Yesterday Hawaiian Airlines sent out an email announcing that you could now earn Hawaiian Miles through their shopping portal for making Amazon purchases, two miles per dollar spent.
This created a bit of an online stir because most folks didn’t realize that you could earn miles for Amazon purchases, while most online merchants have some sort of rewards affiliation — be it through the various loyalty program affiliate malls or through cash back sites like Big Crumbs and Ebates (I usually still use EV Reward to identify who is offering the most lucrative cash back or mileage rewards deal for a given purchase) — Amazon hasn’t really needed to pay out referral commissions which these sites kick back a portion of to consumers.
JohnDeere19 posted yesterday on Milepoint that Amazon purchases actually earn one mile per dollar through the US Airways shopping mall (powered by Skymall). I was aware of this but hadn’t realized what a big deal this was for people until how excited I saw folks get over earning Hawaiian Miles of all things.
Now, Hawaiian offers two miles per dollar and US Airways only one. But unless you’re specifically topping off an existing Hawaiian Miles balance I’d stick with US Airways with its much broader array of international partners and ability to combine partners on awards.
The overall point remains, always check to see what points or cash back you can earn from online purchases. Even Amazon offers something. So don’t leave points on the table. And be a little bit strategic about what points you earn, especially for purchases that will yield just a few miles — can you use the purchase to extend the validity of an account (credit to an account whose miles will expire in a few months and that you don’t have other planned activity in) or to top off an account you’re looking to redeem an award with, and compare who is offering the most lucrative incentive e.g. 2 versus 5 miles per dollar.
Glad to share the Amazon offer with y’all, since I know that so many make purchases through them in the regular course of their week.
Update: I see that Million Mile Secrets has also posted about earning miles from Amazon purchases via the US Airways mall.
I have always felt the nice thing about hawaiian miles is they transfer 1:2 to hilton. So effectively since you get 2 Hawaiian miles per dollar at amazon you are getting 4 hilton points per dollar, which is not a bad deal at all. If you used a hilton credit card for the purchase you could get at least 3 more hilton points per dollar. Even though hilton points aren’t as valuable as some others its not a bad deal!
Ughhh wish I had seen this last week. I just bought a $1,300 Mac through Amazon!
Don’t quite understand (“of all things”) the condescension toward the HA miles opportunity. Even if one doesn’t redeem air awards on HA or their partners, the ability to move HA miles to HHonors at 1:2 is very, very handy for some of us.
@gack that’s great and as a former resident of Hawaii no doubt you’ve found real usefulness in their program but it won’t let you mix partners, its award chart won’t even service many destinations, and isn’t cheap for a large number of awards. My point is that it’s going to be of limited usefulness to *most* readers. I think the US Airways earning opportunity is far more useful. That’s not condescending at all.
If you have a family and fly to Hawaii occasionally you can get decent value out of the Hawaiian program, particularly if you get the credit card as well. It allows you to pool miles between members.
i wish i had known this before! stupid ev reward doesn’t list any amazon miles earning options at all.
is there another website similar to ev reward that has all the information?
thank you.
Agree on the Hhonors conversion opportunity. Being in the Pacific Northwest and an AS elite, USAirways miles aren’t that useful.
Hawaiian miles aren’t that useful either, but the conversion to Hhonors points is.
Signed up for an Hawaiian account just for earnings via Amazon. Thanks for the heads up.
@David US Airways miles = United, Lufthansa, Continental, and others from Seattle, no reason to fly US Airways. But if Hawaiian miles work out for you, rock on! 🙂
Cool! I’ve been looking for a reason to dump my amazon.com card and its 3% back on amazon purchases. getting 2 US points per purchase is nearly 3% back and allows me to cancel my amazon card to open up another chase “hole”.
If you, or someone you know, has an Amazon Associates account for their website or similar business and you can get the referral fees passed onto you, that’s the better option. Associates referral fees generally range from 4% to 8%, providing a much nicer return than a couple of miles.
It doesn’t work with Corporate American Express
@Gary I already have a United account that I’m trying to burn miles from. No need for a USAirways account that will amount to nothing when I’ve got that UA account.
Now 0.5 mile per dollar at Amazon.com