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I have a trip scheduled for Monday and this damn hurricane is possibly going to cost me 16,000 miles or so ;)
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Originally Posted by seawolf
(Post 16991873)
....Lifetime AA status doesn't mean your lifetime. It's referring to the lifetime of the AAdvantage program. There's no guarantee that it will survive an acquisition or bankruptcy years down the road. Just ask the "lifetime" TWA club members what happened to their lounge memberships after AA acquired them.
Which reminds me of a famous story: "Your life or mine?" Quote by baseball Hall of Famer Whitey Herzog, after being offered a lifetime contract to manage by 80-year-old Cardinals owner Gussie Busch |
Originally Posted by sent
(Post 16990223)
Add me to the list of no longer needing to keep my AA Amex, Business Visa, and husband's Amex when our renewals come up pretty soon (although I think his fee is waived as CitiGold?). All of our spending will go to our respective SPG cards now. I like the Capital One Venture Card so I will look into getting the business version of that to replace my AA Business Visa.
Credit cards aside, I don't really know why we need to stick with AA as our carrier when we pay for all of our tickets. The unpublished program was what kept me around. AA hasn't been the most direct route to Europe out of NYC for our last 4 trips (AMS, FCO - off season, HER, MUC). We don't really enjoy flying an AA codeshare on IB and having to transfer in MAD but put up with it for the possibility of LT. Come to think of it, I flew JFK-MIA-SJO to stick with AA while my friends arrived on a direct flight from EWR. Next time, I'll just join them over in Jersey without any guilt. On the plus side, I will start looking to spend our collected 800k miles on some award trips over the next few years. And I don't have to worry about using that shopping portal so much anymore. |
Work it!
Originally Posted by mosquito
(Post 16991692)
I'm still 500k miles away from the 1MM mark. :(
Think it's time for me to turn in the credit card and shift into neutral. |
I think the way AA went about his was very smart. AA is the only airline that confers a lifetime status based on both BIS (Butt in Seat) miles AND non-BIS miles such as credit cards, or dining out or purchasing though their shopping portal. Eventually, that is an unsustainable model. Projecting ahead 10 years, the value of lifetime status would become pretty thin if large numbers can get there throrgh non-flying options. So, the folks within striking distance still have the rest of 2011 and most of 2012 to earn lifetime status using credit cards. By setting a cut-off date, AA joins the rest of the industry in granting status based upon flying. For those of us who are “grandfathered in,” this is a good deal. It increases the value of our lifetime status. For people just starting, they still get all their FF miles, etc but just no lifetime status based upon credit card spending. My challenge is to use credit cards and BIS miles to get to the 4 million lifetime mile level before December 2012.
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Damn It
I wish I would of been accruing AA for the last couple years.
I always put it off. I am not surprised this happened. |
Originally Posted by vrbaba
(Post 16991815)
Rest assured, the value of miles will not be going up, quite the contrary (although the rate of decline varies).
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Originally Posted by trach500
(Post 16991023)
As an infrequent flyer on purchased tickets, do you think it's worth the spend/transfer from Gold to Plat? I always travel on miles because I accrue many with business purchases. I am currently 900K miles about from Plat, but I can transfer many SPG points to hit Plat (2m) easily, do you think it's worth it? Is there a major difference between gold & Plat?
Since you can't use stickers to upgrade award tickets, LTP is not as rewarding if your trips are mostly domestic. But you will get to use 1st class check-in vs. business and a slightly better help when IRROPS occur |
With the addition of the 35K bonus miles for crossing the 1 million mile mark I wish that I was going over that level now instead of last fall. To me it seems that the 35K is worth more than the 8 upgrade certs. At least now an individual has the option, keep the miles to redeem or turn them in for upgrades.
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Originally Posted by AAExPlat
(Post 16990800)
How is it off?
The problem is that none of the spinoffs have ever NOT resulted in massive devaluation. Take a look at AF/KL and AC as models. Both programs are much less customer friendly than they used to be. Why would an AAdvantage spinoff be different? That's the number that has been bandied about by those in the know. You have a better number? That said, even if it's half that, the partners and AA still lose tons of money on those churners... Thanks...I try. But they (UA) only count BIS miles and only on UA metal to boot... Given how easy it was to score LT Gold and Plat, isn't that appropriate? And even then, you could upgrade mid-cons for $90 each way on top of a dirt cheap fare...how is that unfair, especially with upgrade rates being sky high at AA relative to UA. Ask some of the 1Ps for their upgrade rates on UA and see what they say. What makes AA great to fly is that upgrade rates for all tiers are higher than in any of the other programs you mentioned. Yes, it's not free, but what good things in life are?
Originally Posted by Jailer
(Post 16991946)
Which reminds me of a famous story:
"Your life or mine?" Quote by baseball Hall of Famer Whitey Herzog, after being offered a lifetime contract to manage by 80-year-old Cardinals owner Gussie Busch |
Originally Posted by trach500
(Post 16991023)
As an infrequent flyer on purchased tickets, do you think it's worth the spend/transfer from Gold to Plat? I always travel on miles because I accrue many with business purchases. I am currently 900K miles about from Plat, but I can transfer many SPG points to hit Plat (2m) easily, do you think it's worth it? Is there a major difference between gold & Plat?
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Originally Posted by Ritz
(Post 16992122)
Just a quick user-friendly heads-up, AAExPlat - when you quote previous posts, but delete the poster's handle, it tends to be hard to follow and engage in response. BTW, I do, again, agree with most of what you say (except the valuation critique).
If you can tell me how to do multi-quote, I will do my darnest to make sure I get this right in the future. |
Originally Posted by ma91pmh
(Post 16991239)
Reading through this thread, it is amazing to me how much value people place on lifetime plat and certainly lifetime gold. I mean in my book it really isn't that valuable. Why on earth anyone would, for example, direct $100-$200k of "gravy" AA's way so they can save $25 bag fees?????? C'mon!
I still don't get why folks are moving hundreds of thousands of points from other programs into AA. None of us know what other changes might come down the line. Will they tweak elite status (look at the UA forum as they wait in anticipation for what UA will announce in September and whether elite status tiers and bonus miles will change)? Will they merge with another carrier and have more changes? I just see too many variables to be moving around hundreds of thousands of points when the benefits of the tier you'll reach may still change in years to come. You're basically gambling that nothing changes in terms of the benefits of the elite tiers that come from lifetime status. Tom in Albuquerque, New Mexico |
i wish it gets pushed back a little bit... as much as i understand, i wish i have a little bit more time...
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So the big question, which I'm sure others have already asked: what's the best way to purchase a large quantity of miles should one seek to achieve 2MM?
I'm sitting on about 1.25MM right now. If there's an avenue to 750k at, say, 2cpm, I might be a buyer. My reasoning: - Tons of personal travel planned for 2012-2013, most of which would be a good candidate for award travel. - On my coach awards, I usually get over 2cpm. Taking the family to Canada - high fares, short flights, 25k awards - is a good example. - On my premium cabin awards, I'm willing to assign 2cpm to those miles. (It's subjective because I don't personally buy int'l F revenue seats with my own funds. But if you asked me "Would you pay $2,700 R/T for a 135,000 F seat to Asia?" I'd typically say yes.) - We plan in advance, typically avoid peak seasons, and have yet to fail to booked a desired trip with miles (knock on wood). Have to tweak dates occasionally...but I feel I'm a low risk of suddenly having a bunch of unusable miles...or needing to burn the miles in suboptimal places. - I could easily use the stash in about two years. These miles wouldn't sit on the books through many future program changes. In other words, if I could buy at 2cpm, I'd feel like my only real cost to obtain LT Plat is the investment value of $15k for a year or so. Call it $500 or so. Would you pay $500 for LT Plat? I would. I'd probably go up to about $1000-1500. I'd probably fly enough business trips to consume the SWU's even if I go award on all personal trips... Now the question is: is there any way to actually buy a sh**load of miles? :) I know AA directly has caps...along with high prices. |
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