azeckel

I switched companies this summer and the new one requires us to book Avis. I finally used up all my remaining Hertz points and free days from National, so now I'm trying to figure out this Avis program. Very little information is available on their website. I've read several of the longer threads in this forum, but still have a couple of questions.

1.) Does Avis do any sort of status match to Avis First? I have both National Executive Elite and Hertz President's Circle (though I think the latter is due to really poor status level auditing at Hertz). I will finish this year with only 8 rentals but any given year I may have as many as 40+ qualifying rentals. It all just depends on the project

2.) Assuming there is no way to count my 8 rentals from this year towards a free weekend or two, should I go ahead and request miles on those rentals? It looks like I can do it directly from the website...

3.) If selecting points, is there a chart anywhere that shows what you get for each option? I see both Starwood and Delta on the list, and obviously Starwood is a lot more valuable. Is it a dollar-based thing? Or a flat 100 or 500 or something else?

Thanks in advance for your insights.

sdsearch

The information is here:

http://www.avis.com/car-rental/conte...navId=T4M07S00

though it's not in a "chart" format, rather you have to select each partner individually to see what the normal earning is.

Some are flat per-day, and some are flat per rental (regardless of number of days), and some are per-dollar.

The number of miles/points you get is typically fairly low (something like 50 miles or 50 SPG points per day or 2 US miles per $), unless you apply a promo coupon. See this thread for promo coupons:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/avis/...romotions.html

and also look at this website:

http://www.frequentflyerbonuses.com/carbonus.html

Outside of Club Carlson (hotel program), which has been having almost nonstop giant (6000+ point) bonuses almost incessantly for the past couple years (but nothing announced past the end of this year yet that I've heard), the bonuses are not so great lately.

But, for example, the AA 1500 miles bonus mentioned in the promo thread is still a lot better on a 5-day rental than just 250 miles, isn't it? (The 1500 miles will add to the 250 miles, and thus be 1750 miles total.)


As to the first question, you don't earn free wekeends, you earn free weekend days (which often expire all too quickly). And in general, you don't earn them on rentals where you earn miles. And they don't include absolutely all taxes and fees, so they're quite as free as they sound. So those of us who can use the promos and earn good airline miles or hotel points often don't bother even worrying about the free weekend days.

azeckel

Thanks for the detailed response. Neither National or Hertz free days include taxes or surcharges either, so that's not really a deal breaker.

If you assume a full-size rental is about $35/day with our corporate code, I guess the trade-off is in 600 SPG points, for example, versus 1 free weekend day worth $35 (assuming I can use it before it expires). I'll take a look at the promos to see if any fit my travel habits, but I like to follow the adage that awards earned using a service usually generate the best value when redeemed for that same service.

Does anyone know about status match and if past rentals can be applied?

Thanks!

sdsearch

While I generally follow the same adage (for example, SPG points for SPG hotels, not treat it just as an airline card ), I feel there is so little of value in the Avis awards that I just ignore them as if there weren't any.

Even without trying, I occasionally earn Avis awards, but each time I have, they've expired before I had an occasion where it would make sense to use them.

They're only valid for weekends, they often have short expirations, and they often don't work effectively if you try to use them with a longer rental (for example, a 5-day rental and a 7-day rental often price the same, because at 5 days you go to weekly rental, so using free rental day certs for 2 days on a 7 day rental gets you nothing at all, except for making it impossible to use a promo coupon on the same rental).

So to make them work, you have to have one-or-two-day weekend-only rentals often enough that when you get such an award cert you can use it before it expires a few months later.

By the way, you don't need to give up earning airline miles / hotel points to earn your first award when you qualify for Avis First. You just have to give up earning anything else to keep earning them once you're already Avis First.

(The ones I get are because alternate years I tend to drop out of Avis First, then qualify afresh, then drop out, then qualify afresh. I get those even with every single rental earning airline miles or hotel points.)

Try these threads:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/avis/...ch-status.html

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/avis/...t-rentals.html

bkafrick

What my fellow posters have not added, is that Avis First isnt a real loyalty level. Yes, you have to qualify with 10 rentals or something, but its really b.s. You get treated just about as well as every regular renter. You'll have about the same % of upgrades as a Preferred or a non-preferred renter.

The only real levels that AVIS does anything out of the ordinary for you is Presidents Club and Chairmans Club. Both of these are "by-invitation-only" program and is not based on any number of rentals. You could rent 300 days a year, and you won't make these levels.

Anyway. Good luck.