For Black Friday American offered to sell miles for as low as 1.77 cents, improving on the bonus they were already offering. Then since December is the New Black Friday they ran it again for December and through January 3.
Since American now runs AAdvantage more or less like US Airways Dividend Miles, regular price for miles exists only to show big discounts.
However right now they’ve pushed down the price even further for a specific number of miles purchased. Buy exactly 150,000 miles and you’ll get receive 250,000 miles for 1.72 cents apiece. (This price is still more than AAdvantage miles are worth.)
The deal is “10% off” and a bonus of ‘up to’ 100,000 miles through June 30.
Here’s the offer table:
Buying 150,000 miles and receiving 250,000 works out to a price of $4311.19 or $0.017244 apiece.
In theory at least if you use your miles for international travel you should be able to get the 7.5% excise tax back.
American Boeing 787-9 Business Class
At 1.72 cents apiece it’s a slightly better price than we’ve seen, although every month we get a new “As Seen On TV” offer from 60 Second Solutions! If you act now you get a bonus and a discount and a set of steak knives.
If you’re going to buy miles to top off an account towards an award it’s better to do it at a discount than at full price, but there’s no need to ‘jump’ on this pricing since it’s only marginally below what seems to be available much of the time (and I wouldn’t buy miles speculatively given how difficult AAdvantage award availability is for their own American Airlines flights.)
This offer can be useful though — especially to top off an account, but in some cases to buy premium cabin flights at a discount. American lets you put awards on hold for 5 days under most circumstances. So you can secure awards, then buy the miles, then go back to ticket.
American Boeing 787-9 Economy
American processes these transactions themselves. As a result purchases count as bonusable spend for credit cards that give extra miles for airline purchases. (US Airways used to sell miles via Points.com.)
Terms and conditions:
To be eligible for a the bonus miles and discount AAdvantage members must purchase 11,000 AAdvantage miles or more in a single transaction from the Buy or Gift Miles program beginning 7:00:00am CT on June 12, 2017 to 11:59:59pm CT on June 30, 2017. The prices shown include the discount. The discount applies to the AAdvantage miles purchased and does not apply towards taxes or the $30 transaction processing fee. The bonus miles earned are calculated based on each individual purchase amount and the corresponding bonus award. Bonus miles earned do not count toward the annual purchase limits. The applicable bonus miles are awarded to the recipient for Gift Miles transactions.The miles purchased with the Buy Miles program and received with the Gift Miles program do not count towards AAdvantage Gold, AAdvantage Platinum, AAdvantage Platinum Pro, AAdvantage Executive Platinum or AAdvantage Million MilerSM status qualification. Transactions are nonrefundable and nonreversible. The miles successfully purchased or transferred usually post to the designated account right away, but please allow up to 8 hours for processing. Each AAdvantage member is limited to purchasing or receiving in a calendar year, a combined total of no more than 150,000 AAdvantage miles. Miles purchased through the Buy Miles program or received as a gift through the Gift Miles program count against this total. A confirmation email will be sent to the primary buyer/gifter and/or recipient, using the email address(es) associated with the AAdvantage account(s) and any additional email address provided. AAdvantage accounts less than 30 days old are not permitted to Buy or Gift Miles. The price of your purchase is in U.S. dollars. Your credit card company may add a currency conversion fee.
(HT: One Mile at a Time)