by Mia Taylor
Last updated: 2:30 PM ET, Thu April 6, 2023
American Airlines is officially doing away with its traditional frequent flyer award chart and shifting entirely to a dynamic rewards system that fluctuates based on supply and demand.
Starting yesterday, the carrier began publishing how many frequent flyer miles are likely to be needed to redeem tickets in various regions of the country and the world, NBC News reported. And that award rate can be adjusted dynamically for any given flight.
This approach to rewards ticket prices represents merely the latest change in the airline’s lucrative frequent flyer program. Back in December, the carrier scrapped some redemption categories including MileSAAver and AAnytime awards. The new approach is called “Flight Awards.”
In an interview with NBC, American’s director of loyalty, Chris Isaac said the cost of tickets under the new program will be “just like cash tickets, these are going to float based on demand.”
To be clear, this change has been in the works for a few years. The airline first introduced dynamic pricing for award tickets back in 2019.
“This product has become the product that our members have gravitated to,” Isaac told NBC.
According to American Airline's data reported by NBC, the dynamic category of rewards redemption has largely required either the same number—or fewer miles—than awards in the airline’s traditional chart. This has been the case as much as 85 percent of the time over the last few years, according to the airline.
The downside of the new program approach is there’s less predictability for travelers who planned redemptions based on what was previously a static rewards chart. American’s new awards chart lists redemptions at “starting at” mileage levels.
In some cases, those starting at levels may be lower than previous MileSAAver levels. But other starting levels are higher. Given that the new program is dynamic, however, the chart will likely change frequently.
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