Keep Your American Airlines AAvantage Miles from Expiring and Also Earn 3,000 Miles for only $12

Update: When this article was written originally the offer was for 1,500 miles. But now there is a promotion rate for 3,000 miles available. I would act quickly as it may not last long.

I received an email about a month ago saying my American AAdvantage Miles were about to expire. I did not have any American Airlines flight plans through the date of expiration. Even then, I normally credit my flights to Alaska Air due to having status with them which earns me more miles per flight.

AAdvantage miles expire after 18 months of inactivity 

Interesting enough, the email American had many ways to reset your miles expiration clock.

Here is the list:

via AA.com email

So what is the cheapest way to keep your miles?

I head to the AAdvantage Shopping mall and planned to make a $1 purchase on any of the offers. That would have worked without issue but I decided to see what the best offers were.

I see this offer from The Economist

via aadvantageeshopping.com

Even the terms say your account must be active for 60 days but the promotional price last 12 weeks which covers that and more.

The trick here is to subscribe and cancel auto renewal

To do this I simply emailed my confirmation email to customerhelp@economist.com and requesting them to turn off auto-renewal.

Keep in mind you need to allow 30 days for your points to post. 

 aadvantageeshopping.com says,

“Most miles post with a pending state within one week and are confirmed within two weeks from the transaction date. Some exceptions apply - please allow up to 30 days for miles to post in a pending state.” 

You just earned 1,500 (Update: 3,000 now) miles, saved your existing points and got a subscription to The Economist for $12.

 AA miles are roughly worth 1.4 cents. Therefore 1,500 AA miles are worth around $21 according to our analysis. Or 3,000 miles is worth $42!

Way to go! You are 40% of the way there to book a Select Saver flight. (7,500 AA Miles)