AAdvantage® Million Miler Program Launches on 12/1/11

This really doesn't strike me as that big of a deal.

There are few other ways to earn MM status on other carriers beyond BIS miles. I imagine there were very few (but not none) people who were flying AA simply because their card spend or bank direct points also earned MM status. (I also suspect essentially all of that small number of people are posters here or on tobb.)

I reached 1mm myself inadvertently on AA through some unusually heavy Citi spending back in '07. I did focus some spending on Citi's AA-branded card to hit 2mm in '09, but only after I figured this "trick" out. I really felt it was a trick at the time - and thought then (and continue to think) that the market for MM status has moved to BIS miles.

While undoubtedly this egregious change will cause a few people to change their flying, spending and savings patterns, we are talking about 0.01% (or so) of the population. Against that, the problem of swelling of gold and platinum ranks is one that snowballs as more and more pax (or non-pax, in the case of the likes or Mr Pickles) reach the threshold.

While one could suggest I am biased having already reached LT Plat and that there there will be some short term backlash at the margins, to me, AA made the right long term decision on this one. I also applaud AA's handling of the change, confirming all existing achievements will be honored and giving a multi-month grace period for those in sight of a hurdle.

With all your respect, I would never hire you for a CFO!!!

Yup I'm serious.

I think MPers/FTers tend to greatly overestimate our numbers. AA will gain revenue in the next 3 months as some people scramble for miles. After that some revenue will die down but that'll be offset over time because at the end of the day the number of people who will change their behavior is minimal.

That being said I agree that some changes should be considered to what is proposed, the shift from easiest to hardest is a bit much.

As far as non-flying elites go, what could be the problem? They may buy120,000 smoothies and be Lifetime Titaniums to AA's computer system, but being non-flying types, they don't compete with you for lounge space or upgrades as real flyers might.

Well, it's going to take a combination of different offers and purchases, credit cards, AA dining, sky mall purchases, maybe a mortgage refinancing, etc.

If you can afford it, here's a way of getting up to 500,000 of the miles:

https://www.nfcr.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=694

Ten miles per dollar contributed to the National Foundation for Cancer Research (up to 500,000 miles per year, I'm told). Now, if you're contributing cash, that's gonna cost you $50K to get the 500K miles. Of course, you get a charitable deduction on your taxes, but it's still quite a cash outlay to come up with before December.

It's easier if you have capital assets (like stock or mutual funds) that have appreciated. If you've held the asset for a year or more, you can contribute the asset itself and get credit for current fair market value. You get the charitable deduction and the miles and never have to pay capital gains tax on the appreciation.

If you're interested, you could contact the organization to have them help you work through how to make the donation.

______________________
MM=> UA 109%, AA 203%

And US has the stingiest MM program of them all: Lifetime Silver for 1MM BIS miles on their metal only, excluding any COS bonuses, with no added benefits (i.e. no systemwides)......and nothing beyond Lifetime Silver.

Soooooo.....it definitely could be worse.

Redeeming on AA, since you can only redeem SAAver awards, this isn't the case. They're also cheaper to South America.

TATL. Not domestic or SA via AA or LAN, respectively.

Oh? That seems to be the primary use for BA miles for UK-based BAEC members. What qualifies it as a joke?

FWIW, my primary account is AA because of status. My wife is AA for now, also because of status. My daughter is BA. When my wife's status expires, her primary will switch to BA. BAEC household redemptions are powerful, especially for domestic AA travel.

I think the actual situation is far more complex than that, given that you only have to earn 1MM on UA for mid-tier lifetime status, and you have to earn 2MM on AA for comparable status. For some members, those who fly heavily on partner airlines, AA would be easier (but remember that not all partner airlines earn 100% base miles on all fares). For other members, who fly heavily on AA metal, it will be harder to attain mid-tier status on AA than it would be on UA. If I were guessing, I would guess that there would be a lot more AAdvantage members in the second catagory than in the first.

Personally, I already have 2MM, but if starting over, it would be very difficult to attain under these new rules. I first flew AA in 1949. Since then, the number of base miles I have through paid flights on AA partners is about 800, on interisland flights on HA.

In my opinion, the easiest way to make AA comparable to UA would be to limit the miles that count to miles earned by flying, but include all miles earned by flying - COS bonuses, elite status bonuses, other bonuses. For some members, UA would still be easier, for some AA would be easier, probably would balance out. Frankly, I think we have all been surprised that AA hasn't eliminated miles from 3rd party sources before now, so on those I take the attitude expressed upthread that I'm glad they were there while they were there, and I don't mourn their passing excessively. But the MM levels on AA are out of line with the industry if base miles only are included an it takes 2MM of them to get mid-tier, it puts AA in an uncompetitive position. As it now stands, AA has gone from the easiest program to make lifetime status on to the most difficult in one fell swoop. Of course, that may have been their intention, we don't know. If it was their intention, they have succeeded admirably, IMO.

Give it a few weeks and UA's MM program might look a lot different if they adopt CO's current model.

I concur. AA has been losing money for many years and needs to run their airline as a business. While we may be personally unhappy with some of these changes we have to respect their need to make the best decisions they can on how to run their airline. Time will tell how strategically shrewd these decisions ultimately are.

I feel that Maya has been extremely thoughtful and professional in first telegraphing potential changes were coming months ago and now providing us with a three month lead time before they are implemented. She has sat down with us, followed up with this thread and seems extremely open to constructive advice from experienced users on how she can make their program better. This is a nice contrast to many other big organizations and I think we should treat her with similar respect as we offer her our best advice.

I have not been buying the insane fares lately. I requalified with CA runs earlier in the year when I was able to find semi reasonable fares.

But one of the benefits of having the AA credit card is that 100 off cert from the recent promo. Basically unusable.

Look. I'll admit I was already looking to tell AA to take a hike. And for me, this is the last straw. See Microwave's post on page 4. He breaks down everything I've been saying. This instantly went from a great (over generous in my opinion) thing to the absolute worst.

I will continue to take what I can get from AA. Mistake to europe, i'm in. If they ever run a promo not limited to CA TX and IL residents, I'll consider.

But as AA stands today, Karma.

Half right.

AA had to change the program. But they went and made it twice as hard as most of the other airlines.

Very well said Gemac

I don't think my two cents will add a whole lot new to the thread. The change to the Million Miler program is long overdue, IMO. It's been very generous for quite some time, and I've been able to earn my wife and daughter a pretty decent chunk of miles towards lifetime Gold on AA. Neither one of them will get it before the window closes, but I'm thankful for the time I've had to work on it.

While I do agree with others that have stated AA is now more restrictive than others, such as UA, I'm okay with their changes for a couple of reasons:

1. I already have Lifetime Plat. I'm thrilled that it's significantly harder for someone else to qualify in the future. Nothing personal to anyone else, but I want Plat to mean something 10 years from now. And, the more people that can qualify, the less likely it is that will be the case.

2. Right now, I clear virtually 100% of my upgrades as an EXP, and I cleared 80% when I was Plat. It may just be my travel patterns, but as Prem Exec on UA over the last year, my upgrade percentage has been nowhere near 80%. When I do make a soft landing to Lifetime Plat (which I hope doesn't happen for a long time), I want to know I'll be able to achieve that upgrade percentage.

I'm aggressively pursuing Lifetime Diamond status with Hyatt right now. Part of why I value it so highly is because it appears to be a very small group of people that have qualified. Knowing I have a fighting chance to achieve it, I'm looking forward to a status I can carry into retirement that carries significant value. I think AA has helped make my existing Lifetime Plat more valuable with the changes today.

In the end, would I like to see elite status bonuses or COS bonuses included for Million Miler status? I guess I would lean towards yes, as it'll be a lot harder to get my wife and daughter to Lifetime Gold without it. But, in the end, it's only a lean for me, as I still think that might be outweighed by my desire not to bloat the Lifetime ranks.

David - your understanding is correct!

Hmm. Just wondering. Does this include JetBlue, even though those aren't EQMs?

Really? so what happens when they decide to redeeem the miles they accumulated?
Perhaps it might not affect EXPs but the jumping up and down and screaming seen here is relative to LT Plat or Gold is not?
I personally know of dozens of folks in the Caribbean who have accumulated millions of AA miles by the RBC (or is it BNS?) credit cards and LT plat status and the only time they fly AA is to spend those miles.

My final thoughts on the whole issue of LT Plat/Gold is that you all were warned well over a year and some of the notable complainers on the this very thread dismissed the warning as nonsense.

AA telegraphed that changes were imminent some two months ago ( and the prevarication still continued) and now has given three months for members to take necessary action to achieve such.

From where I sit anyone who wanted to achieve the status and have not or unable to do so have only themselves to blame.

I think you're correct, although I'll go a step further and lobby for the elimination of the overly complex and confusing concept of EQPs altoghether; I can't think of another major US domestic airline that has such a third option for elite qualifying, and it's really just an excuse to avoid making COS bonuses elite qualifying. Since one of the main objectives of elite status is to drive loyalty, it would make sense to reward those who fly on paid F and J fares for business with elite qualifying COS bonuses rather than EQP bonuses, since the latter are often wiped out when deep discount tickets are purchased for personal travel while that wouldn't be the case for elite qualifying COS bonuses. Just my two pence.

Some disjointed thoughts on this....

1) The goal of an FF program is partially to reward loyalty, but more as an incentive for you to spend more on the airline. Granting LT status creates an incentive only up to the point where you achieve the tier, it's pure benefits for loyalty after that. AA has long limited the benefits of LT status by not granting LT EXP. EXP is all about incentive. Granting only gold or platinum is all about incentive. All this does is move LT status more from the "incentive" bucket to the "loyalty" bucket.

2) The program has been unpublished, meaning it could have disappeared tomorrow with no notice. This makes it published and unlikely to disappear.

3) I'd bet that we'll see changes in the Citi program & debit program as the result of the swipe-fee changes. USAA has already ended their rewards program on debit cards, I wouldn't be surprised for others to follow.

4) My miles are all BIS. The extra credit for status bonus miles has been nice, but is more generous than other airlines. (Note: at my current travel pace, I'll be somewhere between 900,000 and 950,000 LT miles by Dec 1, so I'm still short of LT Gold). I don't buy miles - that's really a losing deal given that it only achieves Gold status, which provides very limited benefits. Practically, LT Platinum is out of reach for me, especially now.

5) Delta is no "winner" either. Yes, it allows credit for class-of-service bonus toward status & lifetime, and yes, it allows one to earn qualifying miles at certain credit-card spending thresholds, but that's it (except for promotions). DL offers unlimited domestic upgrades at all status levels, but the international upgrades are far worse than AA - if you can even get them.

6) Until recently, award availability has been better on AA than DL. I've noticed that AA is significantly worse lately for international premium cabin award availability than DL - and DL remains notoriously bad.

7) if you want to see "devaluation" and "screwing the elites", go look and see what DL has done to award travel cancellations/changes within 72 hours of travel (when they make the most "low" award seats available). Unlike AA, DL gave essentially no notice of the change. One can lose tens-of-thousands of dollars worth of FF points if one needs to cancel on DL within 72 hours.

8) With consolidation in the industry, there is less need for FF programs, and the airlines can reduce benefits much easier. DL (and UA) are headed that direction with their programs. Consolidation is rarely consumer-friendly. As all the programs become less beneficial for customers, there will be further revenue dislocation as customers move to the cheapest carriers that meet their schedule. There is a move away from loyalty as a way to keep business, much the same way as "market share" has been dumped as a goal.

9) IMHO, all AA has done is make it harder to get lifetime status. Everyone else went there a long time ago. The question is whether it's worth trying to achieve.

Random thoughts, YMMV.

Hi, AmericanAirlines. Thanks for continuing to answer questions on this topic, as we are all trying to understand how the new system will work. My question is this: when you say that " just BIS miles" count (with the credit card exception that you then explained), do BIS miles count on partner airlines or is it base miles earned? Perhaps an example will make my question clearer: Assume that a passenger flies on an I fare NRT-SIN next year on JL metal and a JL coded flight (not a codeshare). BIS miles is 3324. Because the fare is discount business class, it earns base miles at 55% on JL, or 1829 miles. Which number counts towards Million Miler status - BIS of 3324 or base miles of 1829? When I first read your original post, I focused on the base miles and thought that would be it, but in rereading it I noticed the BIS comment and I am now confused. Could you please clarify? Thanks.

D word.

(devaluation)

**NICELY PUT!**

On FlyerTalk, the American Airlines rep said I could transfer my eight 500-mile American Airlines upgrade certificates issued when you achieve 1,000,000 miles to 35,000 AAdvantage miles.

To do this, simply call AAdvantage Customer Service at 1-800-882-8880 (say “AAdvantage Account” when prompted at the Main Menu) to request this transaction

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/16993110-post440.html