American paused their mileage expiration in March due to COVID-19. Starting tomorrow, miles will begin expiring again after 18 months of inactivity. That means if you last earned or burned an AA mile in late 2018, you’ll want to earn or burn one today or they’ll be gone tomorrow!
You can view your AA mileage activity within the past 2 years here.
Most other US airlines, including Delta, JetBlue, Southwest, and United, no longer expire miles.
American has free redeposit fees for awards booked today, so if your miles are expiring, just booking an award will extend your miles. You can cancel the award at any time for free.
Or you can redeem 880 miles for an LA Times subscription for a friend in LA.
Also of note, American announced today that they will stop expiring miles of minors. Their mileage expiration clock will now begin when they turn 21, so their miles won’t expire until they turn 22.5, at the earliest. If your minor had their miles expire earlier this year, you can call American to have their miles reactivated for free.
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10 Comments On "American Miles Will Start Expiring Again Starting Tomorrow, Unless You’re Under 22.5 Years Old"
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I don’t understand- I have a mileage card with them and earn miles regularly. (I keep a recurring bill on that card to keep it active) and yet it says my miles will expire in 2021. Shouldn’t the clock reset every time a mile is earned. Why doEs it look like they have to be so stingy????
Hey doozie.
What year is 18 months from today?
Good Point(er)…
Does it update every month? Every mile?
Just bad optics that they should have any expiration date imo
I don’t see a way to get the LA Times
Enter an LA zip code?
Must have cycled out or something. There’s only the LA Daily News and Financial Times.
I did some experiments with other zips though:
Washington DC Zip:
Washington Post (delivery only)
Dallas Zip:
The Dallas Morning News
Financial Times is available in most zipcodes.
Thanks Dan! I almost missed this. You saved me a ton of miles!
Great!
AA also has a list of charities to which one can donate miles (I believe minimum of 1k) which refreshes the expiration immediately.
Award Wallet also gives 5 AA miles for comments to blog posts, which will refresh expirations, though these take up to 5 business days to post.
Rather than book and cancel, I just donated 1,000 miles to one of three charities American Airlines has relationships with. My remaining reward miles are now refreshed and good for another 18 months — and I did an easy mitzvah! (Contact AA or go online to see how.)