nall

The offer is back:

https://www.aa.com/i18n/aadvantage-p...h-starwood.jsp

AA miles have certainly taken a hit lately, but Starwood will merge into Marriott in the not-distant future, and Starpoints will presumably take a big hit - compare Marriott's transfer rates to Starwood's. So it might make sense for some people.

captaink

For those with an abundance of MR points, this is also an opportunity to convert MR points to AA miles at a slightly less disadvantageous rate (2:1) by passing them through SPG

aaupgrade

I routinely convert MR points to AA using MR Travel Packages, usually when there is a promo. The last time I received 180,000 AA miles for 120,000 MR points with a 50% promo, which is a lot better than this offer IMO.

When they combine programs sometime next year SPG points will convert to MR points somewhere in the neighborhood of 1 SPG point to 2 or 3 MR points; the latter more likely IMO.

Even at 1:1 without the 50% bonus, current SPG points converted to MR points would translate to 1:2 or 1:3 exchange of SPG points for AA miles, which is a lot better than 1:1.25 of this offer. Save your SPG points and cash them in for a MR TP once the programs merge.

BTW, you can't convert MR points to SPG points so there is no way to take advantage of this offer with MR points, nor would any savy MR member do so with the better exchange rates of the TPs available.

nall

This is all very speculative. If I thought the value of the Starwood points would appreciate, I would agree with your course of action. Many of us do not - it's entirely possible the ratio could be 1:1, or Marriott may devalue their currency, given the high premium they had to pay for Starwood.

That poster was referring to Amex Membership Rewards (MR), which are transferrable to SPG, albeit at a bad rate.

MCIUnitedGuy

Yeah, I got quite excited when I read that post. I thought the poster was referring to Marriott points and I'm sitting on an amount that is essentially worthless for Marriott stays but would be a decent amount of AA miles (even at a bad conversion). Spent a few worthless minutes with Google trying to figure out when they started allowing Marriott to Starwood transfers....

nall

At higher amounts of MR, the transfer rates start to become interesting. They do periodically run transfer bonuses for Marriott as well, although the travel packages are sometimes excluded (but that's probably not relevant for you now.)

captaink

Yes. Thank you for clarifying that.

TravelinSperry

I took advantage of the offer today. 40,000 SPG points gets me 60,000 AA miles - which in addition to the 10,000 AA miles in my account is a one way business class flight from US to SE Asia. For me - that's a decent but not great deal. I currently value my Starpoints at 2.7 cents. So it's costing me $1,080 for my biz class flight. Not exceptional - but not horrible.

I have no redemption use for my Starpoints this year and expect a significant devaluation at merger. Although I don't expect this merger of points to occur for 9 months at least so I could've sat still and tried to redeem next summer in Europe (where good redemption opptys occur). Still, I figure a bird in the hand since I'm headed to SE Asia this winter. Who knows what will happen by next summer.

scubadu

Assuming of course, that you can actually find the inventory on AA.

Regards

FlyerBeek

Not to worry... Cathay availability abounds in business!

-FlyerBeek

TravelinSperry

Exactly! I don't expect AA, but Cathay to HKG would be quite amazing in Biz. Worse case I'll use 60k to Japan on JAL and make my way down from there. Either way...

mymilesandpoints

what do you guys use to check Cathay availability for biz class award seats using AA miles? Do they restrict the amount of AA miles that can be used to redeem biz class seats versus their own Cathay members using Cathay points?

FlyerBeek

I search CX availability using my BA Executive Club account. Availability isn't a 100% match to that available to AA, but it's very very close. While AA doesn't actively block CX award inventory, CX does make more space available for their own members (thus why searching for award inventory using my AsiaMiles account isn't particularly helpful if looking to redeem AA miles).

-FlyerBeek

TravelinSperry

I haven't used it specifically for Cathay, but recently used AwardNexus to search for award inventory and liked it a lot.

mymilesandpoints

gotcha. thank you! i always wonder why AA doesn't make it easy for their members to search these award tickets. it seems like if BA can do it, i'm sure AA's systems can handle it too.