It’s not Friday the 13th, but it felt like it. When I woke up this morning, I had an email in my inbox with rather bad news. American Airlines has done something terrible. All of it came out of the blue and with no warning. I don’t understand why they did that!
So, what happened?
An email from AwardWallet, a website that lets you track all your loyalty programs, alerted me that American Airlines has forced AwardWallet to stop tracking users’ frequent flyer accounts at American Airlines.
Therefore, AwardWallet has removed American Airlines immediately from its website. Everyone who was tracking their AAdvantage account on AwardWallet will see that the account is not listed anymore in their profile and got deleted completely.
In AwardWallet you can track it somewhat manually by clicking “Add Award Program to Track” in the left sidebar and then on top selecting “Manually Track Award Program”. It won’t list anymore under “Automatically Track Award Program”, where you still can find Delta, United, and Southwest. American Airlines is now joining these airlines. All of these three airlines have forced AwardWallet to stop tracking users’ accounts on the respective airlines’ websites. None of them got access back to track automatically without any extra steps.
If you think this is unfair, sign the petition at change.org to reinstate access to AwardWallet and the option to track your account. I already signed, so please join us. Unfortunately, I have low hopes of getting access to our accounts back.
There is always hope…
Another way to track your balances across multiple loyalty accounts would be a spreadsheet. You could create your own version, and nobody could stop you to do so, not even American Airlines. It’s not convenient, as you have to update your balances manually, but you can add formulas that give you an option to remind you if and when miles would expire across different loyalty programs.
It’s really sad that American Airlines is going that route and preventing AwardWallet from updating accounts. It hit me hard, as American Airlines is my go-to airline as well as one of my favorite airlines so far. I know, many people hate American, but they always treated me fair, and I had good experiences.
What are your thoughts? Have you used AwardWallet before?
Peter has a passion for Traveling, Photography, and Geocaching. These are the best ingredients for amazing adventures all over the globe. “Traveling is fun, no matter if you stay in a luxury hotel or travel like a backpacker.” Peter shares his experiences on his Blog www.gatetoadventures.com
Some of Peter’s photos are published on corporate websites, in-flight magazines, travel guides, and much more.
