REWARDS FOR MILES
 

Is there any airline program that recognises elite status for miles accumulated, not just flown ?

I am almost up to 3 million miles via AMEX card usage, but very little travel and it would be great to have premier (?) status based on number of miles accumulated.

Any ideas ?

QF - Apparently, American Airlines gives lifetime elite status to million milers regardless of how the miles are earned. So if you charge 1 million miles to your AA charge card and never set foot on an AA airplane, you're elite for life! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif Not a bad deal in the scheme of things.

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"What do you mean you didn't get miles for that?!"

QF Millions,

Sounds like you should switch your million-dollar purchases to Citibank's AA affinity cards. You can probably get a Platninum one easily, and one million miles on AA will get you lifetime GOLD at AA, two million miles will get you lifetime Platinum. Go for it.
check out www.citi.com

[This message has been edited by ChaseTheMiles (edited 07-27-2001).]

Is this AMEX the membership rewards program. I am not familiar with this program. Can the points be switched to AA directly. If not, then you might be better off with the starpoints AMEX where for every 20,000 transfer you would get a 5000 bonus. You seem to know a lot of places that take AMEX so that would be your better way to go in the future. If you have an existing TWA account, you could transfer to TWA (if MR doesn't allow to AA directly) and they will be transferred to AA in a couple of months.

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DtG

If I'm not mistaken, the Amex MR to TWA transfer agreement ended recently. Amex MR to AA is also not allowed.

FewMiles..

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Unofficial Guide to AAdvantage: http://fewmiles.tripod.com/AA/
Unofficial oneworld Info Desk: http://fewmiles.tripod.com/oneworld/

Problem with the Citibank AA card approach is that you ae limited to 60k miles per annum, unless you are already elite.

MR transfer to TWA ended July 3rd. Gold Citi cards have 100,000 mile/year caps.

The only catch to have the CITI AA card is cost $50/Year for Gold and $75/Year for Platinum...and it may take about 10 years to earn Million miles if you are able to charge 100k per year... there is got to be a better way...

I am thinking to cancel my AA card when the the 1 year anneversary come up and will try to get Starpoints Card...



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Al

If you do a lot of traveling, where all the major airlines/hotel chains/car rental companies/etc. take Diners Club, you might consider it. It transfers to AA with no annual limit. The $80 fee is more than made up (the first year) by the 12,000-mile new member bonus - 1,000 miles each month that you charge anything at all. (When you talk to them, note that they talk points, not miles. Two points equal one mile.) Reportedly they offer retention bonuses, smaller but still worth more than $80, to renew after that.

If you want DC, find a member to sponsor you. The sponsor gets a few thousand miles. You still get everything you would get by applying directly.

Clearly if you have accrued that many miles using an AMEX card (how many years did it take you - how much do you charge annually?) then you know where you can use an AMEX card and the Starpoints AMEX is the way to go. But the problem seems to be that you don't know how to use your current 3 million to get enough over to AA to become lifetime gold/platinum. So folks, that seems to be the problem at hand, and I'm not sure the best way to move MR points over to AA with the most miles resulting.

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DtG

See the post at the AA site - MR to AA.

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DtG

I was going to suggest the MR->DL->DC->AA (25% bonus w/ upcoming DC promo) route, & see that it is included in the thread to which you've referred.

QF Millions--I note from your posts in the AmEx forum that your average charges have resulted in your earning 1 million MR points every ~6 months.

Given that kind of charge history, & if it is anticipated to continue, I would think that your first option to go w/ is simply to "start from scratch" w/ a Starwood AmEx card, for the following reasons:

Even w/ what appears to be the most point-conserving conversion re: MR->DL->DC->AA, you still end up sacrificing over 1 million miles (OUCH).

If AA is going to discontinue their lifetime elite program, I would think that there would be some sort of announcement & associated timeframe prior to which it would actually be terminated (if such a thing even occurs)--if such were to happen, you could begin dumping/converting the points immediately. In the mean time, you can have them & the associated flexibility re: redemption, & begin placing your AmEx charges on a Starwood AmEx card (again, you'd have a 5,000 mile bonus for every 20,000 transferred, & you'd also have the option to leave some in place for hotel award stays [oh, how I envy the points balance you could maintain http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif ]).

There's obviously no guarantee re: that any termination of AA's lifetime elite program would be preceded by a "grace period" of sorts during which final mileage transfers could take place.

BUT, in the end, it really comes down to whether you consider lifetime elite status to be worth sacrificing 1.125 million miles for. Given the average monthly charges you've sustained over the last 18 months (plus?), you could obviously regain a sizable balance quickly, & may understandably consider the sacrifice to be worth it.

Regardless of whether you go w/ a Starwood AmEx card, I would also concur that obtaining a Diners Club card would be worth it--having a Club Rewards account available for conversions would add flexibility & additional options to your overall redemption possibilities, & you would also have DC-specific promos to avail yourself of, & possibly use to contribute to optimizing the gain in a given account, etc. Lastly, the DC Club Rewards program also happens to have many merchandise redemption options (as well as the infamous 1:1 conversion promo re: DC Club Rewards points to BA miles, which has taken place every year for the past few years, & has been enormously popular).

[This message has been edited by ILTE_Miles (edited 07-28-2001).]

Guess I must be missing something here, but isn't it a FREQUENT FLYER program? Not a FREQUENT EGGO EATER program, or even a FREQUENT TELEPHONE COMPANY SWITCHER program, but simply if you fly a lot you get status, if not you don't, how simple can it be, people?

When you get down to it, these FF mile programs are a major bonus for airlines. They inspire a great deal of loyalty by people who fly, because we go through all kinds of contortions to stay with our favorite FF program.

They sell tickets to people who don't need to travel, beacuse we make mileage runs.

When other merchants offer miles-for-purchases programs, AA gets paid for every one of those points that are being handed out.

The famous Pudding Guy did AA a huge favor by forcing the maker of Healthy Choice to pay a large sum of cash to AA to pay for all those miles he got.

When I use my CitiAA card to make purchases, I'm doing AA a favor by letting them collect a percentage fee from all my purchases.

So while people who earn miles the hard way (by flying) may have a valid complaint against non-flying mile-accumulators, AA certainly doesn't have any. The more miles get handed out via partners, the better off AA is.

yyz-den - Since you are new to these boards, are you not aware that AA is the only program that does award status based on a total accumulation of points even if none came from flying. So, we are answering the question that was initially asked. The answer is YES. AA!

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DtG