AAdvantage Program Changes for 2024-2025
 

https://thepointsguy.com/news/americ...-changes-2024/

Just announced! Generally mostly positive, in my view.

Here's the summary:
- same elite qualifying thresholds for 2024-2025
- can use some LP rewards to obtain additional LPs toward (re)qualification
- can earn additional LPs and miles when you accept buy-up offers in the app or online
- CK/EP/PPro can redeem miles to use Flagship First Dining
- AA miles can be used to upgrade on select partners...TBA
- trip credits extended to 18 months validity
- Basic Econ tickets can be voluntarily canceled for a $99 fee against the ticket value
- members of any status can buy AC day passes and FL single-use passes
- free same-day standby for members of all levels

Yes, very good. Still my favorite program. For both AA & UA it was "message received" after the Delta fiasco.

Agreed, the two thing I see as positive for me are you can get something of useful value for the 15,000 point level, which before was worthless for anyone who had status from the previous year where the priority check in/seat coupons were worthless. And the ability to get a credit on a basic economy ticket for $99 will make it a lot more likely I'd buy these, where in the past I always opted out for the lack of flexibility even though with status they were essentially the same as any other economy ticket otherwise. They say later this month on that, I'm curious as to how soon that will happen, I have a trip later this year I'd like to buy and would buy it as basic economy if this were available, so I may wait a little and see if they switch this on. And the 18-month extension for trip credits are nice, but I'm not sure I've ever held one that long since I can usually find a way to use them pretty quickly, even as an excuse to squeak in a trip to somewhere that I hadn't planned earlier.

Thanks ESpen36 and TPG for posting and publishing this. Im actually kinda content with the program as it stands now. Have earned a significant number of miles this past year, burned a significant amount for some good value trips, and will retain my EP status for 2024 and looking good already for 2025.

Certainly better than the Delta self-inflicted shotgun blast to the foot.

1) Awesome to see - seemed very dumb that you couldn't earn additional LPs for that - although some here may hate that it could drive additional people to purchase upgrades, tightening the free upgrade pool even more

2) This goes along with seeing AA increase the Main Cabin fare difference from Basic Econ - it used to be $30 one way almost all the time domestically, now I've seen the difference as high as $74 recently. They are making Basic Econ what Main Cabin used to be pre-COVID for flexibility with change cancellation fees but restricting the benefits like seat assignments, and Main Cabin will likely become more and more pricier vs Basic over time and more like the Flexible fares of yesteryear

3) This is actually a reduction in benefits for those who are part of other programs but not elite (including AA elites making a booking with Avios bc they have them through Chase/Amex). Also a (small) reduction in benefits for elites - elites were already prioritized, this just increases the chances of not making standby on a full flight because a non-member on that flight couldn't standby for an earlier flight, which would have opened up the seat for the elite member.

None of the changes really impact me except for potential overcrowding at ACs with more day pass users. Alas, with my upcoming move, my new home airport won't have an AC. I may need to look at switching airlines, that will be painful since I have LT Plat on AA and nothing elsewhere and I don't fly enough anymore to earn status

For avios bookings you can use Finnair to swap the FF number from BA to AA and get benefits that way. I use it a lot to get my free checked bag through an AA CC

I take advantage of a lot of the buy up offers so that's good news they will now count towards LP. ACs are already crowded, some worse than others. PHX, CLT, TPA, MIA D30 come to mind.

I believe the day pass users are now being limited to just AA members - non-members* and oneworld non-elite/ruby members will not be able to access the admirals club with a day pass when previously they could. So that change should be a small net positive for those in an AC.

I think you misread what is changing about AC day passes.

Previously anyone could buy a day pass, even folks who were not AAdvantage members. With this change now you must be an AAdvantage member to buy a day pass.

So in theory this should reduce the number of day pass users, although in reality there probably won't be any noticeable change as I'm guessing a large % of folks buying passes were already members.

And of course nothing is changing regarding club crowding, so if a club is crowded they will just restrict day pass use like they always have.

Didn't realize that was still a thing - I could have sworn that got shut down a little while back.

Some more details now at aa.com and one thing that wasn't mentioned yet in the "coming soon" section

:tu::tu:

AA.com - 2024 AAdvantage Changes

The first "enhancements" AA has made to its program that are actually enhancements.

Color me impressed.

I found this by googling. Not sure if it's final but no cash for upgrades would be great. Looks like BA and IB and only full-fare...

https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...b3f1e73a30.png

Pretty standard for partner upgrades in *A, which makes sense.

Makes a potential partner award devaluation hurt even more :'(

To start, travelers will (finally) be able to earn redeemable miles and additional Loyalty Points when they pay with cash to upgrade to a premium cabin.


PRETTTTTTTTy Pretty PRETTTTTTAAAAYYY GOOD!!!!!! :D

These mileage upgrades on BA/IB have been around for years, nothing new there.

**Applause for AA**

I think they really did a good job on these enhancements (and I really think these are truly enhancements that benefit AAdvantage members). Kudos!

Curious what the rate for FFD dining will be, as well as stipulations. Isn't a daypass to FL currently $150? Does one need to have access to FL before purchasing FFD pass, or is it all encompassing, that you get FFD/FL access. Think that will determine the price, as I could see it being ~$300 all-inclusive, but would guess $150-200 for just FFD access (if you're FL eligible, based on Business Plus costs as well), which would be 15-20k miles?

So I can buy an AA PE ticket from say MIA-LHR and use 25K miles RT to upgrade to business? What buckets is this coming from? How does/can one confirm at booking only? Does it cover positioning flights too? This may be a very good way to use points.

Unremarkable changes - I'd like to see something like 4 x drink chits or similar for the 15k LP level so we could upgrade the paint thinner liquors to something more palatable.

That being said, I think the LP program is an excellent evolution of AAdvantage and the program itself offers real tangible benefits, particularly at PPRO/EP with OW Emerald.

I pray that AA don't adopt DL's horrid practice of considering C+ an 'upgrade', much less their SkyClub restrictions and qualification thresholds for which you get the pleasure of flying rickety old 767s transatlantic among other things. Premium carrier indeed.

We have it good over here all things considered.

Yeah, those are the ones with the co-pays aren't they?

These BA/IB mileage upgrades have been around for 10 years now. They are only good from full fare buckets which makes them practically worthless unless you just happen to have corporate rates that book into full fares. In most cases you can just buy discount business for cheaper.

So yes, you can buy a $4000 premium economy ticket from MIA-LHR and upgrade for 25k miles or whatever it is.

There is ample discussion about these below in the dedicated thread:

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/amer...er-thd-54.html

Wow I was really expecting them to increase the number of miles required to get status

lol. Okay I saw full fare economy on the chart but it didn't say full fare PE. Verdict: 100% useless.

BOB coming back? Free snack for EXP while in main?

Additional airlines SWU redemption possibilities?

Nope.

Not a thing added to make EXP what it used to be. It's the new gold.

FWIW I received my new EXP welcome "pack" this week. Now only 1 luggage tag (I don't use them anyway so technically moot) and no credit card for your status. I honestly was surprised AA didn't stuff a Barclay's app in there.

Yes, I was expecting something like 50/90/150/250.

This was allegedly getting prepped for a rollout before Covid, but it was shelved. There was some quote from either DP or another executive about anticipated temporary fallout from elites after the rollout of “domestic premium economy” (and no, they were not talking about PE on widebodies sold as PE on Hawaii flights).

Considering how few MCE seats there are on the 737s, which fly a substantial portion of domestic flying, and their religious adherence to D0 (2 upgrade lists = more work for agents prior to boarding) it probably isn’t worth the effort for AA to revisit at this point.

The main positive minor thing is the 1k LPs crumbs thrown at us at the 15k level.

This is interesting. Does anyone know when the basic economy change option goes live? I just bought a domestic BE fare last week for travel in March. Not that I plan to change my plans, but I'm just curious.

Even before the switch to LP’s, I had been EP for 6 years and was in the process of dropping AAdvantage for BAEC because chasing EP under the old system was exhausting. I fall into the camp that likes how this program has evolved. I’m able to hold Emerald status now on two OW carriers. PPro isn’t EP, but I’m happy with that level. Add in these new changes, especially the earn on the app buy up offers and I think AA has done a great job of balancing this program between their needs and ours. cheers!

Nothing remarkable, but no complaints. A lot of small changes providing an opportunity for some fanfare. The 18 month window on trip credit is nice, as is the 1,000 LPs at the 15k level (I legitimately cannot understand the existing benefits for anyone that will qualify for any status). Otherwise, I'm just glad that I'll easily requalify in 2024-25 given thresholds remain the same.

Just waiting for the partner award shoe to drop, and hoping to redeem 90k for JAL's new first class, and maybe one more QR J redemption to Africa/Middle East before that happens!

The Flagship Dinning is huge, no more need to chose them as a LP milestone. Awesome to have the ability to redeem Flagship Dinning on every domestic flight.

It's remarkable as this might be the first time they didn't enhance something and make things worse.

These changes are overall negative at the top I think.

One real plus is upgrades on partners if actually possible, but I also see one big negative: Getting miles for buying upgrades means more people will buy those app offers they aggressively push, which translates to less F space going to comp upgrades.

Maybe this won’t matter as much as I think, but it certainly further encourages Golds/Plats to buy up.

The ability to redeem SWUs electronically is nice but fixing IT isn’t an AA program enhancement Lol

I think the AA program best value today really is at the Platinum level for MCE + buying up App offers when F is desired.

Ab-so-lute-ly!

I wonder how they plan to implement this. Perhaps a link at booking to "redeem" or "apply SWU now" to immediately clear?

Any positive is a positive when it comes to airlines. I'll gladly take the freebie, better than the other 15k benefits that we can't make use of with status.

My question here is whether the additional LP's you can get at certain LP thresholds would also count towards the 12 month rolling LP total that leads to your place in line on the upgrade list. You said "toward (re)qualification" which implies only towards status. I would think that based upon the ability to get 15,000 LP at the 250k level as an option (once you're well into EXP territory) would imply that it is not only towards status (re)qualification, but also towards the 12 month rolling LP... unless it is meant to be used by people who might hit 385,000 LP but not quite that 400,000 LP level (or <15k shy of any award level) and want to get there for the rewards.

It may only be a small thing, but I guarantee there are a number of folks out there who make the LP thresholds to get LP rewards who never go into the app to actually select a reward. 1000 LP more for me and not them means there's a real if only slight chance I would jump them in the line for an upgrade on a given flight.

Well, thats better than four seat coupons which are completely worthless for anyone with status.

I am not a big fan of AA and I have no status currently, although I will have gold status in 2025 after two trips, but I must say its FF program is pretty easy to understand.

I had no idea you could purchase access to AC and FL. A business trip to the west coast in February will have me with a 3 hour connex in Phoenix. I shall avail myself of this option... as long as it does not cost an arm and a leg.

Well done AA for making your FFP so easily understandable.