Bilt Rewards Losing American Airlines as a Transfer Partner
There is some unfortunate news today out of the points and miles world as Bilt is losing one of its unique transfer partners. American Airlines and Bilt are breaking up.
As first reported by View From the Wing, American will no longer be a transfer partner of Bilt sometime in June.
Is This a Big Deal?
The only way to get American Airlines miles from a credit card partner is to transfer them from Bilt. There was a time a few years ago you could transfer Citi points to American but that was short lived. You can transfer Delta SkyMiles from American Express and United miles from Chase. So with the Bilt transfer ending, there will be no way to get American Airlines miles from a credit card other than using their co-branded card.
There are certainly better uses for your Bilt points when they have an amazing transfer bonus like they have had (and most likely will continue to have) on their Bilt Rent Day Promotions on the first of each month. Not having American as a partner will sting for some as there is no better way to earn AA miles with a credit card.
Bilt is Still an Amazing Card
Even with Bilt losing American Airlines as a transfer partner, it is still the best card out there for renters. The ability to earn points on your rent without having to pay a fee is incredible. Even if you don’t rent, it can make a lot of sense to pick it up as it is one of the best no annual fee cards out there for things like dining and travel which only get better on the first of the month when all of your points earned are doubled.
Speculative Transfers Before the End
Normally, I don’t recommend speculatively transferring credit card points to a partner if you don’t have a redemption in mind as they can always devalue their program without notice. By that I mean, we’ve seen numerous airlines over the years increase the number of miles needed for a flight without notice.
However, if you are sitting on a large pile of Bilt points and have been hoping to get a business or first class seat on American’s partner at Japan Airlines, there might be an argument to do so if you have no other good way of earning American miles.
On the flipside of that, why not wait for another great transfer bonus, like up to 150% more miles to Air France which we saw a few months ago. You’d get way more bang for your buck.
Wrapping Up
While it sucks that Bilt is losing American Airlines, I don’t think it is the end of the world. There are still a ton of other extremely useful partners in the Bilt ecosystem. If you rent, why don’t you already have this card?
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