There's only reports of one shut down? There must be more to it than using mailers.

Nice try guys, but what about this in the AAdvantage Terms and Conditions:

Do you really think that's going to stop a dog? They can't even read!

Nor can they type, and I'd wager that there is a very strong correlation between those that did the typing and those that did the using of the ill-gotten bonus codes, and that this activity is enough to justify enforcement action by AA.

No one's arguing that pets are actually eligible for AAdvantage accounts, but AA is going to have a hard time determining who simply made an account for all eight (8) human members of their household, got eight (8) mailers and used them all (which is not against any T's and C's), or who created accounts in the name of their household's pets, plants, or cockroaches solely to generate mailers. And of course, the mailers don't even have to be from the same household, especially now that they're emailed so you don't need access to a physical address. Maybe I made an account for my coworker Jane Smith and she let me have her mailer. Nothing fraudulent about that: Citi lets you change the name/AAdvantage number on the application.

It's funny that we are aware of at least 1-2 people having had their account shut down and miles confiscated while the very loophole of which we speak remains open. If they were truly interested in stopping this, they would have stopped the mailers/approvals/bonuses long ago. IANAL but I believe there is a legal term for knowing about an issue such as this and failing to take action to prevent it, and it is a powerful legal defense (laches?). Citi/AA could be accused of wanting to have their cake (increasing sign up numbers and average credit score for metrics purposes) and eat it too (shutting down members who are gaming the system too hard).

There are a lot of holier-than-thou industry veterans in this forum, who are very protective of their elite status and butt-in-seat miles and are bitter toward those gaming the system, so nobody's going to get neutral opinions here. It has always surprised me that FlyerTalk has such a vibrant credit card churning community in the Points/Miles/Card Cards forums, because there is a lot of palpable bitterness toward those who have managed to garner thousands, if not millions, more miles than the actual butt-in-seat flyers. But I don't blame the butt-in-seat flyers for being bitter; it's become harder and harder to use miles because they have been given out like candy, so there is more competition for award space.

Sorry, but I have come to the conclusion that the issue is far too muddled for AA to take any action against those who have earned miles from mailers. That's a convenient conclusion for those who are sitting on millions of miles, but it's the truth.

It is impossible for them to know whether the miles were earned from mailers generated by accounts created for real people or fake people, or coworkers or neighbors. All that matters is that Citi allowed you to change the name/AAdvantage number on the application and approved the applicants for multiple cards/bonuses. To me, this is the end of the discussion.

Citi/AA can fix their issue going forward, they can lock accounts temporarily for a reasonable amount of time to investigate, but they are not going to be able to tell someone with a straight face that they are guilty of fraud or abuse because they used their brother's/friend's/coworkers' mailers, when the mailers were effectively transferrable.

This is going to be my last post on the subject because someone convinced me in PM that there is nothing to be gained from this discussion given the readership here.

Actual post/response:https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/31806378-post1065.html

Great idea.

1. Whatever you, personally, have concluded, ultimately does not matter to American Airlines.
2. American Airlines will take whatever action they see fit according to their interpretation of the rules. The rules explicitly allow them, and them alone, to interpret the rules.
3. It may be muddled to you, but they and their partners at Citi have whatever information they need to understand who was doing what.
4. It doesn't matter if the additional accounts were created for a real person or an animal or a breakfast sandwich. They were created. A mailer was generated. Someone used that mailer to open a credit card. Someone, many in fact, seem to have done that multiple times with many mailers form many accounts created for the purpose of generating those mailers. Those credit card applications can be linked to other credit card applications and accounts at Citi. And through all of that American—which, and this cannot be emphasized enough, does not care what you have concluded about the muddiness or clarity of the issue at hand—can figure out who was doing what.
5. They will absolutely tell anyone they want to—with the absolute straightest of faces—that they are guilty of abuse or misrepresentation. Because the transferability of the mailers really doesn't matter when the generation of the mailer (which, again, with Citi they can figure out may have been triggered by an account with no previous activity) was the result of misrepresentation.
6.They're not stupid.

Well I’m still trying to piece together everything (and to be fair I haven’t read the thread in the Citi forum), but I suspect this is where you may be incorrect. I get the sense (much from this thread prior to the current discussion) that AA has a lot of tools at its disposal to figure out a lot of things that one normally might not think they would be able to.

Posting one last thing: AA would be the criminal here if it confiscated millions of customers' miles after having profited by selling them to Citi.

I was wondering who the criminal would be! Good to know.

I think you summed it up pretty well. And lest anyone think the FT Citi AA thread is the sole genesis of any of this...reusing mailers and other things (e.g., 2 browser trick) were discussed in many of the blogs plus forums on other sites (Reddit, FICO forums), as well, over the years.

you mean that people here are not happily trying to scam the airlines and card companies, just looking at the situation?

Is fraud-pologist a thing here?