Can you imagine the shock when a year after you ordered a magazine via AAdvantage, costing 500 miles and a nominal $2 extra charge for the particular selection, you find a charge for $49 on the credit card used a year ago when ordering the initial subscription ... having no idea that the charge was in fact associated at all with that initial order since the vendor listed on the statement has no reference to AAdvantage or American Airlines. After lots of snooping, I discovered the ugly truth which should be a warning for anyone using the Magazine for Miles Program.

I recently had several exchanges with AAdvantage Customer Service regarding what I discovered to be recurring annual billings from their partner SYNAPSE who utilize non-transparent / difficult to discern language in the Magazine for Miles (MOM) ordering process on the AAdvantage MOM website -- actually more likely the SYNAPSE website which is not revealed so that you think you are still logged into the AAdvantage website -- to set you up unwittingly for annual subscription renewals at newsstand + prices. In my case, I had to pay $2 in addition to using 500 miles in order to get 10 issues (one year) of Atlantic Magazine. Somewhere in the fine print (AAdvantage Customer Service claimed that there is a reference to "annual renewal features" in the order entry form that is supposed to be understood by the unwitting member to mean that you are authorizing not only a $2 charge for the initial subscription but a much larger 'recurring' charge, in this case $49, as well. I was unable to reach anyone live when I called the 800 number on the credit card statement in 2012 to find out what the source of the $49 charge was. This year, after having my credit card company reverse the charge, I did manage by some miracle to break out of the 3 allowable subjects to select from and reach a real person, located in Costa Rica, who was unhelpful and not very forthcoming. She did however identify after some prodding the name of her employer, which she said was SYNAPSE, which she admitted was a partner of American Airlines. I have been unable through them or via AAdvantage to get any assurance that this annual cycle has been broken, so I will either need to cancel my credit card or watch it closely every month going forward. This approach at the very least can be characterized as misleading, but it is essentially unethical and an unfortunate insight into the kinds of partners and practices that the AAdvantage Program has elected to associate and align with which, as a stockholder, makes me a bit nervous.