Another one bites the dust. American Airlines is the latest airline to cut your frequent flyer miles’ lifespan, this time from 3 years to 18 months.
In an e-mail to members, American announced that the changes would go into effect on December 15, 2007. On that date, if your account hasn’t had any activity after June 15, 2006, your account will be zeroed out. If you’re not a recent customer, consider your past loyalty discarded.
At least they had the decency to write, though the letter essentially reads, “What have you done for me lately?”
Frequent flyers who continue to regularly earn (or spend) miles on the airline don’t have anything to worry about, since the clock is reset every time you accrue or redeem. But for infrequent flyers who are slowly collecting their points, watch the calendar.
The change follows the trend: United and US Airways have recently introduced a similar 18-month account activity window to keep miles alive. Delta’s window is 24 months. Air Canada’s is merely 12 months — and even if you remain active in their program, they expire your miles after 7 years. Nasty.
Northwest and Continental sort of have expiration policies. Your miles don’t technically expire, but if you have no activity, the account may. (Northwest’s window is 3 years, Continental’s is 18 months.) That may be a matter of semantics, but from what I’ve experienced firsthand and heard from others, they haven’t been canceling stagnant accounts wholesale. Yet. Just a matter of time, I’m sure…
The lesson: No hoarding! So spend those miles, if you have them. If you don’t have enough for a trip, and want to burn through them, consider magazines.
Related:
- AAdvantage Mileage Retention Policy (aa.com)
- United cuts the lifespan of frequent flyer miles
- Air Canada joins race to the bottom on frequent flyer mile expiration
- Reader mail: Whose miles are worth the most?
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June 3rd, 2007 at 10:20 pm
What would be really sweet of the airlines is to send me an email and tell me that miles, points, etc. are due to expire. I just noticed when I logged into my AirTran account that I lost 4 points, and I have been flying them often. Now I need to really read their program, and go through and set alerts for when miles are going to expire.
So what’s next – frequent flyer mile programs going away altogether?
mp/m
June 3rd, 2007 at 11:18 pm
It’s really frustrating that you need alerts like this, like you might get for your credit card statements, but at this rate, that’s becoming increasingly necessary.
Sorry you lost points.
June 5th, 2007 at 10:02 am
[...] Read More [...]
June 5th, 2007 at 2:18 pm
The only reason this is a problem is if you don’t fly American Airlines once every 18 months. However, you can easily get around this by applying for an American Airlines-sponsored credit card. Make one charge and payment every 18 months and you don’t have to worry about mileage expiration.
June 5th, 2007 at 2:23 pm
True, but some people might not want to spend the annual fee on such a card. So you can take a silly market research survey at OpinionPlace, earn 75 miles, and reset the clock.
The thing is, you need to stay on top of your account, one way or the other.
June 5th, 2007 at 5:30 pm
We rotate our 50 mile car rental credits through our non-primary frequent flyer accounts to keep them “active”.
December 24th, 2007 at 8:20 am
MISING MILES
January 13th, 2009 at 3:34 pm
[...] aren’t going anywhere — or taking us anywhere — fast. Instead of letting them expire worthless, donate some of those miles to a [...]