When American AAdvantage announced details of their 2015 program, and how they would integrate with US Airways Dividend Miles we learned that:
- The programs would combine in the second quarter of 2015
- Members would be able to link their American AAdvantage and US Airways Dividend Miles accounts before that
- But there wouldn’t be an opportunity to transfer points back and forth between the programs before the actual merger of Dividend Miles into AAdvantage
They’ll launch functionality tonight so that you can link your AAdvantage and Dividend Miles account. And you’re going to want to do this, because it’s the way you’ll make super extra darned sure everything gets combined smoothly when the programs merge.
Combining these programs is a monster data nightmare. Though I linked my America West/US Airways accounts, Delta/Northwest accounts, and United/Continental accounts when those airlines merged, I know plenty of people who didn’t and had issues.
Together AAdvantage and Dividend Miles combine to have over 100 million frequent flyer accounts. People have the same names. Addresses often match, but addresses aren’t always kept current or one account may tie to a home address while the other to an office.
There are great algorithms to solve this, and American is certainly on the ball with those. And there will be processes later to track down missing miles.
But the self-serve method is the guarantee.
A little birdie let me know that:
- Matching of accounts should go live tonight — around midnight Eastern time at AA.com and around 3am Eastern for USAirways.com.
- This functionality will be available on the websites but not mobile sites or apps.
- You’ll be presented with the option to match your accounts you log in, and there will be a ‘Match My Account’ link in the My Account section of the website.
- Once you’ve matched your US Airways and American accounts, you’ll see confirmation online, you’ll receive an email confirmation, and a success message should appear under your account at both AA.com and USAirways.com.
We’re getting close to the programs actually merging and this is one more step.
In the meantime, it’s worth recalling that it is AAdvantage account numbers that will be used when the programs do combine.
- Members who have both an AAdvantage account and a Dividend Miles account will keep their AAdvantage account number.
- Members who have a Dividend Miles account but are not currently AAdvantage members will be assigned a new AAdvantage number.
Personally even if I had only a US Airways account, I’d open an AAdvantage number and link my US Airways account to it so I knew my frequent flyer number in advance. I’d hate to have given my old Dividend Miles number to a partner in the time leading up to the merger of programs, have the miles try to credit to the old US Airways number that wasn’t linked to a new account. Legacy US Airways account numbers (from prior to the America West merger), after all, have 7 alphanumeric characters. American account numbers have 7 alphanumeric characters. I could easily see a partner sending over credit to an account number that on the American side belonged to someone else!
So cross this action item off your list and link your accounts..
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Very helpful; thanks!
When UA & CO merged I ended up with an extra 300K points. Fingers crossed for a repeat!!
Once link, will I be able to transfer points from AA to US airways to book awards prior to US airways going away
Thanks for the heads-up!
thank you for hads up!
Best,
PedroNY
Hmm…I seem to remember that when DL/NW asked you to link your accounts they offered some token amount (500 miles?) to encourage you to do it in a timely fashion….
Yes, I’m definitely waiting a bit to see if there’s a token mileage bonus for linking at some point!
My Dividend Miles will expire in April. Do I have to credit miles to DM account to keep it active? There are activities in AA account for the past 6 months.
What’s the hurry? If they’re not matching status, then I’ll wait. Maybe they’ll throw some miles at me to link later, like other airlines have done (if I recall correctly).
Just logged into my AA account (8:45 pm pst) and was prompted to add my US Airways number. Was successful after making sure all info matched each other.
It’s live now.
Is there any way to tell if linking accounts now would make it easier/possible to change which account you credit flights to.I need to change a flight from AA to US for purposes of crediting to prefered trial.
Gary,
I’m in the middle of the U.S. Plat Challenge – should I wait Til I finish on Feb 2 before linking accounts?
AA will NOT provide any bonus miles for this activity. That’s not on the cards ONE BIT. Matching accounts will help in NOT having a new ghost account which you will then need to merge with your existing AADvantage account.
Secondly, it does not solve any purpose to create a new AAdvantage account simply for this activity. It will create unnecessary IT work for the extra layer. It does not achieve anything. It sure does not hurt to do it but it’s redundant. You will know your new account number nevertheless and miles will not be combining till Q2 end.
I went ahead and jumped in and it worked flawlessly. And why didn’t I wait for some bonus? Because there was no bonus in the HP/US consolidation and I don’t expect one here.
Oh, and, finally, I’m getting close to million miler status. Years of HP, US and AA miles, together, have me less than a 100k away.
I assume that the 100k worth of QF miles from the 80s that AA has been putting on million miler ticker for 30 years are still gonna count, right?
@Atif I also can’t believe they’re not giving us anything! WN did too! Maybe I should screw up my address on purpose 😛
@Mallthus – AA hasn’t said how they’re calculating million miler status going forward but I have to imagine at a minimum they will add your current Million MIler total from AA and the same calculation from US together.
@Michael while it shouldn’t matter, there’s no reason not to wait until then
@pssteve you don’t need to link accounts to change who you are going to credit a flight to
@Atif – yes, DL/NW gave miles for linking your accounts since it does make the transition easier. DL/NW, HP/US, and UA/CO allowed moving miles back and forth between accounts.
@jan I do not expect so
>Knowledgeable said,
>AA will NOT provide any bonus miles
>for this activity.
Sure, not today. How would you know if they won’t offer something in the future? Even if it’s been decided at AA, people change their minds.
I see NO reason to link today.
@rrgg
I can tell you no bonus was awarded in the UA/CO merger and, perhaps more importantly, given that it’s the same guy in charge, no bonus in the HP/US merger.
The DL/NW merger was the outlier here.
Seriously, I think there’s a greater risk that the miles won’t be joined 1/1 than there is of there being some bonus that’ll be missed out on. (For the record, I don’t really see that as a likely outcome either.)
I linked and got two email confirmations, one from AA and one from US.
Clearly there is no incentive to do this. I’ll let them take care of this or I’ll wait until the last possible moment.
mallthus, Southwest / Airtran offered some miles. It wasn’t just DL. In any case, you’ve made your choice. I’ll continue to wait since I have nothing to lose.