Noticed that Avis and AA changed their earning structure overnight… kind of a bummer for any business traveler who rents a day or so at a time on a company rate. Definitely a benefit for longer term renters or those who spend a higher dollar value on vacation or otherwise.

The below miles were counting for me as base miles which with 30-40 rentals a year was going to net me 20-25% of my loyalty points for EXP…. No longer sadly

Old structure:
- 500 miles per rental (no status)
- 750 per rental (Credit Card holder)
- 1000 per rental (gold, plat, pro)
- 1250 per rental (exp)

New structure:

• Earn 2 base miles per dollar spent – AAdvantage® members.
• Earn 3 base miles per dollar spent – Citi® / AAdvantage® cardmembers and AAdvantage® Aviator® Mastercard® cardmembers without AAdvantage® status.
• Earn 4 base miles per dollar spent –AAdvantage Platinum® and AAdvantage Gold® members.
• Earn 5 base miles per dollar spent – AAdvantage Platinum Pro®, AAdvantage Executive Platinum® members.

Disappointing for me… will probably go back to National or someone else as Avis car quality is sub-par where I rent. Also disappointing that the change just took place out of the blue, thanks Avis & AA haha

 

Wow this is crazy. It looks like it's posted on the Avis website: https://www.avis.com/en/business-pro...rican-airlines

I have a couple upcoming Avis reservations and this is a huge bummer.

 

And Budget (unsurprisingly) is following suit:

https://www.budget.com/en/programs/m.../aero-american

 

Perhaps, AA is raising the cost of miles sold to Avis/Budget and other vendors. I tried Avis a few times in the past but stayed with National crediting rewards back to free rental days.

 

Agreed, this was a nice little sweet spot for me as it was a 1000-1250 miles for effectively a 24 hour rental at around $60-70…

Now that earn will be cut down to almost 1/3 of that I plan to move to another brand after my upcoming rentals. The hassle with Avis and the age of their vehicles just isn’t worth it for a few hundred miles and LPs

Maybe if I have a weeklong vacation rental or something with highflier $ spend I’ll consider Avis but this will change my behavior the other way. Previously this was really the only reason I rented with Avis

 

I've heard nothing good about Avis and their crappy old cars. National is a great rental car company.

 

Thanks for flagging. Disappointing, this was a real sweet spot that shifted my spend to Avis. On short rentals I could get more miles per dollar (all LPs) with Avis than actually flying.

 

Do I need to book through AA to get the miles or just add my FFN to my reservation?

 

You don't need to book through AA, you can book directly with Avis or with your corporate TA, etc. Just make sure your AA# is attached to your Avis profile and the account is set to earn FF miles.

 

Thanks for the post, I wouldn't have known otherwise. I stick with National for the Exec Elite perks, but occasionally I have cheated with Avis or Budget for the 1250 miles. No more.

 

I had a budget reservation from 9/24-9/27. Do you know how long it usually takes for Budget to post the LPs in customer's AAdvantage account?

 

Wow major blow, roughly 25% of the points now for my typical weekly rentals. (1-2 corporate rentals per week).

American is certainly pushing me away with the new Loyalty Point scheme. Flying and Avis rentals requires a huge amount of spend.

 

My last Avis rental was a 3 day rental with a base rate of $250 - so exactly the same earnings in the old structure as the new in that example.

Aside from that one example - pretty inconsequential change IMO, car rentals are in the noise in terms of the easiest/best ways to earn LPs.

 

$83 base rate a day? Sounds like a pickup or a standard elite SUV? I thought people went with Avis because they are cheap.

 

My points generally post from Avis in roughly 1-2 weeks… it used to be right at a week on the dot but recently it’s been a little more variable