While sitting at home and not flying, many of us are noticing that our airline mileage balances aren’t growing as quickly as we’d like. Instead of flying 1,000’s of miles a month and earning valuable airline miles, we’re stuck at home earning no miles at all.
Thankfully, all hope is not lost. American Airlines, and many other airlines, actually make it quite easy to earn miles even when not flying. In fact, in many cases, you can actually earn miles for things that you’re already doing anyway. Even better, those miles are usually in addition to the miles or points you’re already earning through your credit card!
The AAdvantage Dining Program
One of the best ways to earn miles while staying home is by dining out. Personally, I love earning miles and points by dining out because it presents an incredible double dip opportunity. What I mean by this is that I can earn credit card points and airline miles through a single purchase. This is made possible by ordering take out from a participating Rewards Network merchant.
Since I primarily fly with American Airlines, when dining out I prefer to earn AAdvantage miles. So, before I order any food I first check the AAdvantage dining website for ideas. From the AAdvantage dining website you can easily search for nearby participating restaurants.
Once I find a restaurant that I like or want to try I’ll simply place my order directly from the merchant using a credit card registered to my account. As long as your credit card is registered with your AAdvantage Dining account, you’ll earn 3x miles for your purchase. If you place at least 11 orders annually, you’ll qualify for VIP Status and earn 5x AAdvantage miles for every dollar you spend.
That’s a fantastic return and even better, you still earn points from your credit card for the purchase. In my case, I earn 5x AAdvantage miles from the AAdvantage Dining Program and 5x Citi ThankYou points from my Citi Prestige Card for every $1 I spend!
The AAdvantage eShopping Program
Similar to the AAdvantage Dining program, you can also earn additional American Airlines by doing something you are probably already doing; Shopping!
If you are ever thinking of buying something online, I’d recommend first visiting the list of participating AAdvantage eShopping merchants. From this list, you can easily check to see if you can earn extra AAdvantage miles from any purchases you were already going to make.
For example, if I were already going to buy a new pair of Nike shoes, I could earn 6x miles for my purchase currently. I’d earn those miles, simply by clicking through the link and adding a cookie to my browser. Additionally, once that cookie is added, any additional purchases should count as well. However, I always like to click through the site to make sure the cookie is logged correctly.
Likewise, if I were going to purchase something like a pair of headphones, I’ll always begin my search with the eShopping portal. While searching through the eShopping portal, I might just find that I can earn miles by buying through Bose, instead of shopping on Amazon.
Overall, I find the returns from the eShopping portal average between 1 or 3x at stores I’m actually looking to buy from. Still, that’s at least $0.015 back on a purchase that I was going to make anyway and earn no miles.
Co-Branded AAdvantage Credit Cards
Lastly, the most obvious way. to earn extra American Airlines AAdvantage miles is through various co-branded credit cards. American Airlines currently partners with Citi and Barclays for their co-branded cards. What’s unique about this arrangement is that you can earn massive sign-up bonuses through each issuer.
Currently, you can earn 60,000 AAdvantage miles for signing up for the Barclays AAdvantage Aviator Red card and 50,000 miles from the Citi AAdvantage Platinum Select card. American does not prevent you from signing up and earning sign-up bonuses from both cards.
Furthermore, once you sign up for a co-branded card, you’ll earn miles for each purchase thereafter. With the Citi card, you’ll earn 2x miles at gas stations, restaurants, and American purchases and 1x miles on all other purchases. With the Barclay card, you’ll earn 2x miles on all American purchases and 1x miles on all other purchases.
Clearly the Citi AAdvantage Platinum Select card is the better option if you’re actually going to put any ongoing spend on a co-branded card. However, I’d personally advise against either for ongoing spend. Instead, I’d always recommend a card that earns flexible points currencies. Still, these cards present a great opportunity to earn a lot of miles very quickly through sign-up bonuses.
Final Thoughts
Overall, just because you’re stuck at home and not flying doesn’t mean you can’t earn airline miles. If you’re sitting at home dreaming about your next vacation, but notice that your miles balance is a bit low, there are plenty of options to earn additional miles.
As you can see, American makes it easy to earn miles from many activities that you’re already doing. Even better, when it comes to shopping and dining, you’ll earn those miles in addition to the points/miles you’re already earning on your credit card.
Personally, I’d recommend at least sining up for both the AAdvantage Dining Program and the eShopping portal. Both programs will help you earn miles for things you’re already spending money on. Sure those miles alone might not get you to Europe in Business Class, but they could help you get there! Even better, they’ll keep your miles from expiring as the activity counts as ongoing AAdvantage account activity.
