25,000 American Airlines Miles via Fidelity
 

Hi All,

This site has been very helpful to me.

Thought I'd contribute one of my own. Hopefully this is indeed new.

Up to 25,000 AA Miles if you open a non-retirement account with Fidelity. Details are here. Not sure this is great bang-for-the-buck, but then again, if I'd had another 15,000 miles in my AA account, I wouldn't be flying back from China in coach this spring. :)

Fidelity Page.

Welcome to FT! and thanks for sharing.

This has been around for quite some time with equivalent offers DL, UA, and Amex MR. Nevertheless, I finally "invested" some time to check whether it's worth it or not, so thanks for posting.

The are a few older threads discussing how to circumvent the 50K deposit, you might want to search for them and see how to get the most miles with the smaller deposits. Not sure if this loophole is already closed by now. But whatever you choose to do, please DO NOT call Fidelity to ask about it:p

Argh, thanks nsr, sorry for unearthing an oldie. I searched on American + Fidelity before posting and didn't see anything, but I didn't think of the other airlines. :(

Will look up the loophole and will most certainly not blow the secret! Thanks!

I actually did this offer and the TD Waterhouse offer to get an additional 30,000 miles into Delta. The offers have been there for several years, but did not take advantage of them until now.

My take on the offers:

- The best deal is the $10,000 level where you get 15,000 miles for the deposit.
- Fidelity is the best deal as they will deposit all 15,000 miles at once
- TD Waterhouse divides the 15,000 miles in two parts {I think the second 7,500 deposit will happen several months from now}
- The miles are credited within a week or two {very fast}
- Both brokers will contact you within a couple of days trying to get you to trade or consolidate. I was very clear to the rep that called me and said that I was doing this mostly for the miles.


Now I wonder if I close these two accounts, can I do the same with AA, and get another 30,000 miles?

It is a one-time for "life-time" offer
 

That you can only receive the bonus from ONE airline, not each airline.

It must be new account, and for one time only. Although if you have sizable assets at Fidelity, you can get an exception for it. That can only be accomplished by calling, and if Fidelity agrees to make the exception, the rep would give you specific instructions on how to proceed. For new account you just need to follow the website instructions.

The best bang for the bucks is the $10,000 investment that gets 15K miles, imo.

Fidelity closed the loophole for both $100 cash bonus AND bonus miles. If this is the loophole you allude to.

Opened two accounts; one for each of us with the $50k and then drained it down to $00.50k within 2 weeks of miles posting. That was six months ago and we both got the 25k AA miles. Did it online. Ended up moving all of my accounts from E*Trade IRA and 403(b) to them so they are happy about that.

Caution
 

A bit of caution on this offer. You cannot have a previous brokerage account with Fidelity of any kind! I had an IRA brokerage account before, and I as under impression if you open a non-retirement account you will be fine. However, the T&C stated that it is not valid for a retirement account, and not valid for any previous Fidelity brokerage account holder.

I know it is a small difference, and probably not many people out there misunderstood the offer -- but I was not able to collect any miles.

TD Ameritrade has a similar offer, going to try them instead.

Best,

PedroNY

Yes, It is a pity it is an one-time for "life-time" offer.:(

No, it's not.

loophole
 

it's pretty simple. Fidelity system will count all of youincoming cash over 90 days, it will not look at out going cash. So deposit $10k, move it out, move it back in, repeat 5 times. Some people recommend to do this and leave about $50 in the account, so it is not at $0. Therefore, if you don't have $50k to park there, then you can do it in smaller bits, just need to make sure you get $50k in aggragate moved into Fidelity w/n 90 days of openning it. This loophole may still exist, I have no clue, but it is worth exploring and reposting back if you can get 25,000 miles. Best of luck.

This will not work with TD Ameritrade as you need to "mantain" a balance of $10k over X months. With Fidelity offer there is no "mantain" language.

PedroNY

So does this mean if you already have an account(s) with Fidelity, and have a lot of money in them, you can call and get an exception to open an additional account and claim the miles?

I'd like to know that, too.

No, no need to open an additional account. Just bring in new money. When I did that 18 months ago, the rep I initially talked to, went to talk to the "back office" whatever that meant. Then he made sure the "back office" made a notation on our account, and gave me specific instructions to follow. I dont remember the details but do remember that I am told to call back once the new money is in the account. The miles posted in 2 weeks time after that. I did that for AA miles. 9 months later when I requested the same offer for UA miles I was denied.

The reason why this is an exception is because the offer is for NEW customer only. If you ever have a Fidelity brokerage account before, or an existing Fidelity brokerage account, you are not eligible for the offer. HOWEVER, good size assets naturally carry some weight to get an exception.

Please report back on TD's result.

Thanks - this is very interesting. We already have most of our money with Fidelity spread over multiple accounts, but I'm not sure if our assets are sizeable enough. Would you care to venture a guess as to how much is required: $250K+, $500K+, $1M+, etc. (I understand if you don't want to answer this question).