Battle With the Bank

[Lucky]

Frequent flyer miles can be had for lots of things besides flying, and I have accumulated tons of them by opening credit card accounts, checking accounts, and taking advantage of other offers. Our flight to Brazil was only 40,000 miles each. The catch was that the return trip was horrible. We were to fly GRU to DFW, stay there 12 hours, then fly to SFO, where we were to spend the night before flying home the next day in the afternoon. But, wisely, I went to the AA offices at the GRU airport, pointed out the lousy schedule, and got us rerouted directly home after going through customs at DFW. Not bad.

But this post isn't about that anyway. On my United Mileage Plus page there was an offer of 50,000 miles for opening an Explorer credit card. Usually it is only 30,000, and the account I previously had opened, (and closed) only offered me 25,000 miles. So, I figured that they must want me back to offer me 50,000 miles. I was wrong. They let me open the account, spend the $2000 in qualifying purchases, and then denied me the 50,000 miles on the grounds that I had previously been rewarded when I opened the first account. Well, of course I protested, and they responded by citing the rule that only one offer was good in a 2 year period and I had had mine.

So I wrote back and said, yes, but! You only gave me 25,000 miles, and now you are offering 50,000. You should at least give me the extra 25,000 so that I, too, got a total of 50,000 miles. They wrote back- I didn't fight this by email- and said okay, we will make an exception and give you the extra 25,000 miles. You know, that's often good for a free coach ticket domestically, nothing to sneeze at, right?

So now my bank and I are on good terms again, and now I need to plan another trip. It goes to show that you shouldn't always take the first rejection!

[JKane]

I got ~225k miles on AA during a period a couple years ago where they (w/Citibank) were throwing them at you. You can often get multiple cards including a business card (at most you need an EIN) to maximize the take, just remember you'll have to hit the minimum spend on each to get its prize. And, as Lucky discovered, know the limits/restrictions if you're closing / reopening.

A great place to find out about how to get the most and make the most of miles is Flyertalk.

Also remember miles can expire, so it's good to have at least one mileage transaction every couple months. So keep one credit card that gives you 1 point per dollar or something, or use something like AAdvantage dining or shopping.

[eeyore]

Great tips! Thanks for sharing. I've turned into a miles whore lately. It's turned into a kind of fun hobby. I think I need to design a flow chart though to keep all the ducks in a row.