Keeping AA miles alive
 

DD and I have miles with AA that are going to expire in Feb if there's no activity on our accounts. There is almost zero possibility we will be booking flights before then. I just got an email today from AA with a "bonus miles if you buy or gift miles" offer.

We have enough miles that I'd hate to lose them - would doing a gift from my account to hers (with the subsequent bonus miles going in to my account) be counted as 'activity' on BOTH our accounts, thus keeping them from expiring?

Yes, any activity whatsoever - in both accounts, will extend your miles. The buy/gift option is one, but if you don't want to go that far, just log onto AA's shopping network - https://www.aadvantageeshopping.com/ - and any transaction - buy some flowers or buy anything through any of their sponsored retail outlets - will do the trick. Buy some light bulbs at Home Depot or do some holiday shopping online at Kmart or Best Buy... dozens of places that will award miles with your purchases.

Oh, that would be much easier! Thanks for that, gardyloo.

This just reminded me - I needed to keep some USAir miles "alive" until they're deposited next year in my AA account. So went online just now and bought vitamins I buy online anyway, same price, through the Dividend Miles Storefront, the USAir shopping site. Thanks, txgirlinbda, for the reminder.

You can also join their dining program and go have a beer at a bar or a burger. That counts.

Why not get an Aadvantage credit card -- the $75 fee ought to be worth it to get an extra 40,000 to 50,000 miles? And possibly they are waiving the fee for the first year. And then you can just charge a coffee at Starbucks to keep up your account. The IDine or Shopping programs are easy and free though.

I use airline account shopping to keep miles live, gift cards for places I shop and also lrder my Kcups from Bed Bath and Beyond which offers free shipping for them, Easy.

I renewed our USAir miles with the dining option. Need to register a different card for each member account. Bought a $4.99 breakfast at Denny's two different times. Cheapest way to renew that I could find.
Not sure if AA works the same way.

bookmarking

I agree about getting a credit card get the card get an introductory bonus offer use it once a month or maybe even less and you're all set

"...use it once a month or maybe even less..."

I don't understand this approach when every dollar you spend becomes more miles. Or 2 or 3 on the shopping site. I put my entire life on my AA card. Why would I not? Please explain, I could just be missing your point.

I'm guessing that the idea was jacketwatch might be one of those people who prefer cash back to miles from credit cards. I'm not, as I'd much rather use X number of miles for a $10,000 ticket than to get back maybe $500 to use towards a ticket. Many discussions here have shown that some prefer what we consider "greater value" of using the miles and some prefer getting cash back to use, without regard to how much more "value" you could get using them as miles. But again, value is different to different people.

Thanks, NeoPatrick. I'm with you on this one, no contest. Maybe cash back seems a good idea for the indecisive among us.

We use our mileage card for everything even buying a couple coffee but what I've mad is that that's the minimum usage that you need I think in most cases to keep the account active

Let's try this again as voice recognition didn't work so well I meant to say that we use it for everything even a cup of coffee and I meant to say that minimum usage of I think once a month is enough to keep your miles after

Well so much for voice recognition and I think you know what I mean. :D

Got it. Even once every 18 months should work to keep miles from disappearing.

True. I agree about using miles and saving more money. We have gone to India twice on biz class tickets using miles and man the savings is tremendous.