golfer20

I really can't image more than 5% of AA flyers actively searching for ways to earn LPs. If you're really looking, earning lots of LPs isn't terribly difficult, but you need to know where to earn them.

vasantn

That's even better!

FrankMorris

I really have to agree with this. The number of people getting to, say, 125,000 miles and earning PP because they've booked dozens of RM bookings is probably pretty low. I think you'll see the average person who bothers to pay attention get some LP's off of these various pathways, but the requirements are so much higher for status levels that these opportunities will likely be offsetting how close one gets to status via flying.

The RM interface is still clunky, from room selection to filterable search results, so there are plenty of families, business folks, etc. that will simply want to use a more convenient interface such as Marriott or booking.com (even the booking.com site, which powers AA hotels, is better because you have an account where you can log in to see your bookings, more rooms are refundable, etc.). In addition, you have to account for the fact that many people actually try for status with hotels, rental cars, etc. so there is an opportunity cost to putting all of your eggs in the AA LP basket.

To me, the biggest sacrifice - other than interface - is choice. I'm in Mexico now, and there are plenty of other options in terms of Airbnb, booking.com, etc. that offer me a better selection of location and fine-tuning what I'm looking for in a particular price range. With RM and AA Hotels, I can still find stuff, but I would likely have ended up booking something different. This is entirely the point - AA (and the hotel) is buying my business my offering me LP's. I stay with their preferred vendor and they throw me some credit toward status. Isn't this what loyalty is all about? I'm completely fine with this - I'm still getting a good hotel for roughly what I would have paid for it, but you're swaying my decision to take my business to you because you're giving me something in return that's valuable to me.

All of this said, if the base miles on RM (stay and get 3,000 miles) don't actually count, and they decide to do a spend equivalent, that would be massively deceptive cause me to significantly think my loyalty. I've already got several RM and AA hotels booking given the amount of travel I have going on right now, all of which were chosen entirely because to the LP construct.

FrankMorris

Just to be on the same page here, are we talking about the "pay more to earn more" option? If so, I called AA and asked if these would qualify as LP's and was told no, although to be very clear I have very little confidence in that answer. It was a basic customer service rep who called some other help desk who was offering an interpretation of what I was seeing - it wasn't direct guidance.

Still, these could pretty easily be interpreted as bonus rather than base miles based on the offer structure, etc. I think the odds are lower that these count, although I'm still hopeful they will. Personally, I would be hesitant to put a lot of money in this strategy until March when we see how this actually plays out. I suppose my regular AA hotel bookings and RM booking could be risky as too, but less so than a scheme where I'm offered to pay more to earn more miles, which sounds like the definition of bonus miles to me. Still, that language isn't being used, and if folks are finding that those elevated points bookings are coding as base miles, that's a good sign.

FrankMorris

Okay I decided to play along and see what would happen - I had a hotel I needed to book for next week. Nowhere does it say this until the confirmation email, but the language in that email suggests the difference between "base miles" and "promotional miles" - my suspicion is that my additional 2,000 miles will not qualify as LP's.

While I'll still have the benefit of the extra 2,000 miles from an RDM perspective, I doubt I will continue to book these "promotional miles" rates unless we get confirmation they will count as LPs.

vasantn

Which portal did you use?

[Edited to add:] It looks like it was RocketMiles. It has already been reported upthread that the promo miles have posted as bonus miles, FWIW.

It has also been reported upthread that all miles post as base miles through BookAAHotels.

FrankMorris

No. I used bookaahotels - I’m very much hoping those experiences above are accurate.

vasantn

Cool, keep us posted. I'm quite happy to pay 2¢/LP. Not so happy to pay 2¢/RDM.

Interestingly, the graphic that you posted looks exactly the same as the one I got from RocketMiles.




Not sure why RM and BAAH would post differently.

Did you take the additional boost that BAAH offers, or just pay extra for the room?

FrankMorris

Will definitely keep you posted. As someone else mentioned earlier, there are two stages to essentially pay extra. First, you have the option to “pay more to earn more“ which seems to be about double. Then, after selecting that room, you have the option to buy even more points on the checkout page. My guess is that the purchase of extra points on the checkout page would certainly not count as base points. Now, it also looks to me like the pay extra points will not count either.

vasantn

My question was: Did you do both?

FrankMorris

Ah, sorry. No, I did not do both only the first option of pay more earn more.

jediwho

What date was this for? I am also debating whether I should pay the extra $25 ($50) for these points and whether they would classify as LP.

vasantn

Have the miles posted yet? How did they post?

FrankMorris

Nothing yet. Will keep you posted.

FrankMorris

Wanted to update everyone that my miles posted from bookaahotels.com - all as base miles. Again, to clarify - I selected the option of pay more earn more - as in, a higher rate on the rate/room selection page - NOT the final checkout page with the last option of buying additional points. Interestingly, there were 2 separate posts, but both are listed under "base miles." As I've otherwise posted, I'll certainly be taking screenshots of how these post. I wouldn't be surprised to see these reclassified at some point.