They increased my favourite mini-RTW by about 40%, but I was unsurprised that it is finally getting enhanced. For a while I really just thought they didn't know.

Although those points I accidentally threw over to AP this summer (VDBd up from bargain basement 50% fare into 125% fare + cash) now go not as far. Oh well.

Maybe the Asian carriers (OZ, TG, SQ, NH etc.) complained that too many of their own passengers were accruing points on AC as opposed to their own programs? Perhaps this is a move to discourage Asia based flyers from accumulating points on AC?

I suppose if one is used to being robbed, after a while, it doesn't feel so bad:





Aeroplan charges 60,000 miles + $900 CAD for a return redemption North America-Europe-North America on LH. Assuming each mile is worth $0.02 CAD, that's another 45,000 miles you have to pay in the form of cash co-pay for a total of 105,000 miles. While you may remember the 60K miles level has not changed since as far as you can remember, surely, you can also recall there was no $900 worth of co-pay either back then. The effective mileage cost of such a trip is in fact 105,000 miles even though the base cost didn't change.

Likewise, I posted Iberia Plus redemption as a point of comparison. Iberia Plus and British Airways Executive Club share the Avios program, their equivalent of Aeroplan for which you can transfer your BA miles to IB, one to one. As you know, Canadians have a number of ways of earning BA miles, namely though RBC's Avion Card or the BA co-brand Visa, or through HSBC, or AMEX Rewards or SPG. Essentially, you can earn those Iberia Plus miles simply using your Canadian based BA credit cards, then transfer them 1 to 1 to Iberia without any fee or surcharge and the transfer is instantaneous. More importantly, Iberia does not charge any fuel surcharge on its own metal regardless of your elite status. While my screenshot is in Spanish, they have an English website which you can use to redeem your points, so don't be afraid if you can't read Spanish. So the cost comes to 22,000 miles + $185 USD, which is about 22,000 miles + $240 CAD. Using the same formula, $245 CAD is really worth 12,000 miles most of which is actual taxes that you have to pay anyway. The effective cost of the award is 34,000 miles roundtrip vs. 105,000 miles with Aeroplan.

In a nutshell, even in Y, you are paying more than triple of what would have cost you in miles vs. another frequent flyer program readily available in Canada via numerous other credit cards via RBC, HSBC or AMEX. Not to mention, BA often runs bonus promotions for points transfers from these banks, sometimes up to 50%.

The bottom line is Aeroplan can afford to make these changes by killing the sweet spots of the award chart because it knows the sheep won't do anything about it. They also use backdoor ways to increase the effective award cost without changing the number of miles required in other instances, like return trip to Europe in Y.

Europe 1 to Asia 2 at 105? I thought that was pretty good before the Aeroplan MPM changes

Please explain.
HSBC is my primary financial institution but I've never looked seriously at any of their credit card products.

IMHO Asia 1 - Asia 1 devaluation was just a matter of time.
It was too good to be true.

Personally I'm more disappointed in NA - Europe 1 J going up by 20K.
If it went up by 10K then maybe it was alright, but 20K is a bit too steep.

Come on Aeroplan, show us you can revert devaluation announcements.

I believe HSBC transfers to BA, CX, and SQ. SQ :P

They mentioned a new android app, anybody been able to find it? Is it as brutal as the last one?

Searching Aeroplan in the play store, it's currently maybe 10 apps down the list for me. Will go up as more people search for it and download it

One way to avoid the increase is to travel in Y, and on non-YQ carriers if possible

Aeroplan is so hooked on collecting money for cheap miles from Credit Card companies, that they have no choice but to inflate rewards. We are paying the price. What AC needs to do, and do so quickly, (indeed I think other airlines as well), is to give proper award charts for Airline earned mileage points, without co-pay.

so glad I burned all of my AP miles in June on a last minute flight from NCE-YYZ for 30K , no more AP credit cards for me unless they give me a 20-30% bonus sign up.

WAIT. Full stop.

Which one? I can't seem to find this. I've been a Premier customer with HSBC for years and I've never been told about this. Please elaborate - thank you.

It could have been worse, there could be either blocking or inflating reward costs for peak season. That would have hurt.

I was going to say "I haven't received any notice", but it came in while I was distracted away from this thread.

I don't think it's the NUMBER of miles, but the PRICE.

If the airline wants $400 for a NA-Europe1 flight in J, and you're selling miles at 0.8 cents each, you're losing money.

If they charged their partners more for the miles, they wouldn't need to do this. Their desired profit seems pretty obvious looking at the value of gift cards and toasters. They want the same thing on flights.

As for the new Android app, I'm disappointed they don't have Google login But other than that, it's actually quite nice. There are a few things I'd change (the app icon being the most obvious), but it seems to do its job fairly well. I may have to retire my app (or at least the Aeroplan component).