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Alaska Airlines releases new charts for how many Mileage Plan points you’ll earn when flying on American.
They aren’t too good. This isn’t really that surprising. Alaska Air wouldn’t have been smart to essentially allow American Airlines to generate revenue off of flights and then allow passengers to earn their great currency at the current levels. It’s a currency war peeps! So…here’s a quick look.
Earning up to July 31
And now starting on August 1st
The discount fares have been decimated.
I’m going to do a more in depth analysis of the chart in a later post, but I thought if you’re trying to find fares now that will qualify at the 100% level post August maybe I could be of some service.
Here is a look at how to use the ITA Matrix to search for American Airlines flights from LAX-ORD
As you can see here I clicked on advanced routing codes and added in aa+. This is the ITA advanced routing code for flights that are codeshare with american airlines, or rather, flights that have American flight numbers. I also did the search from August 6th and specified a 1-7 night stay.
This search will yield these results:
Now if we search for American flights that earn 100% miles on Alaska we need to search for specific fare classes or buckets: H,K,L,W,Y
The way you go about doing this and specifying American code shares is shared below.
- specify aa+
- add in / f bc= ( then whichever fare code you want) if you want to search another use | to separate
Now the prices are staggeringly different. Ugh, this doesn’t bode well for earning tons of Alaska Miles and MVP Gold 75 next year.
Just for kicks I searched for 75% levels: G and V fare classes.
These options aren’t really that much more expensive than the lowerst fares we saw above.
The big question remains as to whether these changes are going to affect Elite mileage accrual levels.
Alaska miles are intrinsically more valuable because of their redemption options, so earning the same quantity of Alaska as American would put you ahead in value earned.
I spoke to a rep on the phone and she seemed to think that it only relates to Redeemable and not Elite qualifying. That’s good news if true! It’s also unclear how Elite bonuses will be calculated
I spoke with the same rep and asked her how an MVP Gold or Gold 75 would earn miles. She didn’t seem to know and said that they were still sussing it out. I’ll call Mileage Plan tomorrow and ask someone else and see if there are any updates.
In the above scenario we can examine how someone who is Platinum and MVP Gold would earn miles on an AA flight in fare bucket G or V post doomsday… I mean August 1st.
American =
- RDM =8*407 ( or there abouts) = 3256
- EQM = 3490 r/t
- EQD = $407
Alaska = let’s speculate the Elite is based on actual miles and Gold bonus is 100% of RDM.
- RDM = 3490 ( r/t mileage) *0.75 = 2617.5 + MVP bonus of 2617.5 = 5235
- Elite = 3490
There is a clear advantage if the Elite bonus is based off of your earning. You’d be earning nearly 2000 more Alaska miles and Alaska miles are more valuable. It’s worth now searching for fare buckets more aggressively and then making an assessment as to whether paying more money to earn more miles is worth it.
Use ITA Matrix to search for fare classes that earn you more miles. Make an informed choice on your fare. Don’t forget to use BookWithMatrix for an easy booking.
Opinions, reviews, analyses & recommendations are the author’s alone, and have not been reviewed, endorsed or approved by any of these entities.
Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card
Welcome Offer
Earn 60,000 bonus points after you spend $4,000 on purchases in the first 3 months from account opening.
Annual Fee
$95
Points Earned
Transferrable Chase Ultimate Rewards
- 5x on all travel purchased through Chase Travel℠
- 3x on dining, including eligible delivery services for takeout & dining out
- 3x on select streaming services
- 3x on online grocery purchases
- (excluding Target, Walmart and wholesale clubs)
- $50 Annual Chase Travel Hotel Credit via Chase Travel℠
- The begins immediately for new cardmembers and after your account anniversary for existing cardmembers
- 2x on all other travel
- 10% Anniversary Bonus
- Every year you keep the card, your total spend will yield a 10% points bonus. If you spend $10k in a year, you’ll get 1k bonus points
- Chase Sapphire Preferred continues to redeem at 1.25c in the Chase Travel℠ and the slew of other benefits remain in tact including Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver ( primary ), purchase protections, etc.
- Points are transferrable to 14 Ultimate Rewards partners
- Redeem in Chase Travel℠ for 1.25 cents per point
- No foreign transaction fees
- Suite of Travel and Purchase Coverage
- Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver is my favorite
- Get complimentary access to DashPass which unlocks $0 delivery fees and lower service fees for a minimum of one year when you activate by December 31, 2027.
- $95 Annual Fee
We keep an up to date spreadsheet that lists the best ever offers: You can find that spreadsheet here.
Historically 80k is a very, very good offer and hit in both 2022 and 2023. In 2021, we saw the offer hit an all time high of 100k. Who knows if that will ever come back.
Main Cast:
Cards that earn flexible points and should be used on the bulk of your purchases.
Supporting Cast:
Cards that earn fixed points in the currency of the airline/hotel and can not be transferred at attractive rates. These cards yield benefits that make it worth keeping, but not necessarily worth putting a lot of your everyday spend on.
The Chase Sapphire Preferred® is exceptional starter card and offers transferrable Ultimate Rewards, and pairs well with other Chase cards.
If you carry this card alongside Chase’s cashback cards like the Chase Freedom Flex® and Chase Freedom Unlimited® or the business versions: Ink Business Cash® , Ink Business Unlimited® you can combine the points into Preferred account and transfer into hotel and airline partners
Annual fee is quite low at $95 a year + you get a 10% anniversary bonus on points + $50 hotel credit in Chase travel.
The responses below are not provided or commissioned by the bank advertiser. Responses have not been reviewed, approved, or otherwise endorsed by the bank advertiser. It is not the bank advertiser's responsibility to ensure all posts and/or questions are answered.