the miles that you “saved up” so far? Guess again, because you only have 20,000 miles because the 30,000 miles that you “earned” before 2005 are lost.
In comparison, US carriers are generous enough to extend the expiry date of your miles provided that you have one transaction within every 18 months. Your miles in pre-2005 are never lost as the expiration date gets extended. All one needs to do is dine out once every 18 months (respective rewardsnetwork dining programs) and problem solved!
People didn’t get their miles “stolen,” they chose to let them expire.
Sorry to disagree with you but you are still missing the point. The airlines set up these programs to entice you to fly with them. You flew because you
" thought " you were getting something in return for your loyalty. You spent YOUR MONEY to buy tickets and earn miles .... NOT THEIRS. You had the choice to fly with any one of a number of airlines but you chose them because you thought they would honor their commitment.
There is no comparison to banks ..... when they expire your miles, they are STEALING your money in the form of free trips that you earned.
Even more so when it is money you spent using their c.cards.
Comparison to other and /or foreign airlines is of no import. Two wrongss don't make a right .... it's still stealing.
). An excellent lesson for me 
(always check the AA Forum and AA website to find ways to get points into their accounts). We live and learn.
