American Express Membership Rewards Archives

Qantas 747's like this one return to SFO in December (Image: QANTAS)

Qantas has a new way for loyalty program members to earn points. (Image: QANTAS)

Partnerships with hotel chains have been a mainstay of airline loyalty programs for decades. And now a “sharing economy” enterprise that some see as a threat to the hotel business is slowly wading into the same pool.

That enterprise is Airbnb, which has been making a concerted effort in recent months to court business travelers with things like automatic links to corporate expense reporting systems and up-front information about the business traveler-friendliness of its member properties. And it has seen business traveler bookings surge as a result. The obvious next step was airline loyalty programs.

Qantas just announced a new tie-in with Airbnb that will let its customers earn points in its frequent flyer program when they book through the Qantas website (www.qantas.com). Participants can earn one Qantas point for every dollar they spend on Airbnb accommodations worldwide, if they book through the Qantas site.

“We know many of our customers are just as likely to arrange an Airbnb as they are to book a hotel, and we wanted to recognize and reward them for that,” said Qantas CEO Alan Joyce.

This modern two BR Victorian in San Francisco's Noe Valley is $300/nt (Image: Airbnb)

This modern two BR Victorian in San Francisco’s Noe Valley is $300/night (Image: Airbnb)

Qantas isn’t the first airline to do this. About a year ago, Virgin America entered into a similar partnership with Airbnb for bookings made via a link at the Virgin website. Members of Virgin’s Elevate program earn one point per dollar spent on Airbnb. Members who have never used Airbnb before and create an account get a one-time bonus of 1,500 Elevate points and a $20 Airbnb credit. Virgin’s tie-in with Airbnb is currently effective through October 2017.

Meanwhile, United just added Airbnb to the vendors listed on its MileagePlus X smartphone app. The new partnership allows users to rack up three MileagePlus miles per dollar spent at Airbnb. If you aren’t using MileagePlus X yet, here’s a link to get started.

And American Express has a tie-in with Airbnb that lets its Membership Rewards participants pay with program points for Airbnb bookings. Members must create an Airbnb profile with their American Express login.

Readers: Would you be more likely to book Airbnb if it was affiliated with your primary airline? Post comments below.

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Good news for folks with big stashes of American Express Membership Rewards who like to fly Virgin America: You can now convert Membership Rewards points into Virgin Elevate points to redeem online for any unsold seat on any Virgin flight, without blackouts or restrictions. Bad news is the conversion rate: 200 Membership Rewards points convert to just 100 Elevate points.

Virgin’s Elevate program is based on a “points per dollar” system, so the number of points needed to redeem for award travel vary based on price and seat availability. Virgin provided the following example in its news release: “…a flyer booking a roundtrip ticket from New York to L.A. with Virgin America at a cost of about $320, could redeem that flight for 15,399 Elevate points, equivalent to 30,798 Membership Rewards points, which is comparable to other airline programs that would require up to 50,000 miles.”

To be fair, I should point out that most other airline programs offer domestic award roundtrips for as few as 25,000 miles– but it’s getting increasingly difficult to find awards at that level.

Nonetheless, the new partnership is getting panned by bloggers who cover the points and miles game:

The Points Guy posted:

“…unfortunately the ratio is 100 Elevate = 200 Amex, so a disappointing 2:1 ratio. This is not a great deal because Elevate is a fixed value loyalty program, which mean you can redeem points for any flight and they are worth between 1.6 and 2.1 cents each towards airfare. So if you transfer Amex to Virgin America, you are valuing your Amex points at .8 and 1.05 cents a piece, which is very low. I conservatively value mine at 2 cents a piece and you can purchase points directly from Amex for 2.5 cents.”

Wandering Aramean said:

“The only slightly reasonable explanation for why one would transfer AmEx points into Elevate at these rates is if you’ve got almost enough for a reasonably high-value award already and you just need to top off the account. Otherwise it is quite a bad deal.”

However, Virgin America’s Patricia Condon begs to differ:

“We actually think this is a very rich reward program – given that Elevate points provide a much higher value than miles on a typical legacy airline program. You aren’t comparing apples to apples – as Elevate rewards apply in every cabin and fare class – with no blackout dates or restrictions. The value of our points are consistently worth twice as much (and sometimes more) than many legacy frequent flyer programs, given the reality of legacy airline redemption restrictions.” She also provided the following chart to help explain: