DreAAmliner

I have a trip to Austin, TX coming up in a few weeks for work. I figured I would give either of these avenues a try.
Some things i have noticed:

1) I am finding RocketMiles to be a 100% better interface for searching hotels to maximize LPs, as you can actually sort by miles offered
2) Bookaahotels has a horrible interface and i have noticed that the same hotel will fluctuate between offering AA miles and not, simply depending on your filter criteria.
- As an example, the Van Zant hotel does NOT show AA miles offered, unless i SORT BY DISTANCE TO DOWNTOWN. Then, once i do that, a 7,000 mile offer shows up. WHAT THE HECK!

Has anyone else messed with both and have any tips/tricks? Am i missing something with Bookaahotels?

DreAAmliner

It also looks like hotels with AA miles offers are pre-paid only?
Also, the room pricing and fees are higher for the hotels with AA offers. The difference in pricing looks to still be worth it IMO if it is offering a lot of miles.

LovePrunes

no, as a matter of fact I booked a refundable/cancellable rate as my 1st reservation on bookaahotels last night
originally i was going to book the same hotel with rocketmiles, but just as i was checking out, the mileage offer was DRASTICALLY pulled on rocket miles, but remained on bookAAhotels for the same rate and miles, so I went with bookAAhotels and got a confirmation of the rate.
the interface on bookAAhotels is pretty poor should you need to go in and "manage" your reservations.

DreAAmliner

I certainly see that there are cancellable/refundable rates, but i have not come across any rates that offer AA miles where i can pay at the hotel.
It would be great to double-dip AA miles to book a Hilton and be able to use my Hilton Aspire to pay for the hotel at checkout.... I suppose that's the trade-off for getting AA miles...

LovePrunes

yeah i dont think that's their model at all. i think you pay them so they get their commission up front; at some point the reservation becomes uncancelable, i dont think any way around that with rocket or boookaa
and no way to count for hotel elite status, too

DreAAmliner

I just booked a hotel and selected the room that was $25 more to get 1,000 more miles.
then on the checkout screen, they let me buy an additional 1,000 miles for $25.

I will report back if they all code as base or not. Seems like RocketMiles was able to figure that out....

chitown85

I have also seen 2,000 extra for $40. Maybe it varies based on the room or stay type. Either way, seems like a good value for both the RDMs and the LPs combined. I probably wouldn't opt to do it if LPs weren't part of the value proposition. Great tool to top up status later in the year without having to get on a plane.

vasantn

It has already been reported that the extra miles post as "bonus" miles, and will most likely not count as LPs. You are paying more than 2 cents for each of those miles which are purely RDMs. Not a great deal.

chitown85

on bookAAhotels they've posted as base for me so I assume they count. The other poster mentioned on Rocketmiles specifically it being bonus.

vasantn

Hmm, that's very interesting!

Humberto

I've tried this and the bonus show up as bonus for me on RM

vasantn

So I think I have this figured out.

On RocketMiles, you have only one opportunity to buy extra miles, after you have selected your room. This is unrelated to the cost of the room. So the room miles post as base miles and the extra miles post as bonus miles.

On BookAAHotels, you get two extra bites at the apple. You can choose to pay more for your room (and forfeit the free breakfast which IMO is a bit cheesy) and get extra miles and since they are related to the cost of the room, they will all post as base miles and LPs. Then you have the opportunity to buy "boost" miles at the bottom of the form. I'm fairly confident that these will post as bonus miles.

So BookAAHotels is definitely better for buying extra LPs. RocketMiles is far better in terms of the interface and their customer service has been exceptional, but you can't buy extra LPs. I have not had an occasion to use the BookAAHotels customer service yet but since it's an offshoot of booking.com, I'm betting that it's not extraordinary.

chicaloca453

Someone on another thread said his additional miles were posted as a bonus, and the original offer posted as base. Obviously, YMMV, but there is one data point at least. I believe it's in the Loyalty Points thread.

DreAAmliner

Exactly this. Much better worded than my post...
However, for the searches i have been doing so far for some know travel for later this year, RM is showing hotel options with considerably more miles than BAAH.

ps/side bar - this thread is very clearly predicting what i believe will be a gigantic increase in low-level elites under the new scheme. Obviously, if those elites fly only a few times a year then who cares, but it is interesting to me nonetheless and who knows what the second/third/fourth order effects of that many elites are.

chitown85

I've done 'both bites at the apple' recently and it all posted as base for me. Its a good value all around.