In May 2022, the Air Canada Aeroplan program introduced a creative long term transfer bonus in partnership with Chase. Initially this was only supposed to be valid through the end of 2023, but this has now been extended indefinitely, which is awesome news.
In this post:
Aeroplan Card 10% Chase Ultimate Rewards transfer bonus
The Aeroplan® Credit Card (review) in the United States is a lucrative product that offers a variety of perks. One of the unique features of this card is intended to recognize those who have the Aeroplan Card in addition to a card earning Chase Ultimate Rewards points.
Those with the Aeroplan Credit Card can get a 10% bonus when they transfer Chase Ultimate Rewards points to Aeroplan:
- This applies when transferring 50,000 or more Chase Ultimate Rewards points in one transaction
- You can get a maximum of 25,000 bonus points per year this way, which you’d unlock after transferring 250,000 points in one transaction
- The 10% bonus points will post separately (the initial points generally transfer instantly) — the bonus points should post within 72 hours of the original transfer, but it can take up to seven days
- This offer is valid on an ongoing basis, with no expiration date (previously this was going to end as of December 31, 2023)
- This can be stacked with any transfer bonuses that Chase Ultimate Rewards is offering to Air Canada Aeroplan
This is a brilliant offer on Aeroplan’s part
The people behind Aeroplan are really smart, and they understand how savvy consumers think. In general, I always recommend earning transferable points currencies for your credit card spending, rather than points with an individual airline or hotel loyalty program (there are of course exceptions).
So the real question to ask is why someone should pick up something like the Aeroplan® Credit Card (review) when they could instead get the Chase Sapphire Reserve® Card (review). The answer usually comes down to one of two things:
- The card has to offer compelling rewards for spending money on the card, above and beyond the bonus categories offered by other cards
- The card has to offer perks just for being a cardmember, which more than justify the annual fee
If you’d otherwise transfer Chase points to Aeroplan, this promotion alone would potentially more than justify the $95 annual fee on the card, not even factoring in all the other benefits.
Bottom line
Those with the Aeroplan® Credit Card can receive a 10% bonus when transferring Chase Ultimate Rewards points to Aeroplan. This is valid when transferring at least 50,000 points in one transaction, and you can receive up to 25,000 bonus points annually this way. There’s no end date to this offer, so this should be valid in 2024 and beyond.
This is a well thought out promotion — it creates an incentive for those with Chase Ultimate Rewards cards to pick up the Aeroplan Card, when something like this can otherwise usually be a hard sell.
What do you make of this Aeroplan transfer bonus?
Still no free checked bags on Air Canada after initial status expires. It takes $15k in spend to get silver status which includes a free bag. I'm stuck with this card because of a hard to use 50k discount certificate originally offered, given that partner availability is now mostly blocked. Well played, Air Canada. Thinking of taking the L and dumping it at renewal.
One would never want to fly on Air Canada itself. So, Air Canada points are about partner awards. In the past, access to partner premium cabin inventory was not a problem. But, we've all seen that this is changing (not with just Air Canada). Partners have become tight-fisted with premium cabin inventory. So, if Air Canada points are only about partner awards, one must reassess the utility of this point currency.
I’m based near SFO. Their redemptions from here are absolutely dreadful. When I search for awards to Europe they hardly ever show availability on LH, LX, TP, US or SK but will offer me an itinerary with a double connection in YYZ and YUL for 60,000 points each way in the economy,
@rrapynot: I'm also based in SFO and that's exactly the experience I've encountered. I keep hearing reports from others about great partner awards but that doesn't seem to be available for flights form/to SFO:-(
SFO inbound/outbound awards on AC and its partners are indeed pretty rare. Makes me want to unload this card. I did successfully use that 50,000 mile discount on an LH flight, but it was DTW-FRA and CPH-YUL (nothing even remotely tempting was ever available from SFO or LAX, my two most frequent airports). AC runs tiny planes from SFO to YUL, YVR, and perhaps this works well for them, just not for me. They have...
SFO inbound/outbound awards on AC and its partners are indeed pretty rare. Makes me want to unload this card. I did successfully use that 50,000 mile discount on an LH flight, but it was DTW-FRA and CPH-YUL (nothing even remotely tempting was ever available from SFO or LAX, my two most frequent airports). AC runs tiny planes from SFO to YUL, YVR, and perhaps this works well for them, just not for me. They have to provide partner awards here or just write off the California card market....
Smart move to pitch their card. I’ll be happy to see this in my account on top of the current 20% transfer bonus. I just wish they’d fix that LH group issue so that I don’t have to call in every time.
Maybe they will restore ANA J awards from North America to Japan that can be found on other Star Alliance carrier programs such as MileagePlus.
What about the 1.25 towards a travel charge are they extending it?