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Loyalty Points discussion/questions - From 2022 now used for determining elite status

Old Dec 17, 2021, 11:25 am
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Last edit by: jbeckett
American Airlines announced that starting in 2022, the way to earn Elite status has changed. No more Elite Qualifying Miles (EQM), Elite Qualifying Segments (EQS), or Elite Qualifying Dollars (EQD)!

Now, you can get AA Elite status by earning Loyalty Points (LPs): https://aadvantagestatus.com/?anchor...=newaadvantage

How many LPs do I need for elite status?


Code:
Gold:       40K
Platinum:   75K
Plat Pro:  125K
EXP:       200K
How do I earn LPs?

Flying
What you get for redeemable miles (RDM) is what you'll get for LPs.

AA and B6 flights:
No status: 5 LPs per $ spent in base fare plus fees (excludes taxes)
Gold: 7 LPs per $
Platinum: 8 LPs per $
Plat Pro: 9 LPs per $
EXP: 11 LPs per $

Partner flights (other than B6):
Distance flown x accrual rate* x (1 + cabin bonus + elite bonus**)

* Certain discount fares earn less than 100% of miles flown. In those cases, the discounted accrual rate (0% to 75% depending on the partner and the fare class) should be applied to the flown miles. Otherwise, the accrual rate is 100%. If there is a cabin bonus, it should not be added to the accrual rate; it is applied separately within the parentheses. The accrual rate can never be more than 100%.
** 40% for GLD, 60% for PLT, 80% for PRO, 120% for EXP.

So for example, an EXP on a 5000-mile flight on QR booked in J would earn 5000 x 100% x (1 + 25% + 120%) = 5000 x 1 x 2.45 = 12250 LPs.

A PLT on the same flight booked in P would earn 5000 x 75% x (1 + 0% + 60%) = 5000 x .75 x 1.6 = 6000 LPs.

Earning chart for QR

Here's a great online LP calculator:

https://lpcalculator.com/#/calculator/

AAdvantage non-flying partners:
Generally, 1 LP per base mile earned. But in many cases you can earn large bonuses that post as base miles; see link here: https://exploreamerican.com/newaadva...nloyaltypoints

There are differences among how these programs work, ranging from minor to significant, in terms of awarding LPs. You will need to skim through the thread as there are too many different promo offers to address here. But here are the popular ones:

BookAAHotels and RocketMiles: You can earn large mileage bonuses here, separated into "base" miles and "promo" miles by the portals. For now they are all posting as base miles on aa.com, but there is a suspicion that the "promo" miles may start posting as bonus miles (and so would not count as LP). You don't even have to actually check in or stay at the hotel as long as you pay for the stay.

SimplyMiles: You must link a MasterCard to the account. Then you can add their promos to your card by activating the offers. When you accept one of their offers and then pay for it using your linked card, you will get the associated miles which currently post as base miles on aa.com.

AAdvantage eShopping: Once you click through the AAdvantage eShopping portal to a vendor offer and make a purchase, you will eventually get the associated miles posted to your AAdvantage account as both redeemable miles and Loyalty Points. If the merchant advertises an increase in the miles per dollar spent, you'll earn the higher amount in both redeemable miles and an equal number of Loyalty Points. The same applies if a merchant advertises a higher fixed amount per purchase, rather than a per dollar amount. Examples of this would appear on the portal as, "Extra miles. Was 1 mile/$. Now earn 3 miles/$" or "Extra miles. Was up to 3700 miles. Now up to 6200 miles." However, if the website advertises a "Limited-time bonus offer" for "bonus miles" after meeting a spending threshold, that bonus will only post as redeemable miles and not Loyalty Points. If a bonus is offered for some site-wide activity such as 1000 miles for installing an extension, or 500 miles for enrolling in the portal, or 2000 miles for meeting a spending threshold across multiple merchants, the bonus will only post as redeemable miles and not Loyalty Points.
(If a vendor has offers with both SimplyMiles and eShopping, activate the offer on SimplyMiles first and then make the purchase through eShopping with the MasterCard linked to your SimplyMiles account. Apparently that you can get a double-dip. You can also get a double-dip by stacking the promos with discount offers from your credit card issuers, basically reducing the cost to you.

Booking directly with hotels, car rental companies, etc.: The picture here is a bit unclear but it appears that if you book with a hotel that offers 5x miles, only 1 mile will post as base and the rest as bonus.

Credit card spend:
1 LP per $ spent on an AA branded card (except for one card which earns 0.50 LP per $ and several non-US cards which earn 2 LP per $). See the list of cards, and a lot more small print here: https://creditcards.aa.com/aadvantag...hange_ExecCard

What about spending bonuses?
E.g., your card gives 2x miles for hotels, or 3x for AA purchases, etc etc. These do NOT count.

These bonuses count:
Citi AAdvantage Executive World Elite Mastercard (the $450 annual fee card that gives Admirals Club access): 10K LP bonus when hitting $40K spend for the year.
AAdvantage Aviator Silver Mastercard: 5K LP bonus when hitting $20K spend, another 5K LP bonus when hitting $40K spend, and another 5K LP bonus when hitting $50K spend for the year.

Do miles earned at Bask Bank count?
No.

Will Loyalty Points count toward Million Miler status?
No, Million Miler℠ status will still be earned the same way as today, based on miles earned from flying with American and its partners.











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Loyalty Points discussion/questions - From 2022 now used for determining elite status

Old Mar 7, 2022, 3:36 pm
  #2836  
 
Join Date: Aug 2002
Location: WAS/TYO
Programs: UA 1K, AA EXP (3MM), DL PM, BONVOY TITANIUM, HYATT GLOBALIST, HILTON DIAMOND, IHG DIAMOND AMB, et al
Posts: 5,906
Originally Posted by FlyingFromNY
Are you certain Plastiq gives loyalty miles and not bonus miles?
Plastiq will code as a regular credit card transaction and earn LP just like any other credit card spend made using an AAdvantage earning credit card.

-FlyerBeek
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Old Mar 7, 2022, 3:36 pm
  #2837  
 
Join Date: Feb 2011
Location: NYC suburbs
Programs: UA LT Gold (BIS), AA LT Plat (CC SUBs & BD), Hilton Dia (CC), Hyatt Glob (BIB), et. al.
Posts: 3,227
Originally Posted by Dr Jabadski

(I called Advantage Account Services to inquire about the recent (February and March) missing Hyatt Dual Accrual RDM, of course the agent was clueless, she sent an email to the hotel miles department, said I should get an email in 7-10 days probably the same time as I receive the check thats in the mail.)
Thank you.
Color me very pleasantly surprised. The phone agent I spoke with several hours ago actually called me back to get additional information AND (upon getting my voicemail) left a phone number at which to call her back which was answered by a live human being immediately, transferred to the same agent after a 5 minute hold.

Both times she asked, have you checked with Hyatt to make sure they sent the miles? Both times I said yes, I spoke with them, appropriate information was sent. She asked for some additional details, said Id get an email in a week or so.

Only because I stretched the truth (about checking with Hyatt) a couple of times, I decided to call my My Hyatt Concierge. She said she was not aware of any problems but put me on hold for 3-4 minutes to ask another department. Interestingly enough, she came back on the line and said that yes, there was (or is) a problem, unsure for how long, unsure of expected fix.

Now I feel a little bad for stretching the truth with the AA agent .

Maybe the check IS in the mail !
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Old Mar 7, 2022, 3:48 pm
  #2838  
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Originally Posted by VegasGambler
giftcards.com is still offering 3 miles per dollar on the shopping portal. The fees are $6 for a $250 virtual VGC (only usable online and over the phone -- "card not present" transactions).

So you are paying $6 in fees for 768 miles; that's 128 miles per dollar, plus whatever you use to actually make the purchase. If you use these VGC for purchases that would others only earn you 1 mile or point per dollar then the 768 portal miles are just extra, in exchange for the $6 fee. The only issue is that it's $2k/month maximum.

I used them for my health insurance premiums, monthly utility bills, and to pay some medical bills last month. I plan on doing the same this month.
They also have specialty cards with no fee, if you use those services, such as Instacart, Grubhub, Uber, etc.
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Old Mar 7, 2022, 3:48 pm
  #2839  
 
Join Date: Aug 2017
Programs: Hyatt Globalist, AA Executive Platinum
Posts: 37
I bought a $250 VGC on giftcard.com to try it out and the LPs showed up in about 24 hours. I attempted to load my Venmo account and while the gift card showed up, it wouldn't process when I tried to pay someone with it as my payment method. I panicked and added the $250 to Amazon (adding it as a payment option and then buying a $250 reload of my gift card balance). I have been buying Amazon gift cards at Safeway which earns 2x Safeway points and 4x on AMEX Gold (which translates to $15 off groceries and 2000 AMEX points per $500). The same with VGCs costs about $12 and earns about 2,000 LPs/miles if I use my AA card as well which is nice but not as lucrative as the Safeway/AMEX route.
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Old Mar 7, 2022, 3:58 pm
  #2840  
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Join Date: Jan 2001
Location: NYC
Programs: AA EXP / LT PLT / 3MM, Marriott LT Gold
Posts: 35,308
I see there's been a lot of recent discussion about hotel miles. Let me summarize the data points that I have:
  • RocketMiles and BookAAHotels are owned by the same company, booking.com.
  • Even so, they often have wildly different prices and mileage opportunities.
  • The rates and mileage offer can change very quickly, even within hours or minutes.
  • The RocketMiles website is better but I've found BookAAHotels to have better customer service. I used RocketMiles just once and then ended up cancelling the booking, so all of my experience is with BookAAHotels.
  • RocketMiles offers just one opportunity to get more miles; BookAAHotels offers two (one "pay more to get more miles" and then another "boost" at checkout).
  • Despite a few reports to the contrary, 100% of my bookings and potential bookings have offered the extra miles at almost exactly 2 per mile.
  • I completed 4 hotel stays through BookAAHotels in January and February, and purchased the maximum number of extra miles on all of them. They all posted as base miles, despite the fact that the confirmation email split out the miles between base miles and promo miles. The base and promo miles posted as separate line items in my AAdvantage account but all in the "Base" column.
  • On March 1 all those base miles converted to LPs without a hitch.
  • However, since then, there have been a couple of reports that the promo miles are now posting as non-LP bonus miles, so I would be very careful about buying miles over and above the base mileage offered, until there is more clarity. I believe these were from RocketMiles; I haven't seen a similar report regarding BookAAHotels. But it's likely that BookAAHotels will follow suit.
  • I just completed a BookAAHotels stay yesterday and am in the middle of another one. We should know in a few days how BookAAHotels is now handling the promo miles going forward. I will report back here as soon as I have the information.
  • Someone asked about no-showing. I no-showed for my first reservation and got the miles exactly as if I had checked in and completed the stay.
I've tried to address all the points raised in today's posts here, based on my first-hand experiences. I hope this will be helpful.
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Old Mar 7, 2022, 4:15 pm
  #2841  
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Originally Posted by vasantn
  • Someone asked about no-showing. I no-showed for my first reservation and got the miles exactly as if I had checked in and completed the stay.
There is also a chance that this could be property specific.
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Old Mar 7, 2022, 4:32 pm
  #2842  
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Originally Posted by jmandc
I bought a $250 VGC on giftcard.com to try it out and the LPs showed up in about 24 hours. I attempted to load my Venmo account and while the gift card showed up, it wouldn't process when I tried to pay someone with it as my payment method. I panicked and added the $250 to Amazon (adding it as a payment option and then buying a $250 reload of my gift card balance). I have been buying Amazon gift cards at Safeway which earns 2x Safeway points and 4x on AMEX Gold (which translates to $15 off groceries and 2000 AMEX points per $500). The same with VGCs costs about $12 and earns about 2,000 LPs/miles if I use my AA card as well which is nice but not as lucrative as the Safeway/AMEX route.
I'm not sure why you panicked. You were trying to do manufactured spend; that's not going to work. You can't just liquidate the card to a bank account.

But don't you have actual legitimate spend that doesn't currently earn you bonuses? Monthly utilities? Cell phone bill? Can you pay rent or mortgage by CC? Anything at all that you can pay online or by phone, that normally earns you 1 mile or point per dollar? There is a $2k per month maximum here so there's probably no need to resort to MS.

Last edited by VegasGambler; Mar 7, 2022 at 4:43 pm
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Old Mar 7, 2022, 4:51 pm
  #2843  
 
Join Date: Jan 2003
Location: DL: Silver; AA: EX PLAT; UA: Silver; HY: DIA; HH: DIA; MR: TIT
Posts: 1,708
Originally Posted by nk15
Do we have a clear confirmation in writing from AA (rather than speculation) that LPs determine upgrade priority only WITHIN each elite level, rather than across elite levels?
I do not think that we do....
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Old Mar 7, 2022, 5:06 pm
  #2844  
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Originally Posted by VegasGambler
giftcards.com is still offering 3 miles per dollar on the shopping portal. The fees are $6 for a $250 virtual VGC (only usable online and over the phone -- "card not present" transactions).
.
It doesn't look line there is a way to track the balance on this virtual gift cards, why is a pain, so it may be best to use the completely in one transaction, if possible. Otherwise, there will be a need for manual tracking and possible confusion.
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Old Mar 7, 2022, 5:11 pm
  #2845  
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Originally Posted by nk15
It doesn't look line there is a way to track the balance on this virtual gift cards, why is a pain, so it may be best to use the completely in one transaction, if possible. Otherwise, there will be a need for manual tracking and possible confusion.
You can track the balance on giftcards.com

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Old Mar 7, 2022, 5:21 pm
  #2846  
brp
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Originally Posted by brp
I decided to buy one now and see. I have a feeling that buying gift cards will eventually fail to generate LPs (better if I'm wrong), so testing it now to see what happens.

I know that some things show "Tracking" on the eShopping site as soon as the transaction is made to show that it was done through the portal. At present this one is not.

Cheers.
So my purchase was cancelled by Giftcards.com after a few hours . As second attempt with a different card was cancelled immediately

The first time my CSR did ask if it was legit (and deny the first time). I said Yes, and it went through. But they reviewed and canceled.



I have an email into them to ask why, but this may not be in the cards for me for a bit, scammer scum that I am...

Cheers.

Last edited by brp; Mar 7, 2022 at 5:30 pm
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Old Mar 7, 2022, 5:36 pm
  #2847  
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Originally Posted by brp
So my purchase was cancelled by Giftcards.com after a few hours . As second attempt with a different card was cancelled immediately

The first time my CSR did ask if it was legit (and deny the first time). I said Yes, and it went through. But they reviewed and canceled.



I have an email into them to ask why, but this may not be in the cards for me for a bit, scammer scum that I am...

Cheers.
My first purchase was cancelled but is still tracking in "Recent Visits" on the portal. My second one went through and I got the GCs but it is also still tracking in "Recent Visits". It's been over a week now but it still hasn't graduated to "Pending".
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Old Mar 7, 2022, 5:57 pm
  #2848  
brp
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Originally Posted by vasantn
My first purchase was cancelled but is still tracking in "Recent Visits" on the portal. My second one went through and I got the GCs but it is also still tracking in "Recent Visits". It's been over a week now but it still hasn't graduated to "Pending".
Were they both with the same card and info or did you change stuff up? As I mentioned, I did change card, and I even changed so that the from and two emails were different valid variants. But the second was an immediate cancel.

Cheers.
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Old Mar 7, 2022, 5:58 pm
  #2849  
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Originally Posted by vasantn
My first purchase was cancelled but is still tracking in "Recent Visits" on the portal. My second one went through and I got the GCs but it is also still tracking in "Recent Visits". It's been over a week now but it still hasn't graduated to "Pending".
I had one visit track with 3x the spend it should have, one get cancelled (and track with 3x the attempted spend for VGC and the correct attempted spend for the store GC, and one track with 2x the correct spend. None have posted. Of course the cancelled one should not post but the other two should.

I emailed CS about the two that should post and the reply was

Please know that I understand that these orders #xxxx and #xxxx from Giftcards.com have been tracked with the wrong purchase amounts. Allow me to inform you that when merchants audits the transactions on the account the rewards added for the wrong amount may get reversed to correct the transactions on the account.

I replied pointing out (again) that no rewards had been given at all! I hope they get this right eventually.
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Old Mar 7, 2022, 6:05 pm
  #2850  
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Originally Posted by OskiBear
It's been a few years since I was on a cruise and spent much money/time at the casino. However, in the past, I seem to recall that I could charge my casino wager/chips to my onboard account that I would then settle with the credit card on file. It occurred to me at the time that this was a way of possibly generating spend as it wasn't charged as a cash advance on the card.
Does anyone have recent experience with this and if this actually still works?
I do this quite a bit as I cruise often. It is great when there are big spending bonuses. I think the max casino charge to cabin Celebrity is $3K per day.
​​​
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