The Air Canada Aeroplan program used to be a fantastic program up until they devalued their award chart substantially in July 2011, and then started imposing fuel surcharges on award tickets later that year. Currently, there’s only a handful of Star Alliance airlines that they do not charge fuel surcharges on. These include US Airways, United, Turkish, TAM, TACA, South African, SAS, Ethiopian, Croatia, Copa, Brussels, Air New Zealand, and Aegean. As a result of the award chart devaluation and new fuel surcharges, the value of Aeroplan miles decreased drastically. People with loads of Aeroplan miles were looking for new ways to get value out of their devalued miles.
One of the ways to get somewhat decent value out of these miles was to transfer them to US Airways miles at a favorable ratio of 1 Aeroplan mile to 0.84 US Airways Dividend miles through Points.com. For example, 50,000 Aeroplan miles yielded 42,000 US Airways miles. Although too many people didn’t know about that technique, those that did also knew this was a great way to transfer Membership Rewards points to US Airways miles. Since Membership Rewards do not transfer directly to US Airways, but do transfer to Aeroplan in a 1:1 ratio, one could transfer 1 Membership Rewards Point –> 1 Aeroplan mile –> 0.84 US Airways miles through Points.com.
Well, the ability to transfer Aeroplan Miles to US Airways at a (1 : 0.84 ratio) still exists through Points.com. Take a look at the image below. If you exchanged 100,000 Aeroplan miles:
- to US Airways, you would get 84,011 US Airways miles
- directly to American Airlines, you would only get 37,388 American miles (You don’t want to do this)
This old technique has new implications now that US Airways and American Airlines are merging. Any Aeroplan miles that you convert to US Airways will eventually become American miles. It means that if you exchanged 100,000 Aeroplan miles to US Airways, you would get 84,011 US Airways miles which will eventually become 84,011 American Airline miles, much better than the 37,388 miles if exchanged directly.
Why one might want to convert Aeroplan miles to US Airways miles (eventually American miles)?
- You may not be finding good value out of your Aeroplan miles due to the award chart devaluation and high fuel surcharges
- You may just have a ton of Aeroplan miles sitting around
- US Airways currently does not charge fuel surcharges on partner award tickets
- A same award booked through US Airways may be much cheaper than through Aeroplan (US to China, Tokyo, Hong Kong costs 90,000 US Airways miles in business class vs. 125,000 Aeroplan miles)
- The value of American miles is going to increase due to the merger and the expanded route network
- You may value the Oneworld Alliance more than the Star Alliance
- American one-way awards are cheaper than Aeroplan one-way awards
How to convert Aeroplan miles to US Airways miles:
- Get a Points.com account
- Add both your Aeroplan account number and US Airways account number to your Points.com account
- Perform the exchange by going through the “Trade, exchange, and buy” tab.
Things to consider:
- You need a minimum of 15,000 Aeroplan miles to perform the exchange.
- You can convert 50,000 Aeroplan miles at a time.
- There is no fee to do this.
Summary
If you have a ton of Aeroplan miles sitting around or can’t find value in them, convert them through Points.com to US Airways miles (eventually American Airlines miles) at a ratio of 1 Aeroplan mile : 0.84 US Airways miles. Although you are taking a 16% concrete mileage loss, this may be a decent transfer depending on how you value your miles. Do your own math to make sure it’s worth it to you. Keep in mind the merger still has a long way to go, so Aeroplan to American is certainly not an instant exchange.