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American Airlines offers discounted MileSAAver awards within the United States and Canada to select cardholders, including people with the Citi® / AAdvantage® Executive World Elite™ MasterCard®, the Citi® / AAdvantage® Platinum Select® MasterCard® and the CitiBusiness® / AAdvantage® Platinum Select® World MasterCard®.
With all of those cards, you can book one way awards within the USA and Canada for as little as 6,500 miles for flights less than 500 miles flown or 8,750 miles one way for longer flights.
Every two months, American Airlines publishes a list of new destinations in the United States and Canada eligible for discounted awards. The current list covers awards that must be booked by May 31, 2015 for travel by July 31, 2015.
Award travel must originate somewhere in the continental United States or Canada and must go to a city on the very long destination list. Awards can be booked one way for 8,750 miles in economy or 21,250 miles in First Class. Roundtrip awards are double those prices.
You have to call American Airlines at 800-882-8880 to book the discounted awards. Luckily American Airlines just eliminated the phone booking fee for awards that can’t be booked online!
Here is the full list of discounted destinations for April through July. Not all destinations are discounted each month. For instance, Calgary is only discounted in April and May while Burbank is discounted all four months.
How Good Are These Awards?
Let’s say you have the Citi® / AAdvantage® Platinum Select® MasterCard®.
You decide to go from New York to Burbank (the most convenient airport to Hollywood) with your miles.
You pick out your American Airlines-operated flights with MileSAAver space.
At this point, you do NOT complete the purchase. Purchasing online will cost 25,000 miles. You have to call in to get your discount: 800-882-8880.
You book the roundtrip for 17,500 miles and $11.20. You use about 1/3 of the 50,000 mile bonus you got from the Citi® / AAdvantage® Platinum Select® MasterCard®.
- Because you have the Citi® / AAdvantage® Platinum Select® MasterCard®, you get an automatic 10% rebate on the award that is deposited into your account in a few weeks. That makes the net cost only 15,750 miles for a roundtrip.
- Because you have the Citi® / AAdvantage® Platinum Select® MasterCard®, you get a free checked bag in both directions, saving you $50 roundtrip.
United and Delta charge at least 25,000 miles roundtrip for domestic awards.
Short Haul Example
During the March 22 American Airlines Devaluation, there were some silver linings. One is that domestic awards under 500 miles cost only 7,500 AA miles one way. If you fly such an award to a discounted city, you get 1,000 miles off per direction, bringing the price to 6,500 American Airlines miles. If you have the Citi® / AAdvantage® Platinum Select® MasterCard®, you get a 10% rebate on redemptions, bringing the net price to 5,850 AA miles one way. The same flights would be 7,500 Avios or 12,500 United or Delta miles.
Bottom Line
Discounted domestic and Canada MileSAAver awards open to American Airlines credit card holders are a fantastic deal.
If you need to book a domestic award, see make sure to check what destinations are discounted. If your destination is on the very long list, you can save big miles.
Key Links
- Here is the full list of discounted destinations for April through July
- Application Link: Citi® / AAdvantage® Executive World Elite™ MasterCard®
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Editorial Disclaimer: The editorial content is not provided or commissioned by the credit card issuers. Opinions expressed here are the author’s alone, not those of the credit card issuers, and have not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by the credit card issuers.
The comments section below is 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 questions are answered.
Long list but mostly two-bit cities (no offense to youse guys in Laredo, TX and Garden City, KS) but I’m heading for SFO and paying full price, unfortunately.
Full price is probably not a good use of miles. Try to book with Arrival miles instead (or something similar.)
Hi Scott
any advice if it is cheaper to fly out of LAX to Quebec using miles or simply cheaper to pay out of pocket….?
And is it worth it spending tix for biz class since it is only a few hours or is there another way of spending less $ or using less miles to get a biz seat ???
I have AA and UA miles
Thank you
You have the prices in front of you, so I couldn’t give any advice. Only you know your subjective valuations of your miles and your comfort.
I tried to book DCA to PWM in June (the biz class award, economy not available) – was told I couldn’t because both cities need to be on list. That has never been true in the past, has it? I called again and was rejected again. If they changed this to be from listed city to listed city it would now be pretty useless.
That’s not correct
Or so i thought when I gave up on the first person. 2nd said the same, both put me on hold to check with another desk. You might want to try. In any case, for 2000 miles I decided to not invest another 30 mins. I could email a complaint but first I’d want to hear recent contrary experiences.